Why I beleive Dempsey should be highly rated

Dempsey looked good at times against Brennan I thought. I'm most impressed with his quick feet.

Watch from 6:30 onwards:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFxcNfXMA60[/ame]


It's the 10th round as well so evidently he could keep up the pace late in a fight. He does get hit often with the jab however which makes you question his chances against a great jabber, despite his effective use of head movement in other films.

He rushed in against Firpo, eager to finish the fight early, and got caught during the first few seconds of the fight. I think he fought in a daze from that point onwards giving and taking some huge punishment in a wild brawl where all skill was thrown out the window, to Firpo's advantage since he was obviously the less skilled of the two. Still better than a Peter McNeeley based on the film I've seen.

Firpo beats up an old Jess Willard:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqqAgFqJllQ[/ame]

5:30

Out of all the footage of Dempsey that I've watched, it is his sparring and boxing exhibitions that impress me the most. In the boxing ring he seemed to favour sheer aggression over the use of the boxing skills that he did possess (just read his books or watch his sparring films).

I do not think he looked that bad against Tunney, he displayed some impressive head movement at times, although Tunney made him ineffective with his tactics.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0tMBpsRgTU[/ame]

 

I think Dempsey generally looked good in fights.
His resume is open to debate.
I see some under-rate his wins, others might over-rate.

 

i've yet to see a dempsey fight were i've been impressed.

 

mendoza just aking are you only thinking of dempsey in this thread ?

 

This seems in part be adressed to me (good post by the way), so I'll answer it.

I agree Dempsey looks good, I just don't think he looks great. When some say "Yeah, his record has some big holes in it, but on film he looks as good as anybody, with a defense and attack similar to that of prime Tyson", I can't agree in conscience. I don't think the film that is valiable of him justifies such an elevated standing.

Louis, on the other hand, does look great even by today's standards. Just how he would fare against the Klits etc is always very hard to say for sure, but there's no doubt that he'd be the sharpest and most technically proficient puncher by some distance in the HW division today.

As to why Louis looks so much better on film, I can't say for sure if it's boxing that developed a lot during those years or just that he was plain better. Probably a combination of the two.

 

Louis was simply better and he was also a much more calm and patient boxer, less likely to go wild and make mistakes than Dempsey. A lot of the time Dempsey resorts to wild slugging to get his opponents out of there. It's much less aesthetically pleasing but it worked, against the opposition he fought atleast.


Whenever someone first looks at, for example, Roberto Duran's fights, they usually come out not being too impressed. However there was art to what he did which can only be learned by intensively studying his filmed fights and knowing his opposition.

With Dempsey, we don't quite have that option with only his title fights having been filmed, he displayed some of his furious best in pre-title performances against Fulton, Morris, Gunboat Smith, Levinsky, Brennan (the first time) of which we can only read about. The training films have revealed to me a lot more about Dempsey than his actual filmed professional bouts.

Not saying I rate him very highly because I don't. Usually I'll be the first one to call him overrated due to his lack of accomplishments compared to many other fighters, who not only took on the best opposition but chased them to prove their worth. Dempsey didn't exactly do that with Harry Wills.

 

:goodyes indeed.louis was beautiful to watch,his calm manner,short ripping punches and his machine gun jab and shuffle.
you're bang on about mr duran too.i didn't appreciate him years ago and didn't like him for his knee to groin tactics versus buchanan.
watching his head movement all these years later you can only admire him

:goodcompared to these 2 dempsey was a caveman.sorry:?

 

Yeah? Funny. If there's someone who impressed me right from the bat it's Duran. But there's still subtitlies to pick up on as you continue watching him. Just a magnificient fighter, even though I can't stand many of his fans.

 

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3wxHY3p9DiQ[/ame]


[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vnb-aVMUQ98[/ame]


Funnily enough Duran often looked like an actual caveman.

 

a bit primitive looking wasn't he:twisted:

 

so this is not going to turn into a vitali and wlad dont have to beat an ATG heavyweight to get into the top ten heavyweights arguement.

so youre saving that for your follow up thread ,if dempsey then why not the klits

 

I've got Dempsey in my top 10. But he's been slipping ever since his placement. It's his feverish and mythical legacy that keeps him hanging on really. I feel bad continuously dropping him.

 

It's always been my hunch that those who speak less favourably of Dempsey are guilty of repeating ill-conceived ideas like he wasn't that skilled or he does not own any decent wins.

To both I think they're false accusations.

Good fighters like Fulton, Firpo, Brennan and Miske are downed played because the 20's was such a hot era, full of activity and talent.

Dempsey was a one-of-a-kind fighter. Check out the Tate sparring footage. Once two thirds in Dempsey demonstrates the kind of slipping and movement I can safely say I've never seen a man of that size do.