Would Ingemar Johansson have have won the title

If McCall had totally forgotten about defense and tried for a quick KO the same way as Machen, he'd at least get knocked down. Because no matter how good a chin is, if you don't think about defense at all, and come forward with head held straight up, no movement, no rolling, you will get timed and hit flush to the chin with punch you not prepared to. Against Liston Machen didn't forget about defense. Same as vs Frazier (who was never a KO puncher anyway).

The thing is... if you have seen fighters who make a pro debut without an amateur career, the way how awkward their punches often are, you get an idea of what Johansson's jab looked like. I'm not kidding or exaggerating when I say it was half chopping-punch half-push.

I'm talking about opposition.

Which of the better fighters Hart faced would Johansson beat?

 

Johansson was a smart strategical kind of guy. He didn't have a very broad variety of assets, but he knew just how to make the best use of the ones he did possess. Watch how, in the first Patterson fight, he holds back with the right hand and sticks almost entirely to the left, with only the very rare light right thrown in there, until Patterson isn't being cautious about it anymore(Patterson himself later recounted how he'd become convinced that Johansson's right hand was only a media invention), then takes him by surprise at the start of the third round and seals the win. He knew how to play possum, draw openings, and lull people into complacency quite effectively, and could execute a gameplan flawlessly.
His boxing is ugly and has holes in it, but he is economical, he keeps a pretty tight guard, and although his jab is obviously not a forceful or commanding punch, it serves him well as a measuring stick/pacemaker. The man was an Oympic finalist, dominant European champion, and world heavyweight champion to boot. He absolutely mopped the floor with the world's top two heavyweights back-to-back. Now, from the conversations I've had with you in the past, I get the impression that you think there were pretty much no competent boxers in history until the last 10 years or so, but surely you have to admit that he undeniably showed himself to be one of the absolute elite fighters of his own era, if nothing else.

 

I'm not sure I understand what you are saying. Have you confused some names here?

Both Machen and Patterson were overconfident and not really familiar with Johansson's style. European fighters who have seen him prior to facing him, had more success vs him than Machen or Patterson 1st time, even though they are light years behind these two skillwise or ring-generalship-wise.

Ruiz split three fights with Holyfield who was just coming off two Lewis fights and would go on to beat Hasim Rahman. Johnson, Rahman, Oquendo were contenders. He got robbed vs Valuev, and lost a controversial decision to Chagaev. That's a lot more than what Johansson achieved in his career.

 

Once again, Johansson is too harshly under rated by you. Machen went 10 rounds with Liston and was never again blown out in his career like he was against the Swede. No one is saying that he's an elite fighter, or even a very good one because he WAS so limited, but he was very good within his limitations, and had a certain cleverness in lulling his opponents, particularly his two most celebrated opponents to sleep before suddenly springing that right of his. A fighter like Earnie Shavers may have had prodigious power in that right hand of his, but he was nowhere near as capable as Ingo in delivering, or springing the trap on his opponents as Johansson. Another fighter that had power, and an effective way of using it, again with a right hand, was Max Schmeling. Ingo has to be given credit for that at least. His jab was not classically beautiful as an Ali, Holmes, or Liston, but what it was used for, was to find the range, and serve to hypnotize an opponent into forgetting about the "Toonder and Lightning" right. Ingo's peak was past when the secret of the right was found out, and after Patterson nearly decapitated him in their 1960 rematch. Ingo was never the same again after that punch. But before that, he was quite good at using what little he had in his game and I maintain that the ko of Machen was as devastating a performance as I've ever seen, and no excuses about it either, as Machen was a tough nut for anyone to crack, as Liston and Frazier would find out. There's a subtle middle ground of criticism regarding Ingemar Johansson and his place among the heavyweight champions and that means being realistic and not placing him at or near the top, and also not classing at the bottom either with the examples you mentioned. And by the way, 1958-59 Ingemar Johansson blows away John Ruiz in a mismatch equal to the Tua disaster, and I give Ruiz alot of credit for what he's accomplished in his career, and cut him far more slack than most people do.

 

You are calling that smartness? I'm calling that awareness of one's poor handspeed and average timing and thus not wasting much energy trying to throw a punch that you know you would miss from distance. That's a very common one-dimensional tactics of many big, but primitive punchers.

People who knew about his right hand, had no problems whatsoever with it, making it completely useless, and making him look as bad fighter and ring-general as he actually was.

That's a usual European style of defense. If you have seen such fighters against actual skillful boxers, you'd be aware of how easily penetratable it is.

It's because he needs to show at least some activity, he doesn't want to get disqualified for not fighting again. So no choice but to use whatever poor punch he has. He's not measuring anything up, he just paws with it to keep himself busy, is all.

Peter Rademaher was a good amateur too. Dominant European champion? You mean Cavicchi, Cooper and Erskine show dominance? European heavyweight competition was extremely poor during that time, where guys like fat awkward Weiland or "new Paulo Uzcudun" Urtain could become titlists. Johansson claiming the world title for one fight was a fluke, and a disgrace to heavyweight history.

What are you talking about? Do I need to post my All-Time P4P Top 10 again, so you can count how many modern fighters in it, or I need to name my favorite fighters, like Joe Gans, Benny Leonard, Barney Ross, Kid Gavilan, Jim Jeffries, Ted Lewis, Joey Giardello, etc etc?

 

Overconfident fighters sometimes do silly things. There were plenty of upsets of that kind in history. Fights like Al McCoy KO1 George Chip, Al Singer KO1 Sammy Mandell, Al Davis KO1 Bob Montgomery, Young Corbett KO2 Terry McGovern, Terry McGovern KO1 Pedlar Palmer, Michael Nunn KO1 Sumbu Kalambay, Antonio Tarver KO2 Roy Jones Jr, etc.

That'll have him have better opposition than Johansson, something I have said from the very beginning.

I'd like you to voice your picks.

 

I will go a step further and say that his right hand may well have been a bit better than Louis'. Of course there are all sorts of right hands: right hands that come from counter punching positions and often via traps (Schmeling, Walcott), 'normal' right hands (Holmes, Lewis, Louis), unorthodox, hard to predict right hands (Marciano, Tyson) and the unpredictable and hard to see ones, like Johansson and recently W. Klitschko.

Johansson was not the complete package, but there's no denying in the effectiveness of what he did had, and how he used it.

 

I might be harsh on him, because I really think his IBHOF induction was quite possibly the worst choice of all they have made. But my harshness is based on careful watching of 6 his fights + 1 sparring, plus reading of some contemporary sources. I guess some people will defend even Joe Grim if I called him a completely terrible fighter, and start attributing him with skills he never had.

That only shows overconfidence of both Machen himself and of his trainer (which is a weird thing, as Al Silvani was a great trainer coming out of Stillman's).

Level of "cleverness" of such tactics is very low. It is used by most one-handed punchers with medium-to-low aggressiveness.

Shavers' right hand was very well known, and thus it was more difficult task for him to trick an opponent and make him overconfident.

Schmeling's right hand was overrated. Joe Blackburn said about it very well in his interview.

You are trying to give meaning to one-dimensional primitiveness.

He was at peak for two fights against opponents who had little clue about his style and came very overconfident?

Ruiz has showed MUCH BETTER skills than Johansson ever showed. Give Ruiz a word about right hand, and there's only one way who's going to be the winner - John Ruiz. People call him primitive, well, had you watched Johansson more attentively, you will know what real primitiveness is.

 

What was Machen's usual style? What is my description of him having completely changed it for this particular fight, wrong in?

 

:nut

 

First, whatever you want to call it, it worked, did it not? Second, no, I haven't often seen this sort of strategy executed as well as Johansson did it. And third, it wasn't the only strategy he was capable of implementing.

Um, no, they didn't. His European opponents obviously knew about his right hand, and he still handily beat them, stopping most of them as well. Patterson obviously knew about it after the first fight, and he was still nearly knocked out by it- down twice in a round with the three-knockdown rule in effect, in fact- in their third fight.

I'm curious- if you think Johansson's boxing skills were below average, like those of a fighter just turning pro with no amateur experience, and that his right hand was "completely useless" against people who knew about it, how exactly do you think he did these things?

That's because he had good boxing skill.

Yes, how silly of me. He did only beat pretty much every name European heavyweight of that era.

It's becoming increasingly clear that you just think that pretty much every heavyweight era prior to 1990 was extremely poor.

Perhaps I should have been more specific to the heavyweight division. Regardless, you certainly do make your rounds on this forum by attempting to diminish the status of various old-time fighters, especially heavyweights. Countless times you condescendingly describe world-elite heavyweights from the 1910s through '70s as being incompetent and poor, and you seem to have little to say about the likes of most any heavyweight champ from Dempsey to Ali other than that they were overrated and not good at most anything you can think of.

 

Because people with good power are usually more known than Johansson was to Machen or Patterson?

And what was his other strategy?

Most of them - perhaps, but for a true puncher he had too many fights vs poor opposition that lasted the distance.

My original statements were separated, please don't put them together, ripping them out of context.

It could be made completely useless. From report about Brian London fight that lasted all 12 rounds: "He (Johansson) concentrated on his left jab to pile up points, and never landed his famous right hand."

The level of heavyweights in Europe was as "high" as some US state's championship. If you look through some Ring magazines of that time, they often printed European ratings, looking at it makes me laugh.

Ring magazine described Weiland in his fight vs Urtain the following way:
"Weiland had been decked in each of the first three heats and displayed about as much skill, mobility and science as an elephant learning to play the harp." Yet this "elephant" actually started to turn the fight around in the 5th and 6th rounds, slowing Urtain down and weakening him.

Do I need to put my all-time heavyweight Top 10 here and we will count how many of them fought in the last 10 years?

First, you are placing words (incompetent and poor) in my mouth which I didn't say. Second, if you paid attention to when I usually am criticizing those heavyweights, and how exactly, you will notice that I do that after someone else with pink-glasses on starts describing them as some kind of supermen, with no significant flaws, each and everyone as skillful as can possibly be for their abilities, cutting through all opposition like a hot knife through butter and never having a slightest problem in doing so. Which I, of course, cannot ignore, as such things often contradict facts.