Exposing the Myths

[Ambling Alp]

Thought it would be fun to address some boxing myths:

-John L. Sullivan never won a fights with gloves.
the truth is that Sullivan won many fights with gloves.

-Traditional weight classes.
The truth is that there really isn't that much tradition. The lighheavyweight division became the 8th weight class in 1903. In 1922 the Jr Welterweight class was born, with the Jr Lightweight soon to follow. Both fizzled out around 1933. So there were 8 weight classes until 1959 when the Junior Welter and Jr Lightweight classes came back. Since then many (way too many) have been added.

-Dempsey's fight in Tunney was his first with the neutral corner rule.
The truth is is that the rule was in effect in Dempsey's fight with Luis Firpo in 1923. In fact there is a photo of Dempsey waiting in the corner when Firpo is down.

-Max Baer "killed" Ernie Schaaf.
The truth is we really don't know. After Schaaf fought Baer, he had three more fights before the Carnera fight when he tragically died. What ultimately caused his death could happened in the Baer fight, but also could have happended (or pushed along) in any of the fights that he had after he fought Baer.


- Joe Louis need a knockout against Conn in their first fight.
The truth is that if Louis would have won the 13th, 14th, and 15th rounds he would have won the decision.

-Ken Norton couldn't take a good punch.
The truth is that Norton was only stopped twice until he was 35 years old. One of those stoppages was against Foreman. In 3 fights against Ali, one against Quarry, and a 15 round war against Holmes, Norton wasn't stopped or even knocked down.

- Ray Leonard won a lot of title fights because of "gift decisions"
The truth is that Leonard only won 2 title fights by decision in his career.

These are just a few that came to mnd. I'm sure there many others.

[pundit]

-Max Baer "killed" Ernie Schaaf.
The truth is we really don't know. After Schaaf fought Baer, he had three more fights before the Carnera fight when he tragically died. What ultimately caused his death could happened in the Baer fight, but also could have happended (or pushed along) in any of the fights that he had after he fought Baer.

The autopsy showed that Schaaf had entered the Carnera fight with acute meningitis. Hence it is actually very unlikley that Baer killed Schaaf. The myth had been bolstered by Baer himself, however, and his role in "the harder they fall".

[granberry]

"The truth is that Norton was only stopped twice until he was 35 years old. One of those stoppages was against Foreman. In 3 fights against Ali, one against Quarry, and a 15 round war against Holmes, Norton wasn't stopped or even knocked down."

All very true.

Glass chinned Norton fought a total of 39 rounds against Ali--the fighter who "knocked out" Liston with a single "punch" in the first round.

WHERE WAS the magic punch as Ali struggled with glass chinned Norton?

Ali struggled with Norton for a total of 39 rounds and still hasn't beaten Norton.

Quarry was a last-minute subsitute and was fat as a hog when he "fought" Norton. He hurt Norton early, and then ran completely out of gas.

Larry Holmes had a right hand like a wet noodle at the time he fought Norton.

Any championship level fighter would KO Norton in 1 or 2 rounds.

Norton also had a glass midsection.

Norton was knocked cold in 6 rounds by Joe Luis Garcia.

"Ray Leonard won a lot of title fights because of "gift decisions"
The truth is that Leonard only won 2 title fights by decision in his career."

How many phony stoppages did Leonard get credited with by stooge referees?

The ref stopped his fight with Benitez with 6 seconds left in the last round. That created a furor at the time.
The fight was in Vegas, and the bettings odds were for a KO by Leonard.
That got a lot of comment at the time.

How about the ref's work in the Kevin Howard fight?
Kevin Howard knocked Leonard flat on his back and the ref didn't stop the fight.
But later the stooge ref jumped in a stopped the fight when Howard was not down so Leonard could have one of his totally phony KO's on his record.
That was garbage.

When the ref stopped the first Hearns fight, Don Dunphy (with his thirty years of experience calling fights) said,

"They're stoping the fight. I don't believe it. Hearns was ahead on points."

The "decision" Leonard was awarded against Hagler was a joke.
You can't take a title by running away and holding on.

Unless your name is Leonard.

And of course Hearns knocked Leonard down twice in their second fight and they called it a "draw."
More garbage.

[BoxBuzz]

Ok you prefer the aggressive fighter. You don't like the Whitakers, Leonards, Ali's.

How about Willie Pep? Is he on your poison pen mailing list as well?

[Collins2000]

The truth is that there really isn't that much tradition. The lighheavyweight division became the 8th weight class in 1903. In 1922 the Jr Welterweight class was born, with the Jtr Lightweight soon to follow. Both fizzled out around 1933. So there were 8 weight classes until 1959 when the Junior Welter and Jr Lightweight classes came back. Since then many (way too many) have been added.

Huh?!!?!?! 14 of the 17 current weight divisions were standardized during the Walker Law of 1920.

You've mentioned this before.

After your extensive investigation, can you tell us who the 14 champs were in 1920.

[Jaclem]

..alpine ambler....good list. i always like to see the one about louis/conn corrected. for a while it almost got to the point that if conn had just stayed on his feet after the eighth round he would have won a unanimous decision.

[Collins2000]

Jr. Welterweight:Pinky Mitchell
Jr. Lightweight: Johnny Dundee
Jr. Featherweight: Jack "Kid" Wolfe
"Paperweight": Johnny Coulon

14 minus (standard 8) minus (4 given here) = 2.

Who were the other two?

[HomicideHenry]

Willie Pep= won a round without throwing a punch

Often heard this one, but never seen it ever proven.

=shrugs= who knows...

[dr_devious]

Larry Holmes had a right hand like a wet noodle at the time he fought Norton.

Any championship level fighter would KO Norton in 1 or 2 rounds.

So your saying that Ali and Larry Holmes arent even championship level fighters Crankberry?

[Ezzard]

Ketchel's teeth in Johnson's glove.

The Pep one was discredited a while back. A guy posted on this site.

Recently there was a discussion on the Gans-McGovern fix/no fix... Anyone have and thoughts on that one?

[granberry]

Ketchel's teeth in Johnson's glove.

The Pep one was discredited a while back. A guy posted on this site.

Recently there was a discussion on the Gans-McGovern fix/no fix... Anyone have and thoughts on that one?

Ezzard--

What you know about Joe Gans you could write on the head of a pin---

and still have room for your name and address.

[granberry]

Willie Pep= won a round without throwing a punch

Often heard this one, but never seen it ever proven.

=shrugs= who knows...

Ali "won" a large number of rounds where he actually got the shit kicked out of him by Jimmy Young---

according to the stooges who did the "official" scoring of the fight and saved Ali's obviously lost title for him.

[RiddickBowe]

Willie Pep= won a round without throwing a punch

Often heard this one, but never seen it ever proven.

=shrugs= who knows...

When Pep died, in the Ring's story on his life it was mentioned that a reporter looked into this and newspaper accounts at the time talked about the round Pep supposedly won without throwing a punch was actually an action-filled round. It's been disproven, although you'll still hear people like Bert Sugar telling it on Ringside and other shows.

[I Feel Fine]

I only saw the fight once or twice, but people say that in Marciano-LaStarza II that Rocky couldn't get passed LaStarza's guard, so he started pounding LaStarza's arms, breaking them, and then knocking LaStarza out. Now, I don't know if LaStarza had any arm injuries or not, but it didn't seem to me watching the fight that Marciano ever made a consistent effort to go after LaStarza's arms, or that he ever noticably hit LaStarza on the arms. Could this be a myth, also?

[KOJOE90]

Harry Greb was born Harry Berg.

A myth.

[UpWithEvil]

Recently there was a discussion on the Gans-McGovern fix/no fix... Anyone have and thoughts on that one?

Reviewing the footage, it certainly looks like a dive to me.

[I Feel Fine]

Clay-Cooper 1963: the myth being that Clay got 2-5 minutes extra break because his gloves were changed after Dundee tore one of them. In reality the glove was already torn, but Dundee made it worse. He asked for new gloves, but it would have taken too long to get them so they went on with the gloves they had. Clay got less than 10 extra seconds, not 2-5 minutes. Dundee did use smelling salt on Clay, however, which was apparently illegal.

[granberry]

Clay-Cooper 1963: the myth being that Clay got 2-5 minutes extra break because his gloves were changed after Dundee tore one of them. In reality the glove was already torn, but Dundee made it worse. He asked for new gloves, but it would have taken too long to get them so they went on with the gloves they had. Clay got less than 10 extra seconds, not 2-5 minutes. Dundee did use smelling salt on Clay, however, which was apparently illegal.

All the "information" IFeel posts are regurgitations straight from the Ali Industry.

[granberry]

How about a "discussion" by the geniuses here about the Billy Fox-Jake LaMotta fight

and whether or not it was a fix.

[granberry]

Myth: Jimmy Young and Doug Jones Deserved the decisions against Ali
Fact: Both fights were close. Jones came on late, but Ali had a big enough early lead. Young did not deserve the decision; further study of tapes of Young's fights indicates that Jimmy Young does indeed suck. He should have lost to Foreman.

MYTH: That people like decagon who post on "boxing" sites know even a smidgeon about boxing.

FACT: They don't.

[HomicideHenry]

Always heard the Marciano-LaStarza second fight (with the broken chips of LaStarza's arms) as being true @ I Feel Fine, but whether that is true or not, can be argued---LaStarza did say that he did urinate blood after the fight due to Marciano's powerful body shots.

[I Feel Fine]

Clay-Cooper 1963: the myth being that Clay got 2-5 minutes extra break because his gloves were changed after Dundee tore one of them. In reality the glove was already torn, but Dundee made it worse. He asked for new gloves, but it would have taken too long to get them so they went on with the gloves they had. Clay got less than 10 extra seconds, not 2-5 minutes. Dundee did use smelling salt on Clay, however, which was apparently illegal.

All the "information" IFeel posts are regurgitations straight from the Ali Industry.

Well, I've actually seen the fight. You've probably jacked off to photos of Cooper landing the left hook on Clay, but you likely haven't seen the film if you believe Clay got 2-5 minutes break inbetween rounds. Either that or you're still going through cognitive dissonance that one of your many anti-Ali talking points is clear bullshit.

[I Feel Fine]

Always heard the Marciano-LaStarza second fight (with the broken chips of LaStarza's arms) as being true @ I Feel Fine, but whether that is true or not, can be argued---LaStarza did say that he did urinate blood after the fight due to Marciano's powerful body shots.

I have to watch the fight again but I'm pretty sure I didn't see any consistent shots landed on the arms. But yes, Marciano did land some good body shots, that I remember.

[Senya13]

Clay-Cooper 1963: the myth being that Clay got 2-5 minutes extra break because his gloves were changed after Dundee tore one of them. In reality the glove was already torn, but Dundee made it worse. He asked for new gloves, but it would have taken too long to get them so they went on with the gloves they had. Clay got less than 10 extra seconds, not 2-5 minutes. Dundee did use smelling salt on Clay, however, which was apparently illegal.

Actually they did get some additional time, according to Dundee in that Hauser book, about a minute or so. Also, the Ring sometime in the 1980's once quieried the participants of that fight again of what happened. According to them, the glove was replaced, one of the officials ringside (I don't remember who exactly) had a pair of new gloves, and they replaced the ripped glove with a new one.

[Ambling Alp]

The truth is that there really isn't that much tradition. The lighheavyweight division became the 8th weight class in 1903. In 1922 the Jr Welterweight class was born, with the Jtr Lightweight soon to follow. Both fizzled out around 1933. So there were 8 weight classes until 1959 when the Junior Welter and Jr Lightweight classes came back. Since then many (way too many) have been added.

Huh?!!?!?! 14 of the 17 current weight divisions were standardized during the Walker Law of 1920.

You've mentioned this before.

After your extensive investigation, can you tell us who the 14 champs were in 1920.

Decagon,
It doesn't seem that the Walker Law's creation of new divisions was taken too seriously.
The record books that I have don't aknowledge the Paperweight divison at all, and the Jr Featherweight/Superbantamweight division isn't recognized until 1976.

As mentioned the Jr Lightweight and the Jr Welterweight division were established in the early 1920's (Pinkie Mitchell and Johnny Dundee were the first champions) but died out in the early 1930's. It wasn't until 1959 that they were revived.