Was Jack Dempsey a harder puncher than Evander Holyfield

Semi-retired Willard wouldn't have lasted more than couple rounds taking all those flush shots with small gloves from Holyfield.

 

The question was who hit harder. Not who was the better heavyweight. There's plenty of heavyweights who hit harder than Holyfield yet couldn't hold a candle to him in terms of resume.

Miske was knocked out only once in a 105 fight career over a 10 year period and that was to Dempsey. Being the first time ever that he was even knocked down. The idea that Holyfield would absolutely wreck him in a sickening fashion is pretty ridiculous. Holyfield was nearly stopped by Burt Cooper. The Bobby Czyz, a fat blown up light heavyweight, managed to go 5 rounds with Holyfield before retiring in his corner because of his eyes burning. Prior to that he even gave a pretty decent account of himself matching Holyfield in punch output and landing over 1/3 of his own. Holyfield landed over half of his 322 punches and wasn't able to even knock Czyz down despite a mediocre 190 lbr being able to do it. 42 year old Larry Holmes went the whole 12 with Evander who only won because of his workrate.

Holyfield was a tough and strong fighter with a high workrate but he does not hit harder than Dempsey.

 

He quit. You don't rub your nose on the floor with your glove checking for blood if your not in good enough shape to continue, he waited to be counted out, he was actually smoking at the press conference before the fight, he did not take it serious in the slightest

 

Holyfield.

Dempsey never dropped/hurt guys nearly as good and durable as Mercer, Old Foreman or Bowe. Dempsey never stopped fighters as good and durable as Tyson, Douglas, Dokes Cooper or even DeLeon or Qawi.

Holyfield is a VERY underrated puncher. He hit harder than Dempsey.

 

That would mean Douglas was still conscious enough to asess damage to his face. I agree that a lot of the circumstances point to Douglas not taking the fight seriously. I dont see any real evidence pointing to the punch Holyfiled landed not being hard enough to stop Douglas

 

Look at what he took from Tyson and look how easy he went down with Holy..He was looking at his glove, focusing to see whether it was bleeding or not in the Holy fight, not preparing to get ready for battle again, he wouldn't of lost the fight there at that moment if he had his Tokyo head on

 

Theres nothing wrong with you said here. I agree wholeheartedly. But my point is that Holyfield still took out this unfocused, fat version of Douglas with one shot. If I had to pick, my guess is Dempsey is the harder puncher. But there is still evidence pointing to Holyfield having a good punch, solid knockout power, on him

 

Holyfield was letting off solid shots against Foreman and did little more than shake him a bit. Never was there a point in the fight where Foreman was seriously hurt and on the verge of knockout.

Mercer willingly took a knee after a solid left hook but wasn't close to being knocked out. Wasn't the same as actually knocking a guy down.

I don't think anyone would rationally categorize Bert Cooper as a durable fighter. He was stopped 16 times. Almost every time against the best he faced. A durable fighter is someone who is hard to knock out. Douglas had been stopped on 3 separate occasions prior to Holyfield and was almost counted out against Tyson. Dokes was starched prior to the Holyfield fight against Coetzee who was a B level fighter from the 80s that lost more than he won against the best he fought. DeLeon had been stopped twice prior to fighting Holyfield and would go on to get stopped plenty.

 

Dempsey didn't drop/hurt people period.

If he had somebody in trouble, they were gone very quickly.

If he was landing much of anything on them, they were in trouble very quickly.

Decent chin, good chin, best chin in the business, it made no difference.

That is the difference.

 

He literally had him all over the place 3 times.

So he was hurt and wanted a break? Sounds good enough to me.

The punches he took in his fight with Mercer prove he had an excellent chin. I won't be told otherwise.

Douglas was tough guy. He wasn't counted out by Tyson, he got up and beat him. He proved his chin in that fight. Dokes was more of the 'good', rather than 'durable', but he was tough too, he took bombs of Weaver and obviously went the distance. Same with DeLeon, more good than durable.

Anyway, take all of them away, and he's still dropped and stopped Tyson and Bowe, which is far more than what Dempsey ever did.

 

I actually think that Gibbons and Miske would do quite well against Evander. They wouldn't beat him of course, but why do you think they were so bad? Gibbons was all-time great fighter.

 

Well, Miske was very durable and Dempsey stopped him. Brennan was stopped only 4 times in long career, twice by Jack. Morris was big and tough, Dempsey also stopped him. Then there are infamous Willard and Firpo who were big and durable, despite their flaws.

On top of that, most of these fighters were stopped in quick and brutal fashion. Evander rarely stopped someone quickly. I'm all for Holyfield>Dempsey as a fighter, but I wouldn't put him over Jack as a puncher.

 

That's exaggerating it a bit. Foreman was a bit shook but he wasn't close to being knocked out.

You have pretty low standards.

That's extremely unreasonable then. He was stopped in exactly 1/4 of all fights he fought. Knocked out by Bowe, Foreman, Jefferson, Luis Ortiz, and Carl Davis in 2 rounds. Also stopped by Carl Williams, Michael Moorer, Corrie Sanders, and Larry Donald. What's worse is that's only half of the guys he was stopped by. Everyone that was a higher level than a tomato can knocked this dude out or beat him.

I said he was almost counted out which is a fact. How good those guys were isn't really the focus here.

How does that make Holyfield the harder puncher? Ali stopped Foreman and Frazier would you say he hits harder than Earnie Shavers? Those two names are better than anyone Shavers knocked out.

Jack Sharkey said a past prime Dempsey hit harder than prime Joe Louis. Would you mean to assert that Ali hits harder than Louis? Foreman compared Holyfield's power to the same as Ali. Everyone on this thread that is saying Holyfield hit harder than Dempsey is saying that Ali hit harder than Louis whether they realize it or not.

 

I admittedly don't know as much about Dempsey as you but I don't think the bolded is true. Willard was in trouble in the first round, having been dropped 6 times, yet was stopped AFTER the 3rd round.

 

I thought Holy had respectable power, could hit hard enough mate, but more wear you down power combined with good work rate