Was John L Sullivan the most dominant of all the heavyweight champions in his prime?

I think the case can be made

John L Sullivan was an exceptional talent and it is fair to say that his prime coincided with perhaps the weakest period in the heavyweight divisions history.

Depending on when you regard Sullivan as becoming the world champion he defended the title 25 to 33 times!!!!

In either case the record has never been surpased.

He is also one of the few champions in any weight class to have knocked out over 100 oponents.

At his peak Sullivan was not only beating the best fighters available he was destroying them. Sullivan offered $ 1000 (a huge sum of money back then) for any fighter who could last four rounds with him and some who atempted usucesfully to win the money were regarded as being world class. Only Tug Wilson the British champion was able to claim the money and he did so by repeatedly going down without being hit. During the portion of his career that corresponds to his prime he could probably have beaten any two heavyweights in the world on the same night.

By the time Sullivan fought Jake Kilrain he was badly disipated by his years of riotous living and fighting the best challenger in the world. Many in the media thought that he could not turn the clock back and that Kilrain was heir aparent. Sullivan turning back the clock and defeateing Kilrain could be compared to Muhamad Ali defeating George Foreman in Zaire.

Sullivan is often criticised for not fighting Peter Jackson but Jackson did not come allong untill the tail end of Sullivans reign. Even if we asume that Jackson would have beaten him it would have been little diferent to him loosing to Corbett and would have left his record intact.

 

I am not certain but he was a two handed fighter before he broke his left arm making him dependant on the right hand Boston special.

He claimed to have used the left hook before Corbett did.

 

I think he should probably have fought George Godfrey and indeed he made two unsucesful atempts to do so.

Having said that I dont think that Godfrey was as good as Kilrain.

People see the Mitchel and Kilrain fights as being Sullivans signiture fights and they might be but they came relativley late in his career.

Sullivan had been regarded as the best fighter in the world since he beat Joe Goss in 1880. That is the best part of a decade before the fights with Mitchel and Kilrain.

I honestly think that Joe Louis's bum of the month club gave him a stifer test than the best heavyweights of this period gave Sullivan.

You are also right to observe that Sullivan was an interesting and complex character. He was an inteligent man and largley self taught in terms of boxing technique. He is known for his riotous behaviour outside the ring but he was a verry diferent person when he was sober to when he was drunk. He seems to have been courteous and generous towards his oponents for the most part. If he knocked a man out inside of four rounds he somtimes gave them the prize money he had put up if they lasted the distance when he thought they had put up a courageous fight.

Oh and his hobby was making cheese!

 

I will get back to you on that.

I will look through the newspaper archives and see when he started smashing up saloons.

 

Both are inluded.

It shouyld be noted however that Sullivans title claim was not universaly acepted untill he had beaten title claimants under both rulesets.

 

He fought four fights with bareknuckles including the fight with Pady Ryan which many people see as consolidating his claim as champion.

The convention early in Sullivans career was that all bouts except title bouts were fought under Queensbury Rules. Ryan and Sullivan both won the title in their first fight under London Prizering Rules.

It should be noted however that many Queensbury bouts employed skin tight leather gloves weighing only 2 oz so these fighters would have known how to punch with bare knuckles without damaging their hands.

Sullivan is realy the first gloved champion more than the last LPR champion.

 

He seems to have been hitting the bottle hard by 1885:

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