Middleweights vs heavyweights...

[raylawpc]

Do you think Sharkey would have fought HW had their been good
money at MW and LHW ?

When Tom Sharkey fought there was no LH division, and he seldom weighed anywhere near the MW limit.

Beyond that, Sharkey was ripped for those days, without much - if any - body fat to speak of. He generally weighed between 180 and 185. I doubt he could have even gotten down to 175.

[Robinson]

Sharkey fought Corbett at 176lbs and McCoy at 173lbs. It is
safe to say he was much lighter earlier in his career and was
around that weight for several other fights.

[Robinson]

The first example of a highly skilled middleweight taking on a highly skilled HW that I'm aware is Bob Fitzsimmons...

Charley Mitchell's fights against Sullivan and Corbett pre-dated Fitz's win over Corbett.

MW's fighting HWs was quite common until the inception and acceptance of the LH division because the next step up from MW was HW.

Which is why I dont feel this thread is so far fetched.

John L, would you think that perhaps Sharkey was in his 160s when he
started out, as a younger man. According to boxrec he did fight at
173lbs against McCoy in 1899. So it is perhaps safe to assume that at
5'8 he was at a lighter weight earlier in his game.

Thanks

[The Great John L]

Without doing any research it's reasonable to assume that a few of his early fights may have been fought at or below 170, but this was an era without prior day weigh ins and supervised dehydration, and as ray pointed out there was very little excess weight on Sharkey.

[raylawpc]

Sharkey fought Corbett at 176lbs and McCoy at 173lbs. It is
safe to say he was much lighter earlier in his career and was
around that weight for several other fights.

The clippings that I have for the fights do not list any weights for Sharkey. It is possible that he got down to 173 for McCoy because, for that fight, Tommy Ryan trained him and Tommy was infamous for drying out fighters.

Ryan dried Jim Jeffries down to 205 for the first fight with Fitz, and Jeff's natural weight was about 215.

Keep in mind, too, that the middleweight limit in those days was 158. I don't think Sharkey could ever have made 158.

[harrygreb]

i like irenes post. nice one GI