Who has the most incomplete record on boxrec?

[Controversial]

There are obviously loads of incomplete records on here but which fighters have loads of bouts missing?

[Petu v.d. Pajm]

There are obviously loads of incomplete records on here but which fighters have loads of bouts missing?

1000's of them.

As an example - Billy Hensley (https://boxrec.com/en/proboxer/589483) had 3 fights listed before I managed to get hold of the archives of his hometown newspaper - now he has 33 and likely is still missing snother 20-30 fought in neighboring cities. For all I can deduct, Hensley's archrival Willie Belvin (https://boxrec.com/en/proboxer/764619) also likely fought 60-70 fights, but only 8 has been found so far.

There is loads and loads of these guys all around the world. Thousands, indeed.

[Controversial]

There are obviously loads of incomplete records on here but which fighters have loads of bouts missing?

1000's of them.

As an example - Billy Hensley (https://boxrec.com/en/proboxer/589483) had 3 fights listed before I managed to get hold of the archives of his hometown newspaper - now he has 33 and likely is still missing snother 20-30 fought in neighboring cities. For all I can deduct, Hensley's archrival Willie Belvin (https://boxrec.com/en/proboxer/764619) also likely fought 60-70 fights, but only 8 has been found so far.

There is loads and loads of these guys all around the world. Thousands, indeed.

Yes I'm sure there are thousands.

Years ago I posted about Canadian welterweight Joe Gollob. On BoxRec in 2013 he only had 3 fights recorded but according to a newspaper article, the "Ottawa Citizen" dated September 14th 1943 the article said his record at that time was 138-11.

A few updates were supplied by Miles Templeton but still only 14 bouts listed.

.

[prewarboxing]

Yes,

I am afraid that the additional data I supplied only related to his uk contests. I don't research other than uk!

I do hope that one day you might find more for his North American and Canadian career.

Miles Templeton

[Controversial]

Yes,

I am afraid that the additional data I supplied only related to his uk contests. I don't research other than uk!

I do hope that one day you might find more for his North American and Canadian career.

Miles Templeton

Thats cool Miles, the UK alone must be hard enough work.

[scartissue]

Mexican fighters are the most difficult to keep track of for two reasons. 1) Very poor record-keeping and acknowledgement to different agencies and 2) many of them go by their nicknames.

For example, I once read a small piece on an experienced journeyman named Diablito Campos, but his record showed one fight. A loss to Rodolfo Gonzalez. Then, by chance, I was reading an old Ring mag from the 50s and I saw in the Mexican results a fighter named Agustin 'Diablito' Campos. I notified boxrec about this and like magic, almost 40 fights populated his record. I think it's still a bit thin, but one can see what they're up against tracking down results on someone going by an alias in a country where results are sketchy.

[prewarboxing]

Yes,

I am afraid that the additional data I supplied only related to his uk contests. I don't research other than uk!

I do hope that one day you might find more for his North American and Canadian career.

Miles Templeton

Thats cool Miles, the UK alone must be hard enough work.

It really is, especially the period 1914 to around 1935. As an example, take a fighter who had a lot of contests but who lived off the beaten track, so to speak. George Harwood of Craghead, a pitman from the Durham Coalfield.

BoxRec currently has 27 contests for him. Boxing News (or "Boxing" as it was known back then) has 124.

I have found a further 71 for him in various regional newspapers (mainly in the North-East). My total is 195.

115-53-24 with 2 no decisions and 1 no contest. He won the majority of his bouts and so he was no mug.

There are many examples of this from all over the UK. Even somewhere like Cornwall was a hotbed of the sport during the 1930s, and East Anglia! Not a lot going on there now, or even over the last 65 years if truth be told.

I am almost at the end of the planning stages for my forthcoming book, which I intend to write next year (2021). I aim to write the definitive history of the sport in the UK and Ireland. I will be dealing with the issue of boxers records very thoroughly within this. Along with a lot of other good stuff.

Miles Templeton

[Controversial]

Yes,

I am afraid that the additional data I supplied only related to his uk contests. I don't research other than uk!

I do hope that one day you might find more for his North American and Canadian career.

Miles Templeton

Thats cool Miles, the UK alone must be hard enough work.

It really is, especially the period 1914 to around 1935. As an example, take a fighter who had a lot of contests but who lived off the beaten track, so to speak. George Harwood of Craghead, a pitman from the Durham Coalfield.

BoxRec currently has 27 contests for him. Boxing News (or "Boxing" as it was known back then) has 124.

I have found a further 71 for him in various regional newspapers (mainly in the North-East). My total is 195.

115-53-24 with 2 no decisions and 1 no contest. He won the majority of his bouts and so he was no mug.

There are many examples of this from all over the UK. Even somewhere like Cornwall was a hotbed of the sport during the 1930s, and East Anglia! Not a lot going on there now, or even over the last 65 years if truth be told.

I am almost at the end of the planning stages for my forthcoming book, which I intend to write next year (2021). I aim to write the definitive history of the sport in the UK and Ireland. I will be dealing with the issue of boxers records very thoroughly within this. Along with a lot of other good stuff.

Miles Templeton

Good luck with the book Miles, sounds very interesting

[bwu]

That book will go to the top of my must read list when it’s released.

As to the topic, I suppose it depends on the reliability of the claimants. For instance, Bob Fitzsimmons claimed he had 350 bouts. If that’s correct, every record I’ve ever seen for him is sorely lacking.

[prewarboxing]

That book will go to the top of my must read list when it’s released.

As to the topic, I suppose it depends on the reliability of the claimants. For instance, Bob Fitzsimmons claimed he had 350 bouts. If that’s correct, every record I’ve ever seen for him is sorely lacking.

Thanks bwu. I'll keep this forum updated on it. Started on it today.

Miles Templeton

[AntonioMartin]

Orlando Maldonado and Juan Bruno are missing their bout...

Maldonado KO1 Bruno, Juan Ramon Loubriel Stadium, Bayamon, Puerto Rico, sometime in March of 1983.

I was there myself in person as a then ten year old.

[DavidKehler]

I think that the question posed in the first post in this thread can't be answered, as far as the United States is concerned. Until recent decades, boxing was a grass-roots, locally focused sport operated on an ad hoc basis by a very loosely connected network of entrepreneurs of various types. Press coverage, particularly prior to World War II, was often spotty outside of the major metropolitan areas, and some of the reporters who covered boxing bouts were barely literate.

Then, there is the issue of boxer identity, resolved only a few years ago in contemporary boxing. It wasn't uncommon for a boxer to use a fake ring name, and there were lots of reasons to do so, some sleazy and some sensible. Guys changed ring names. Promoters misspelled boxer names in newspaper advertisements. Nicknames are a real problem in reconstructing records, particularly the most common ones. Just which Kid Young was it who stopped which Young Kid in that four rounder?

These problems apply to the records of even very significant boxers. Consider Stanley Ketchel, who was a world champion. His early record is mighty incomplete. Early in his career, he boxed under several names. Early in the last century, while based in the mining town Butte, MT, there was a period in which he boxed every night in a theater as one of several of the evening's entertainments. The are no known newspaper accounts of these nightly bouts.

In that same period, in some large cities, there would be a ring set up in the back room of a saloon with fights staged on weekday afternoons between young boxers who most certainly were paid. For example, as a youth, Charley Goldman, later Rocky Marciano's trainer, had hundreds of these bouts. Multiply that by hundreds of boxers.

BoxRec has undertaken an immense project in the assembling of historical boxing records. I don't think that it is possible to make a reasonably accurate estimate of what percentage of the universe of bouts has been catalogued on this site, to date. What is possible is conducting more of the careful research that has compiled far more boxing records on this site than has every appeared in any single place anywhere anytime.

[Djanders44]

I would guess that James Corbett and Jim Jeffries had a lot more fights than we know about.

[Controversial]

I would guess that James Corbett and Jim Jeffries had a lot more fights than we know about.

Dempsey too

[p4p1]

I would guess that James Corbett and Jim Jeffries had a lot more fights than we know about.

[quote=Djanders44 post_id=5488407 time=<a href="tel:1609650545">1609650545</a> user_id=118974]
I would guess that James Corbett and Jim Jeffries had a lot more fights than we know about.

Dempsey too
[/quote]

I’d wager that Johnson, McVey, Jeanette and Langford probably each have more unrecorded fights than those 3 combined. From what I’ve read Black fighters would often fight every week because they needed the money.
I very much doubt Johnson in his first fight was fighting for the Texas MW state title or in his 4th fight he was fighting for the ‘coloured’ heavyweight title. Johnson only has 4 recorded fights between 1897- the end of 1899. Choynski was put in with Johnson in 1901 so Johnson ‘would learn his place’ I doubt a guy that’s 5-1-2 would have the kind of reputation that required Choynski to be drafted for a Johnson fight.

[Ambling Alp II]

Very likely that these guys are missing a lot of fights. Corbett always stood out to me. He has to be missing some. Tommy Loughran said that Corbett mentioned to him that he had 39 fights.

Having said this, boxrec has done a tremendous job in compiling their records.

[pound per pound]

If he was being truthful, Bob Fitzsimmons claimed 300 fights! Even he if off by 100, I'd say there's your answer.