This is true. As great as he was, he sure got p!ssed off when Wepner introduced him to some good old rabbit punching though .....
1) Those sure looked like low blows to me 2) Even if Klompton is pushing an anti-Dempsey agenda, so what? He's basing it off film and facts. Post your own film and facts either proving him wrong or other fighters dirtier fighters than Dempsey. Fair, no?
I enjoyed the film and liked the kidney rabbit punch combo...he was always a rough hundry fighter and admitted to such..didn't take crap in the ring much like holy field..hecwanted to win...but he never losses a fight on a foul
Wladimir Klitschko and Jack Johnson might be the dirtiest, just going by how much clinching they did. Muhammad Ali wouldn't be too far behind with his grabbing, especially in his 1970s style. For Wlad and Johnson there really is no need for a highlight video, in many of their fights the clinching is almost constant.
No one aside fom myself has even addressed the issue of whether rabbit blow and kidney blows in the Gibbons fight (and perhaps other fights) were fouls at all. It seems Gibbons' manager might well have agreed to Dempsey's prefered straight Queensberry rules, where rabbit punches and kidney punches are not prohibited. I provided a newspaper excerpt where he says as much. There might be other sources that prove that wrong, but at the moment I'd question the factual accuracy of the video Klompton made.
I fully agree. The issue here is Crapton is posting a video of bouts that occurred 90 some years ago. Different time, different rules, different manner of rule interpretation. A good historian SHOULD know that one cannot look back upon 90 year old events through today's eyes. The one posters comment that Dempsey was never DQed is an important point to remember. Finally the ref of Dempsey Sharkey stated quite clearly that BOTH fighters hit low on occasion but none of the blows were intentional nor serious in nature. He further stated that at no time during the fight prior to the KO did Sharkey or Sharkeys corner complain of any low punches. He also stated unequivocally that the three punches prior to the ko blow WERE NOT LOW. Quite obviously if one looks were Sharkeys hip bones are located, draw a line between them, and look closely as to where they land they are not low punches. It's important to not judge the punches as to where they land on the trunks as this is irrelevant. Their location in relationship to Sharkeys hip bones are the deciding criteria as this was how a low blow was defined back in those days.
It would be much harder to find the cleanest heavyweight champ who had any enduring success. When I find it really troubling is when there is a house ref in cahoots with the dirty stuff, a la Daugherty in the Gibbons fight.
How many "house ref's", in how many fights in Dempsey's career and why was this house ref accepted by the opponent? There wasnt that much hoot and holler, there was some, about a house ref at the end of the day they accepted. Even now fighters in title fights can nix a ref or an official at that time it was the same thing. Being the champion gives you the power to pick and chooser, especially a fighters who puts asses in the seats. It wasnt such a big deal back then, sure there were complaints from the opponents but at the end of the day the champion gets what the champion wants. Maybe 90+ yrs people can look at and say it wasnt right, it wasnt fair but it wasnt illegal.
What, with the way this vid starts out, the first 7 seconds or so, I've got to do a reset of sorts...
Gibbons had something to say about it after the fight when Dempsey wasn't stopped from the low blows. But you are correct, the Champ gets to dictate the details. And if someone is getting dirty, at some point, the opponent needs to return the treatment.
Get good enough, and the dirty tactics just become part of the schtick people expect from you. Heck, that transcends heavyweight champs and filters right on down to the lighter weight guys. Still does. Salido, for example, is so well known for it that it's pretty much built into his persona now. To call a fight fairly would neuter the full Siri experience.
Do you think Kearns also negotiated to have low blows legal and to be able to stand over fallen opponents and hit them as they rose? LOL. Even if rabbit punches and kidney punches were legal or agreed upon by the participants it begs the question why Dempsey fought so hard to have rabbit punches disqualified in the Firpo fight but then used them himself so liberally later on. The spirit is still the same. For decades it was parroted over and over that there was no corner rule until Dempsey-Tunney 2 and that it had just been instituted and Dempsey was unfamiliar with it. Thats simply not true. Go pull the Queensberry rules, the rules the Toledo commission set down to paper in1918, the Walker law, etc. If you want to pretend Dempsey wasnt fighting dirty in those fights then I would suggest you submit yourself to the same low blows Sharkey was getting. LOL. Yeah, I kinda didnt think so. You chose one fight, the Dempsey Gibbons fight, where I think I used three clips of, maybe four, totally probably less than 30 seconds of a 10 minute video, as somehow proof my video is factually inaccurate based on a comment that Eddie Kane made. Which is fine, throw out the kidney punches and rabbit punches I showed for the Gibbons fight. You still have him spinning Gibbons into the ropes, pushing him through, hitting him while hes defenseless in them and continuing well after the referee is trying to break them. You also have a lot of articles talking about the low blows he threw in that fight as well which given the film wasnt feasible to include. You still have him rabbit punching Brennan to the canvas and standing over him (both illegal in NY at the time). You still have him standing over Willard (illegal at the time), hitting while hes rising and supported by the ropes ( both illegal at the time). You still have him standing over Firpo and hitting him as he rises (both illegal at the time). You still have him attempting to stand over Tunney (illegal at the time). You still have all of the low blows and head butts against Sharkey (illegal at the time). Like I said, maybe you can find me some addendums to the rules of the Walker Law, the Illinois Boxing Commission, and the Toledo Boxing Commission where all of that was legal. I'll be waiting here. Throw out rabbit punches and kidney blows anywhere you want and he was still dirty as ****.
More cherrypicked garbage. Dempsey had around 75-80 total bouts. How many times was he disqualified? Once again as typical and always you spin boxing tactics and rules from nearly 100 years ago through today's eyes. Any historian would be ashamed of themselves for such an obvious and purposeful misinterpretation of history. Did you write your "book" with similar historical distortions? This is what occurs when a salesman pretends to be a historian.
Its not spinning to say Dempsey violated the rules in place. Guys like you like to ***** about him being unfairly treated when he was actually forced to follow the rules against Tunney but hate hearing that he got away with a truckload of fouls throughout his career. Chickens coming home to roost.
