Teach me about Marvin Hart

Pretty sure i said none of those things.

The ref made clear before the fight he was gonna favour aggression. That is the context of the fight, both men knew the score. Johnson decided to counter and cruise which saw him land big shots but not as many as hart did.

Judging a fight on retrospective criteria ain't something i agree

Both knew the score, fought how they fought and hart got a close victory that divided opinion. Calling it a robbery with no footage and a poor grasp of the era seems a bit daft to me but each to their own eh?

 

:think...:yep

Well, we laughed at the fairy men too. :deal Funny walks. Not in a polio way but funny. Funny hah-hah. Not funny-peculiar. Not polio peculiar funny. But gay funny. We laughed at people with polio who were gay quite heartily. I must say.

We laughed at dead parrots as well, Flea. :blurp

 

:rofl

Pining for the fjords...

 

Ramirez was never puffed up , bloodied , battered or outclassed by Whitaker . Unless 1 reads d **** det u end yor laix taip

 

Python hit and miss for me actually :bart

Nudge nudge wink wink

 

go2agri wiz u on dis

 

Fights were not judged only on aggression that is false, but on Greggains promotions the emphasis was put on it.

Otherwise how would Johnson have won his previous fights?

Greggains was not a top referee, he never refereed a title fight ,and only once ref'd outside his residential state of California. Hs total experience in that capacity was 25 fights 15 of which were supporting 4 rounders, and quite a few were on his own promotions.

He refereed the first Jeffries Sharkey fight ,that was his most prominent bout and apart from the Johnson Hart fight, his officiating was for ham and egg scraps.


Jeffries, a week before the fight said in the event Hart won he would fight him if the public demanded it.
He also reiterated what he had stated many times, he would not defend his title against a black man under any circumstances.
A stance that Hart had taken, he had only come to California for the prospect of fighting Kid McCoy ,or Jack O Brien.
" I'm a southerner,and my folks would disown me if I fought you."

Hart was forced into the fight when Johnson turned up at his training camp and called him a coward to his face.
After he signed for the fight, Hart made a less than edifying speech. "I tell you right here that this c**n will have to go some to beat me, before the twentieth round is reached there will b a n****r prostrate on the canvas I have got the wallop to win".

Greggains did not say anything to Hart about being aggressive, but he made this public statement before the fight.
" I have notified Johnson that he must fight all the time or the fight will be called a no -contest".
Stacked deck?
McVey's manager offered Jeffries a guarantee to fight him he refused , as he refused to fight Johnson.

If he was so confident in his ability to beat them ,why not take the easy money, instead of defending against no hoper Jack Munroe, and losing money?

What 175lbs + highly rated guy in his prime did Jeffries test himself against?
In fact what highly rated guy in his prime did Jeffries beat?

A point to remember is that Johnson put on a round 20lbs of muscle after the Hart fight,a year after losing the decision to Hart Johnson only sclaed 185lbs for the Langford fight. Photos of Johnson squaring up to Hart show a slender, sinewy Johnson , more akin to a light heavyweight .

This content is protected

This content is protected

As expected, you have turned Magna's thread into an extended Jack Johnson knocking session.

 

Originally Posted by Mendoza
Johnson was a smart guy, and a good business man. This was a high stakes type of fight, with the winner increasing his chances of meeting Jeffries.

I find it hard to believe that Johnson, who knew very well how fights were judged in his day failed to give himself the best chance to win. The more logical conclusion he cloud not hurt Hart, and was outworked.

An interesting case study is why did Johnson lose to the likes of Griffin, Hart and Choysnki, but easily defeat Langford and McVey?

On paper Langford and Mcvey were better heavies than Choynski, Griffin or Hart. We need to examine how good McVey and Langford were when they meet Johnson. McVey he was a teenager in the first two matches and but 20 in the 3rd match. Langford according to Clay's book was only 20 years old, and just 156 pounds.

Yet when Johnson was matched with more seasoned fighters with ability who were not young, or in-experienced, he lost. I tend to think Choynski, Griffin, and Hart were better than most of Johnson's title opponents.

As champion ( 1908-1915 ) Johnson was never tested vs a highly rated 175+ pound guy in his prime, outside of Willard who knocked him out. But before he was champion he was tested vs highly rated guys in their prime or near prime, and lost three times.

Were Williard, Choynski, Griffin, Burns, and Hart the best fighters Johnson meet from 1901-1915? You could make a case they were.

So you are saying Johnson lost to a past their prime Choynski and Griffin? Perhaps, but keep in mind Choynski two years later in 1903 drew with Hart.

Sam McVey was too young ( 19 and 20 ) to rate as one of Johnson's best. In fact he quit for a year after losing to Martin, who had a glass jaw and could not take body punches.

Jeannette had a losing record when he first meet Johnson, so there's no way he would be among the best Johnson defeated.

 

Aggression factored in more toward scoring a fight in the 1900's. It has been discussed here and in Adam's book which you quoted.

Greggains likely had more experience than that. Much of the past fights are un-recorded. At any rate, being the 3rd man in the ring for Sharkey vs Jeffries means he was already a big time ref.

Partly false, he did give Griffin a 4 round match as champion, and I assure if Griffin somehow won via KO, he's the next lineal champion. What fighters say, and what they do what a big purse is up can differ.

Sharkey, Corbett, and Ruhlin come to mind.

Counter point, most of Johnson's best wins happened when we was under 190 pounds. If your game is speed and defense extra weight and muscle does not help that part of your game. Had Johnson been 190 vs O'Brien, perhaps he would have done better.

 

Choynski was fighting In Australia in the 1890's and against Corbett in SanFrancisco, he started losing to lesser lights by the 1900's while still capable of the occasional good performance by dent of the previously mentioned cutrness and wallop. No way was he prime when he beat Johnson.
Griffin was never that good so it doesn't really matter if he was prime or not. McVea is a different kettle of fish. He was one of boxings great prodegies, I can only think of Tyson and Patterson as better Heavyweights at 19/20. He did lose to Johnson and Martin but he had already defeated Martin, one of the top 5 Hw's at that time. He had also beaten Russel-fresh off a win over Griffin-and Kid Carter, then also a top notcher. His age is irrelevant, his ability at that time cannot be in doubt. Hart or Burns wouldn't beat him, Griffin or 1901 Choynski either. Martin who was splitting contests with Sam at that time had actually KO'ed Griffin in 1901 in 7 as well as beating Armstrong, Childs, Ferguson, Klondike, Russell etc. He was at his peak when Johnson beat him. He helped prepare Ruhlin for the Jeffries fight fand from reports (and if I remember correctly brief footage) appeared to outclass his boss.
Jeannette is more debateable but I wouldn't dwell too long on a "losing record" at that time, that's for Boxrecked people, I'd reckon. He had beaten Langford, Cole and Jeffords at that point and would beat McVea a few months later but if I were to drop one guy from the best that Johnson fought, it would be Joe.
Still leaves Hart, Burns, McVea, Martin and Willard for my money.

 

1. Why is it likely that Greggains had more experience?
2.Is it any more probable than the possibility that McVey, and Jeannette had more fights than are recorded ,which possibility you dismiss out of hand?
3.Greggains was not already a"big time ref ,"when he officiated for Jeffries and Sharkey, it was his second time as the third man.

4.Jeffries fought Griffin in a no decision 4 rounder in which he undertook to stop him or lose a $100 forfeit he did not stop him and lost the forfeit.
It was NOT a title fight, and has never been recognised as such.

"Griffin went down from a push in the first round and was knocked down twice by clean punches in the second. From then on he was in survival mode to claim the $100 forfeit. One report, prior to the start of the bout, described Griffin looking like a "famine sufferer". Attendance: 5,000".

5. Johnson himself said his best weight was the 208lbs he scaled for Jeffries. Your analogy makes as much sense as saying Ali's best wins were when he was under 200lbs .

6. Johnson would have done better against O Brien if he had taken the fight seriously , and actually trained for it, instead of going to a party the night before the fight.

Johnson knew there was no way in the world that O Brien could stop him, which was the only way he could win as it was a no decision fight , and so he didn't bother to train.

One observation
A year before he fought Johnson, Hart was the beneficiary of an outrageous decision against Sandy Ferguson.

"According to the New York Evening World, Sandy Ferguson was clearly robbed of a victory by the decision of referee Patsy Earl. "Ferguson outclassed his man as a boxer. He hit him when and where he pleased, and several times during the contest had Hart on "***** Street"." Ferguson decked Hart in the seventh, and in the 13th only the ropes saved Hart from going down again".
Ferguson fought Johnson 5 times and was made to look a complete fool against him.

This content is protected

This is the 5 minutes of bootleg footage from the second Jeffries v Sharkey fight, the last round was re-enacted almost a week later as the camera ran out of film.

 

Yeah if nothing else, Hart deserves credit for beating arguably the greatest hw of the pre Louis era.

They stepped in the ring knowing aggression was the main criteria and he certainly brought it by any report, for the full 20 rounds. Threw more, landed more and never stopped fighting. Maybe under a different rule he'd have fought more conservatively and sharp shooted a bit more but the fact remains in the fight he had, he did what he had to do.

Interestingly enough neither were considered in Jeffries class after that fight.

 

He may have thrown more, I don't think he landed more. Johnson was unmarked at the end. If Greggains had been the referee and sole judge in the Ali Chuvalo title fight, I think the crown would have changed hands. Aggression has to be effective to score points.

 

that's the thing though, had he been the ref, ali would have fought an aggressive fight and kicked the **** out of george.

effective aggression scores points today but we can't score on today's criteria.