How good was Jack O'Halloran?

[ron4972]

Manuel Ramos's career is very interesting as well. Going into the Frazier fight, the guy was getting respect in the US and Latin America. A crackling puncher with hefty size, Ramos came up the hard way. Most of his early and middle career was fought in Mexico City and Los Angeles. My guess is that the promoters in each city were doing business with each other to turn Ramos into a star.

http://boxrec.com/en/boxer/8055

The first few years of Ramos's career were spotty. He a lost number of fights, and drew in others. But it looks to me as if Ramos was over-matched in that early period, being tossed in the ring with tough guys like Henry Clark and Joey Orbillo. Either way by 1966, Ramos had found himself, and began a 15 fight winning streak that made him a top draw in Mexico City and Los Angeles. Two of Ramos's KO victims were Archie Ray and James J. Woody. Ramos also won close decisions over top names Eddie Machen and Earnie Terrell. The Terrell bout, held in Mexico City, was controversial. But the nod went to the young Mexican power puncher, who was clearly building a big name by 1968. By the middle of that year, all the organizations and boxing magazines regarded Ramos as a legitimate top ten contender.

Losing a world title tiff to Joe Frazier in 1968-- by second round knockout -- was no shame. The boxing world was still intrigued by Ramos's power and scrappy fighting style. But later in the year, Ramos was KO'd by top ten contender George Chuvalo too. Like the Frazier bout, that fight took place in Madison Square Garden. The pair of KO losses cast a cloud over Ramos's status. Even so, the Los Angeles promoters were eager to clean up Ramos's record and groom him for another big time fight.

Ramos started 1969 by getting a close but good win over Tony Doyle, the skilled journeyman. Next up was an easier fight for Ramos, with stepping stone Jack O'Halloran, who was 17-5-2. The thinking was that the giant, hittable O'Halloran would provide an ample target for the tall, power punching Ramos to unload his bombs. After that, bigger and better things would be available for the Mexican KO artist.

But to everyone's surprise, Ramos was stopped in a shocking upset by O'Halloran. From this moment onward, Ramos himself was just a trial horse, shipped around the world to fight local favorites.

Biography
http://boxrec.com/media/index.php/Manuel_Ramos

[scorpio83]

I wish I could find a newspaper to find out what was O'Halloran's reach in the tale of the tape in one of his fights.

[Caractacus]

I don't think Jack O'Halloran was ever in an enough high profile fight in his career to have the "Tale of the Tape".
published in a newspaper at least.
But at age 26 yrs for the fight with Bugner in 1969, he weighed in at
" 17 st and 8 three-fourths lbs") = 246 and three-fourths lbs
BTW Who were his trainers and what gym did he train out of in Philadelphia and in California ?
was he ever a sparring partner to Joe Frazier ?

BTW check out this ring action photo and the look on Joe Bugners face .
(The BBC aired this fight but I think it may have been lost due to the "Great Wiping" of the BBC archives in the early 1970's)

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-boxin ... 99253.html

[ron4972]

I don't think Jack O'Halloran was ever in an enough high profile fight in his career to have the "Tale of the Tape".
published in a newspaper at least.
But at age 26 yrs for the fight with Bugner in 1969, he weighed in at
" 17 st and 8 three-fourths lbs") = 246 and three-fourths lbs
BTW Who were his trainers and what gym did he train out of in Philadelphia and in California ?
was he ever a sparring partner to Joe Frazier ?

BTW check out this ring action photo and the look on Joe Bugners face .
(The BBC aired this fight but I think it may have been lost due to the "Great Wiping" of the BBC archives in the early 1970's)

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-boxin ... 99253.html

I researched Bugner vs O'Halloran in the British newspapers, and Bugner was given favorable reviews by the UK writers. The fight itself was very rough, and Bugner is reputed to have won 5 rounds against 3 for Jack. Bugner entered the bout with a record of 14-1, all against local boxers who had been selected as confidence builders for Joe. This meant that O'Halloran (15-2-1), was Bugner's first "live" opponent. Normally the British media was very harsh with Bugner, but on this occasion, they were satisfied with Bugner's performance. O'Halloran put Bugner under heavy pressure, and swamped him with both hands. But the young, scrappy Bugner didn't buckle, and came back swinging at his larger opponent consistently. I trust the British write ups in their assessment of this fight.

I didn't see the film on the this fight. My description is based on what I remember reading in the British boxing articles from UK newspapers on microfilm.

[Caractacus]

It was after the O'Halloran bout that Bugner's manager Andy Smith got some investors to have him tour America
in June 1970
and learn some things from Muhammad Ali as a sparring partner.

I'm also impressed with Jack O'Halloran's physique back then.
He wasn't 250 lbs of bulky muscles but looked mostly made of cords of sinew despite his huge frame .
He must have trained by "old-school" methods ala Jim J. Jeffries or Rocky Marciano who had same type of physique.

[Caractacus]

you can see about 2 seconds of the rare Foreman vrs O'Halloran film footage here at about 16:25
In remembering watch the full footage it was a lot more competitive and O'Haloran even shoving Foreman backwards a couple times.
Even so Jack O'Halloran goes down swinging !

[Caractacus]

I was able to find out who trained Jack O'Halloran in the early part of his career.
A former middleweight boxer by the name of Marty Feldman.

https://www.philly.com/philly/obituarie ... punch.html

[Caractacus]

I wish I could find a newspaper to find out what was O'Halloran's reach in the tale of the tape in one of his fights.

I was also able to find out Jack O'Halloran's reach for the fight with Ron Lyle in Novemeber 1971.
It was

"83 and one-half inches"
( with 15 " fists)

-measured around the clenched fingers without the thumb,which Kalan told us how a fist was measured some time ago.

[Caractacus]

another interesting thing was Jack O'Hallorans football playing weight in 1965 was 285 lbs,
but after he got some backing by a syndicate of investors he spent six months in a gym
and dropped his weight down to 226 lbs but put some weight back on when he turned professional boxer.

[scorpio83]

I wish I could find a newspaper to find out what was O'Halloran's reach in the tale of the tape in one of his fights.

I was also able to find out Jack O'Halloran's reach for the fight with Ron Lyle in November 1971.
It was

"83 and one-half inches"
( with 15 " fists)

-measured around the clenched fingers without the thumb,which Kalan told us how a fist was measured some time ago.

Thanks for finding out about O'Halloran and I want to ask you if you found out from the newspapers website?

[Caractacus]

I actually read that in the biography book OFF THE ROPES The Ron Lyle Story,(page 117)
It stated that Ron Lyle had a 76 inch reach in the Ramos fight(and Ramos had a 76.5 inch reach)
and then it refered to an article that was in THE DENVER POST November 1972
when it talked about his fight with O'Halloran.
it wrote that O'Halloran had a 'a 27 lb and also a Seven and one-half reach advantage over Lyle,
(Lyle's listed weight was 217 lbs for the Ramos fight btw)
so I just did the math.

[Caractacus]

Check out this link to see a post fight photo from the Bugner vrs O'Halloran match.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/NICE-VINTAGE-O ... 1569880208

[scorpio83]

I actually read that in the biography book OFF THE ROPES The Ron Lyle Story,(page 117)
It stated that Ron Lyle had a 76 inch reach in the Ramos fight(and Ramos had a 76.5 inch reach)
and then it refered to an article that was in THE DENVER POST November 1972
when it talked about his fight with O'Halloran.
it wrote that O'Halloran had a 'a 27 lb and also a Seven and one-half reach advantage over Lyle,
(Lyle's listed weight was 217 lbs for the Ramos fight btw)
so I just did the math.

Thanks and I have the Ron Lyle book. Man, I forgot that the author wrote about O'Halloran's reach advantages over Lyle so I could calculate it.

[Caractacus]

Its odd that in Ken Norton's autobiography GOING THE DISTANCE,no mention of his "Barn Burner" fight with O'Halloran.
It looks like a whole year in Norton's boxing career was either lost in the manuscript or edited out to keep the pages down.
It just jumps right to Norton's fight with Henry Clark.

[m3304]

My brother & I were at the Garden when O'Halloran fought Foreman before Foreman became champ.
We also saw Foreman fight Peralta there which was a close fight so we were hoping O'Halloran might
do some damage. Foreman knocked out Jack. It was not a main event fight so when the main event
was about to begin my brother noticed O'Halloran sitting in the seats ready to watch the main event.
My brother said 'Hey look over there O'Halloran is in the front row watching, it's hard to recognize him
when he isn't horizontal"