Was Demspey's duck of Greb even more blatant than his duck of Wills?

McG,

Who came 2nd in that 1922 readers poll regarding challenger to Dempsey ?
(I'm suspecting Jess Willard)

 

New York Times---July 24, 1923

WILLS GETS A BIG OVATION---WILLARD PRACTICALLY IGNORED

There was a hint for Tex Rickard and Jack Kearns in the reception accorded Harry Wills on his arrival at the Yankee Stadium last night. The colored heavyweight was cheered every step of the way from the entrance in centre field to his seat near the ring. That the New York city boxing public at least thinks that Wills is the logical candidate for a chance at Dempsey's heavyweight championship is evident. Willard, on the other hand, who had aspirations in that direction until he met Firpo, was practically ignored. It is not hard to find out what the public is thinking if it is given a chance to express itself, and it showed what it thought of Wills last night, with Rickard and Kearns both there to hear.

 

TIME MAGAZINE--October 30, 1926 (on Dempsey)

"He has not been a popular champion. The 'slacker' talk helped make him disliked. It was abetted by many other things . . . above all the fact that he did not want to fight Negroe Harry Wills."

 

TIME MAGAZINE 8/17/1925

"Jack Dempsey was introduced from the ring at the opening of the Olympic Stadium in Los Angeles. Booing thundered from the topmost rim of the amphitheatre, mixed with a chant of 'Bring on Wills'. Dempsey turned the color of an embarressed orchid and crept back to his seat."

 

Good stuff, Old Fogey. :good
I'm not surprised by stuff dated 1924-'26, but it certainly appears that the boxing public were fully behind Wills before the "last year or two of Dempsey's reign" that I had claimed. I stand corrected.

 

TIME MAGAZINE 4-28-1923

"It is generally accepted opinion that Harry Wills is the only man in the game who can stand at Dempsey's level. There is vague talk of a fight between the two at the Polo Grounds on Labor Day."

NEW YORK TIMES July 14, 1923

Jack Johnson---"There are three persons in the world who can knock out Jack Dempsey. Firpo, Harry Wills, and Jack Johnson."

Check the New York Times archives from 1922 to 1926. They are literally filled with reports of offers of purses to Dempsey to fight Wills, starting with $350,000 from Harry Frazee on March 5, 1922. On January 5, 1923, Frazee offered $500,000. By May 18, 1926, the offers had reached $1,200,000.

 

That makes sense. Brennan gave Dempsey a hell of a fight in 1920.

This poll doesn't really do much to push the claim that there was significant public demand for Harry Greb though, considering this is THE PITTSBURGH POST, and he narrowly edges big Jess Willard in the votes and gets 55% of the amount of votes Brennan gets.

 

Well, it is not difficult to figure out that there probably was not that much interest in recycling Willard or Brennan.

As for Gibbons:

New York Times---July 1, 1923

GIBBONS RECORD NOT IMPRESSIVE

KNOCKOUT STRING SCORED OVER SECOND-RATERS---MEEHAN BEST KNOWN VICTIM

"While Gibbons' string of consecutive knockouts looks impressive on paper, it has failed to make the majority of big boxing men take him seriously. Most of his knockout triumphs were scored over second-raters and others very little known. He has never stopped an opponent classed as a topnotcher. His best effort was in knocking out Willie Meehan, but when Meehan fought Gibbons he was considered through as a high-class ring performer by virtually all the critics."

This article goes on to point out that Gibbons had blown his big chance in 1922 by losing decisively to Greb.

Apparently Dempsey fought Gibbons in Shelby, Montana because there was no way this fight could be sold to the New York Press.

As you can tell, the overall gist of this long article is that Gibbons had a very padded record and was "not taken seriously" by big boxing men. There is a paragraph in which the writer mentions that a small minority thought that Gibbons' cleverness gave him an outside chance of outpointing Dempsey.

It ends with this evaluation of Gibbons' opposition.

"He has faced Billy Miske, Bill Brennan, Bob Roper, Battling Levinsky, Harry Greb, and George Chip. In fact, these are the only men who stand out in the list of men he has met."

Interestingly, I don't think there is a modern record of Gibbons ever fighting Brennan.

 

I dont know how much stock we can put in these "purse offers". Anyone can say anything. A couple of years ago Murad Muhammad was offering Wladimir Klitschko $20 million to fight Evander Holyfield, but he'd obviously done his sums wrong. LOL. There's no doubt that Wills-Dempsey could generate the money but just because a promoter or a syndicate says they can put that fight on doesn't mean it's a can't-fail deal. Tex Rickard had the best record for big bonanza fights and it's likely he was a dead against the Wills fight. According to Dempsey he actually finalized a deal with Floyd Fitzsimmons to fight Wills, but the promoter didn't show him the money. I dont know if that's true, but these money considerations and promoter considerations are worth taking note of. Of course, we'll never know the full truth about behind-the-scenes stuff but we should all acknowledge it exists.