I suppose Peter Jackson and Jack Johnson were not real black fighters. This statement is silly. Like I said Dolt, older versions of the ring record book list them as KO wins for Jeffries. If you read the papers for research, you can see these names as reported wins. Not a shred of evidence you say? Very stupid of you, but certainly par for the course! Would you like a link that shows this? I think the real point of this thread is to point out the Jeffries, who was an active champion and pretty much fought the best out there had an easy title fight. So what. This does not change the fact that your god Jack Johnson flat out ducked the best 3-4 challengers out there while he was champ, and was in fact out boxed and floored by men under the light heavyweight limit. :hi:
I agree that Jeffries almost certainly never fought Martin. A lot of ink was spilled about a potential Jeffries Martin title fight, and a previous encounter would surely have been known about. I do however think that it is possible that Jeffries fought Childs, since both were regional names when the fight alegedly took place, and there was never realy any interest in matching Jeffries with Childs in a title fight. It is quite plausible that such a bout could have slipped under the radar.
One of the newspaper articles that reffers to the Jeffries Childs fight says that Jeffries KOd Childs in the second.
Unless of course Jeffries KOd Martin easily and they were trying to build up the gate and keep it a secret. :stir
If Jeffries kayoed both Martin and Childs, he would move up drastically on my all time list. Can anyone confirm this? This would mean Jeffries took on the elite black fighters of his era Jack Johnson, Denver Ed Martin, Frank Childs, Bob Armstrong, and Hank Griffin. VERY impressive.
I do not rate highly white fighters who ducked elite black fighters like Gene Tunney, Jack Dempsey, Tony Zale, John L Sullivan, etc Fighters who took on the black dynamite like Jake Lamotta, Joey Maxim, Jack Sharkey, Stanley Ketchel, Harry Greb...these fighters had balls! Looks like I might be able to add James J Jeffries to the bottom list..which means his rating goes up
I will stand by what I said. The Childs fight might have happened but the Martin fight almost certainly didn't. If Jeffries did beat Childs then he beat two of the three best black contenders who were around when he won the title e.g. Byers, Armstron and Childs.
I should have made it clear he was referring to his early times . The fact that Jack Finnegan should not have been anywhere near a title fight has been conclusively proven.Jack Johnson has nothing what so ever to do with his thread.:huh Yes show the link then we can demolish it.:good Do people still use the word dolt? I thought it went out with knave, varlet ,and poltroon? Do you live in the back woods ,or is it just that you are backward?
This just HAS to be a joke Jackson won the title from George Godfrey who was 35 years old in actual fact there was no title it was just how the fight was billed. If you think Jeffries win over a tubercular,alcoholic ,4 years retired, 37 years old Jackson has ANY merit,then Jack Johnson's two wins over a 35 years old Jeffries and an ancient Fitz are the two best wins ANY Heavyweight Champ has on his recordatsch
This is one area where Jeffries deserves some credit, to the extend as Mendoza always says (Oh OH i could be in trouble here), that he did what he needed against an ancient Peter Jackson who was a great but no longer was. Yes there are plenty of others at the time who probably could have beaten Jackson, but Jeffries still did the job quickly and decisively. Tell me, why were none of these great coloured fighters prepared or able to claim the coloured title before Jeffries defeated Jackson? Is it not possible that like everyone else of the time, they considered themselves not good enough or in the same class as the all time great Jackson. It wasnt until Jeffries KOd Jackson that they became able to legitimately claim a title. Jackson's loss was not that dissimilar to Sullivan's loss to corbett in that neither meant anything in relation to how a prime for prime great match up would have gone. Should Corbett receive zero credit as the world Champion for beating the inactive alcoholic Sullivan while not fighting Slavin, Jackson, Goddard and others?
The San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Bulletin both make refference to a fight between Jeffries and Childs when discussing his previous fights. Both newspapers are consistent in saying that the fight took place in Los Angeles and that Jeffries won by knockout in two rounds. Neiter article is a primary acount of the fight. So the evidence is compeling and tantalising but inconclusive.
I think this is farcical tbh.Jackson's last fight as the real " Peter Jackson". was against Frank Slavin,in 1892 this fight was in Covent Garden ,about half a mile from where I was last night ,watching Judy Collins.Jackson was 31 years old and allready a heavy drinker,after this bout he descended into alcoholism, his sparring partner,Con Riordan, stated in the Times that," Jackson is now a physical wreck", his hand shook with tremors .Unable to get the top white boxers to face him he had lost all heart for the game. Jackson never defended his coloured title and it lapsed, only to be revived to sell tickets in a contest involving Bob Armstrong ,whose only qualification to be fighting for it was, [like his opponent], the colour of his skin. Returning to the States Jackson had a meaningless 3 rounder with no hoper Denny Kelliher 11-15-12,he then retired .Three years later he had a no contest 6 rounds with a nobody light weight Gustav Wilkie 2-3-1and retired again.Three years later, bankrupt alcoholic,and tubercular , he was dragged out of retirement to face the up and cooming Jeffries.Jackson was 37 years old and had had 9 rounds of boxing in 6 years.He" fought" Jeffries in 1898 and died of T B less than 3 years later . If you want to extract some kudos for that "victory" ,by Jeffries , you must be as desperate as Mendozy. Corbett,[ who had consistanly ducked Jackson after their draw,]beat the unbeaten reigning heavyweight Champion in Sullivan ,with hindsight everyone could see Sullivan was no longer "John L" 4years inactivity and a dissipated life style had robbed him of his resilience and wind.If you read Corbett's account of their fight he admits that he caught the 34 year old Sullivan at the right time. To equate Jeffries win over Jackson's with that of Corbett's over Sullivan is a stretch imo. One was over an undefeated Champion was was slighty past it ,and was the overwhelming betting favourite,[even Corbett's father bet on him]. The other was akin to Burke and Hare, digging up the living dead. All this talk of a Jeffries/Childs match is highly unlikely imo ,two prominent fghters such as they would not have been denied plenty of press coverage . I do however, know a man who fought Childs twice , winning both, and knocking him out once.
Martin and Childs are reported wins in the papers. Of Course Jeffries beat Armstrong with a broken thumb. Armstrong could punch a bit. Odd Johnson himself never fought him.