László Papp, the brilliant Hungarian southpaw who was the first fighter to win gold medals at three successive Olympics; and he might have achieved even greater success as a professional of Hungary's Communist government had not refused him permission to fight for a world title in 1965.
"I was one step away from a world title shot but it would have meant going to America and my government didn't approve," Papp said in an interview after the fall of communism in Hungary in 1989. "I think it was just jealousy. I was earning more money than most of them. There was a lot of antagonism.”
"I believe I had a good chance of winning the title as I had defeated others who defeated Joey Giardello," he said. "This is my one big regret in life." He retired undefeated having won 27 fights, 15 by knockout, with two draws.
"El Maromero" Jorge Páez, eccentric 1980s and 90s featherweight champion from Mexicali, México who was born into a family that operated a circus.
Páez was able perform many of the tricks and acts in his family's circus, like juggling, flips and other acrobatic stunts. His nickname "maromero" means "acrobat," and he would often enter the ring in elaborate costumes and/or with a funny haircut.
Love him or hate him, Páez truly was an entertainer.
Jorge “Maromero” Páez — The Champion Who Danced Through Life and History
Before he became one of Mexico’s most electrifying boxing legends, Jorge “Maromero” Páez was a circus artist — literally born under the big top. From acrobatics to uppercuts, from laughter to legacy, his journey embodies the purest form of Mexican passion, resilience, and showmanship.
The Circus Kid Who Shook the Boxing World
Growing up surrounded by performers, Páez developed the agility and charisma that would later make him a global boxing sensation. As a child, he performed stunts and worked as a security guard at his family’s circus. His uncle, recognizing his potential, trained him to box — and the ring became his new stage.
A True Fighter’s Story
In 1988, Páez achieved immortality when he defeated the undefeated American Calvin Grove, who held an impressive 34–0 record. Though behind on all judges’ cards, Maromero’s fearless attack in the final rounds floored Grove three times, earning him the IBF Featherweight World Title. He defended it eight times, each fight blending entertainment and endurance — dancing, jumping, even entering the ring in wedding dresses or clown outfits.
The Showman of the Ring
Fans didn’t just watch Páez fight — they watched him perform. His eccentric haircuts, acrobatic moves, and fearless attitude turned every bout into a celebration of life and Mexican spirit. He wasn’t just a boxer; he was a cultural icon — an artist in gloves, an entertainer who reminded the world that joy and courage belong in every fight.
A Life Beyond Boxing
After retiring with a record of 79 wins, 14 losses, and 5 draws, Páez found faith and humility. When asked why he didn’t seek fame like other idols, he replied:
“I don’t want to be an idol for anyone — God doesn’t like that.”
Legacy of a Legend
Maromero’s story is not only about titles or knockouts. It’s about transformation — from a circus boy to a world champion, from a showman to a man of faith. His life reminds every Mexican that greatness is born from hard work, heart, and the courage to be yourself.
“El Maromero” didn’t just fight — he flew. And when he did, all of Mexico flew with him.
Jorge Paez enters the ring in one of his entertaining outfits, a Vampire costume. He was entertaining as heck, but don't let the clowning around fool you, he was one hell of a warrior, IBF featherweight champion, defended his title 8 times with wins over solid fighters. Jorge Paez was a colorful character in boxing, but he was fearless, tough as nails, had good boxing skills, good power, he iced 52 opponents. He had a very unorthodox style, combining acrobatics with solid boxing fundamentals, it confounded opponents and delighted fans. He was a hard slugging showboater, he would throw six or seven shots at you in succession like a machine gun, loved it when he did that. You never knew what you were going to get when you watched a Paez fight, however, you knew something exciting was going to happen.
"After my victories I would always do the backflip. I wanted the fans to know I was a performer. I was there to give a show and I was from the circus. I wanted to be different from other fighters. Other fighters wore the same trunks almost all the time; I wanted to be different. I wanted to put on not only a good fight but a good show.' I was criticized a lot for being a clown, but I wasn't just a clown. I was a good clown who also came to fight." - Jorge Paez
Freddie Welsh, "The Welsh Wizard", featherweight and lightweight in the early 1900s, one of the greatest to ever do it. The man holds wins over Benny Leonard, Ad Wolgast, Willie Ritchie, Johnny Dundee, Abe Attell, and Charlie White. That's one f... of a resume. Freddie Welsh a great practitioner of defensive boxing. In the ring, he was calm, elusive and a frustrating opponent for those who relied on power and aggression. He welcomed the opportunity to fight a brawler, fully confident that he would be able to out-slick him. Born in Wales on March 5, 1886, Frederick Hall Thomas came to America as a teenager and fell in love with boxing after witnessing a workout inside a Philadelphia gym. He turned pro in 1905 and fought under the name of Freddie Welsh. He was also known as "The Welsh Wizard." Welsh never shied away from tough competition, meeting Benny Leonard, Willie Ritchie and Ad Wolgast three times and Packey McFarland twice. A true boxing scientist, Welsh was a clever counterpuncher who believed in feinting and shifting his body to draw his opposition out of position. He campaigned in Pennsylvania through 1906, and for a brief period in 1907 he fought a series of bouts in his birthplace of Pontypridd, Wales. The slick boxer returned to the United States and rose to prominence in 1908 after the McFarland bouts. He lost the first contest but fought to a 25-round draw with the great McFarland in their second encounter. Welsh closed out the year with a 15-round decision win over reigning featherweight champ Abe Attell in a non-title fight. In 1909, he won the British lightweight title and in his first defense he faced Jem Driscoll, who was disqualified in the 10th round. In 1914, Welsh won the world lightweight title by decisioning Willie Ritchie in London. He sandwiched successful title defenses against Wolgast and Charlie White around a non-title win over Leonard. But when he met Leonard again in 1917, with the title on the line, Leonard scored a ninth-round knockout. Among the other legends Welsh met were Johnny Dundee, Battling Nelson, Rocky Kansas and Johnny Kilbane. Welsh served as a lieutenant in World War I and helped disabled veterans at Walter Reed Hospital. He was discharged a captain and returned to the ring in December of 1920. He fought five times over the ensuing 16 months and retired after dropping a 10-round decision to Archie Walker in 1922. Welsh went on to manage Jimmy Goodrich, who won the New York State lightweight title left vacant by Benny Leonard. Despite making a fortune in the ring, Welsh hit hard times and tragically died penniless and alone in a New York City hotel room at the age of just 41 in 1927. It was a sad ending to the life of one of the greatest fighters to ever step foot in a boxing ring.
Fast Freddie: Why Welsh Was A Wonder
By Mike Casey - There was that famous first fight between the two masters, and the fight before that with which many boxing fans of today might not be familiar. Before Benny Leonard figured out Freddie Welsh and took away his lightweight championship, Freddie had figured out Benny. It is so often the way it goes between two titans who are thrown together in the same little pocket of time. x Both men were geniuses of their profession, and I don’t describe them thus lightly. The once prized word of ‘genius’ has sadly lost much of its gloss in our super/brilliant/fantastic 24/7 era of eternal blue sky thinking. We like to think that geniuses come strolling down the trail every five minutes because it shields us from the uncomfortable fact that most of today’s ‘world champions’ fall woefully short of the mark. Boxing geniuses, for one thing, know how to throw a left jab properly. Most of us, I hope, appreciate the genius of Benny Leonard, although I have encountered a few starry-eyed souls who have told me that Benny would have been sent packing by Floyd Mayweather Jnr. But how many know of Freddie Welsh and all his glorious fistic and social contradictions? Pale and lean as a greyhound, Freddie was a fascinating conundrum in and out of the ring. Born in Pontypridd, Wales, he grew to be a master boxer, a brilliant exponent of the left jab and equally adept at scrapping and spoiling in the trenches. He could make hearts soar with the elegance and cleverness of his work or he could severely test the patience of his audience by cynically shutting his opponent down with artfully executed fouls and general negativity. That lively and intelligent brain in Freddie’s head was always buzzing and at war with itself. One could imagine Welsh constantly changing his mind and quickly tiring of trivial pursuits that failed to challenge his intellect. Freddie claimerd to be teetotal, a committed vegetarian and a non-smoker. And for most of the time, he was. He saw his body as a temple, long before such terminology became cool among the keep fit brigade. But this didn’t stop Welsh from partaking of the occasiomnal juicy chop, downing a nice glass of claret or puffing contentedly on those pleasantly lung-busting firworks known as Turkish cigarettes. Always a crafty operator, the young Freddie got the idea to set himself up as an instant expert on physical fitness and culture, buying a book on the subject and making himself sound suitably worldly. Then one of the students in his regular class threw a spanner in the works by suggesting that speed balls were needed to hone hand and eye co-ordination. There’s always an awkward one. Welsh, the great expert on such matters, had never punched a speed ball in his life. What he did next was typical of the way his mind worked. When the speed balls arrived, he bought himself time by dismissing them as sub-standard and demanding replacements. In the interim period he set about punching a speed ball assiduously in his own time until he had mastered the art. For one whose introduction to boxing and its paraphernalia was accidental, it is generally agreed that Freddie Welsh did pretty well thereafter. But let us get back to the business and beauty of the left jab. Thing of Beauty Back in the early days of 1965, Mel Beers wrote a nice little article on Welsh for the sadly long defunt Boxing International magazine. Here is what Beers had to say about the most important punch in the boxer’s repertoire: “The left jab, properly used, is a thing of beauty in motion. It is boxing’s basic punch and those who mastered it usually went on to become world champions or leading contenders. Billy Conn and Willie Pep mastered the jab. So did Abe Attell, Packey McFarland and Benny Leonard. Tommy Loughran was another who built his boxing wizardry around a jab that shot straight and true to any part of the opponent’s anatomy. “Who had the best left jab of all? It is impossible to say, but after plowing through piles of yellowed newspaper clippings and talking to scores of experts with long memories, the name of Freddie Welsh comes up more than any of the others.” Now, add that great jab of Freddie’s to his athleticism, quick mind and natural cleverness, and you begin to see why he was so special. He was also a tough and rugged man into the bargain. It is quite extraordinary how the simplest of weapons, when correctly employed, can not only endure throughnthe ages but completely negate and befuddle supposedly superior alternatives. Back in the mists of time, there was a fascinating little sparring match between an old and rusting Jem Mace and the brilliant Jem Driscoll. Such was Driscoll’s sublime skill that he made even Abe Attell look pedestrian in their classic New York encounter of 1909. Yet the few who were privileged to watch the session between Mace and Driscoll were astonished by Driscoll’s inability to keep Mace’s metronome of a left jab out of his face. The rise of Freddie Welsh to the top of the tree was not meteoric or sensational. Like a surgeon perfecting his trade, Freddie picked his way through the ranks slowly, cautiously and often drearily. The chess-playing side of Welsh wasn’t always appreciated by impatient crowds who had paid their money to see some good old-fashioned violence. But Freddie kept winning and then learned his business in earnest when he travelled to America and began to beat the cream of the crop. Boxing historian Mike Silver believes that Freddie Welsh is one of the most interesting characters to have ever won a boxing title. Here are Mike’s thoughts on the Welsh Wizard: “Welsh’s impressive performance against six of the greatest fighters of his generation says it all. During his prime he was a marvellous ring scientist whose mixture of orthodox and unorthodox moves puzzled and frustrated opponents for years. He possessed one of the keenest boxing minds in the history of the sport and was a true pioneer of his art. “After losing a newspaper decision to a near prime Benny Leonard in 1916, Freddie figured out the chess moves for the return match and outpointed Leonard. News reports of that ‘no decision’ fight stated that Welsh had outboxed the future lightweight champion. How many fighters can make that claim? He did the same to Abe Attell and Johnny Dundee. The Welsh Wizard also held Packey McFarland to a 20-round draw. “But perhaps Freddie’s most impressive performance of all was the time he made boxing master Jem Driscoll lose his cool. In their 1910 fight Driscoll was so frustrated by Welsh’s unorthodox methods and his ability to neutralise his great jab that Jem deliberately butted Welsh and was disqualified in the tenth round. It is obvious that even against great fighters, Welsh had the ability to make them fight his fight.” Riotous The fight with Driscoll was a riotous affair both in and out of the ring. Jem must have wondered how he ever contrived to lose the fight after the first five rounds in which his beautiful left jab ruled the roost. Freddie couldn’t get anywhere near the Peerless one. But then Welsh finally got inside and hammered Jem with a series of hard kidney punches. Encouraged by not getting so much as a warning from referee ‘Peggy’ Bettinson, Freddie upped the ante as the fight rumbled on by roughing up Driscoll in the clinches with some artfully executed head butts to the chin. Still referee Bettinson would not issue a warning as the crowd hooted and jeered Welsh’s foul tactics. From ringside, Jem’s reddened kidneys were clearly visible and it was clear to him that his complaints to Bettinson would continue to fall on deaf ears. For probably the only time in his professional career, Driscoll allowed his temper to fray. The red mist descended and all thoughts of science were discarded as he ripped into Welsh in a blind fury in the tenth round, pounding Freddie’s ribs with a succession of steaming hooks and swings. The comical part of all this, as only true devotees would notice in such a bedlam, was that Jem never stopped punching correctly. Such was his God-given grace, he could swing ‘em in from the bleachers and still look a picture of technical perfection. Then he gave Welsh some of his own medicine by butting him under the chin and throwing him across the ring. At long last, referee Bettinson woke up – and disqualified Driscoll! What followed, and what continued for some time, was a gorgeous brawl between irate Irishmen and Welshmen throughout the hall, until a team of Cardiff police constables finally broke it up. Mike Silver reminds us, quite correctly, that Welsh’s cagey and original style was a hybrid of both the English and American schools. Freddie took the classic elements of each and stirred them into his very own brew. “There was an unpredictable and deceptive quality to his work,” Mike notes. “An opponent never knew what he was going to do next. He could be a fine stand-up counter puncher and jab artist if it suited him, but he could also quickly morph into an aggressive in-fighter and mauler. “His brilliant defence, the key to everything he did in the ring, kept him world champion even after he’d passed his prime. He utilised footwork – blocking, ducking, swaying and side-stepping to great effect. No one was able to stop him and take the title in a no-decision fight until Leonard figured out how to do it.” Welsh’s great sense of timing and distance judgement were two other formidable assets that allowed him to maintain the ferocious schedule that was expected of the fighters of his era. Mike Silver reminds us of Freddie’s run-up to the world title, which required him to calculate his way through a minefield of golden talent: “After winning the newspaper nod over Johnny Dundee in January 1914, Welsh fought five more times that month! Four fights later, after having outpointed Joe Rivers and Leach Cross in 20-round bouts, he outfoxed Willie Ritchie for the lightweight title in yet another 20 rounder. That type of schedule would wreck today’s top fighters.” Mountain Freddie Welsh climbed to the top of the mountain when he dethroned Willie Ritchie and finally toppled off its peak against a Benny Leonard who was approaching his untouchable best. Both fights became etched in the memories of those who saw them. Welsh’s disciplined mind was geared to expecting any opponent to be at his very best. He had heard of Willie Ritchie’s punching power and his big right hand. But Willie was a slow starter and he knew it himself as he prepared in his dressing room on the night of July 7, 1914, at Olympia in Kensington. He reportedly boxed the equivalent of six rounds with selected sparring partners as he awaited his call to the ring. By contrast, Welsh, who might have made a good Mr Spock if he had come along later in life, was his usual precise self. A series of breathing exercises were followed by exactly 10 minutes’ sleep before he and Ritchie were notified that referee Eugene Corri had entered the ring. Artful Freddie, who had injured his left eye in training, climbed through the ropes with a piece of sticking plaster over his right eye. The pattern of the battle was quickly set as Welsh employed his nimble footwork and quick hands to outbox the plodding Ritchie. For all his exertion in the dressing room, Willie just couldn’t seem to get out of the starting blocks. With uncanny instinct, Freddie appeared able to anticipate Ritchie’s punches before Willie had even begun to twitch. On the rare occasions when Ritchie cornered Welsh, the skilful challenger demonstrated his all round ability by dropping the fancy stuff and fighting his way out. But Ritchie’s reputation as a battler to be feared was not the stuff of myth. In the fourth round, he suddenly speeded up and became a more dangerous proposition, his streaking attacks making the contest a much more competitive affair. Welsh always retained the edge, but now it was a splendid duel of exciting out-fighting and intelligent close quarter work. Watching the action was a good old writer of the time called Denzil Batchelor, who wrote: “There was no clinching. It was a beautiful fight to watch and as rare as it was beautiful. How many of the most eagerly anticipated fights of a lifetime consist, when we get down to statistics, of seventy per cent hugging and thirty per cent boxing? Referee Corri had told these two exceptionally intelligent boxers that at a tap on the shoulder from him they must break instantly. They obeyed him to the letter.” While Ritchie’s famous right hand was always a threat to Welsh, Batchelor compared Freddie’s talent for blocking that punch with his left forearm as being almost the equal of Jack Johnson. Only once, in a torrid tenth round, did Welsh get seriously caught. A peach of a right from Willie slammed against Freddie’s jaw and might have put him in serious jeopardy. But Welsh turned his head a vital fraction before the moment of impact, taking just enough steam out of the blow. Fighting back bravely but always intelligently, Freddie steered his way through the remainder of the battle to earn Corri’s decision and the world lightweight championship. Freddie reigned for three years before Benny Leonard came calling again. Old gunfighters never stop being challenged and finally get beaten to the draw. Welsh had fought off opposition of mighty quality throughout his illustrious career, but even the engine rooms of the cleverest men eventually malfunction and wear down. In short, Freddie was in the autumn of his fighting years while brilliant Benny was just beginning to soar to those giddy heights that only the special few ever reach. On May 28, 1917, in old New York, the 21-year old Leonard set a ferocious pace and made Welsh’s lean body the principal target. Punching hard and fast, Benny fired in accurate shots to the ribs and stomachs as he pursued the 31-year old champion constantly. Seeking to smash through the champion’s ring of confidence, the sprightly challenger cheekily stuck out his chin as an inviting target. Welsh was a boxer who rarely miscued tactically, but now he was being lured into errors by a similarly clever and agile mind. In the fourth round, Leonard nailed Freddie with that flashing right counter that would become a potent trademark of the brilliant New Yorker. Freddie’s head was thrown back and his knees dipped from the force of the blow. He couldn’t make his legs work for a few desperate seconds, but then he showed all his ring savvy as he bluffed and hustled his way through the crisis. In truth, however, the old stager was just delaying the inevitable, as great and proud champions do. He must have known it was over, just as the equally instinctive Leonard must have realised that this was his big night. He was on Freddie in a flash at the start of the ninth, knocking the Welshman down with a right that cut straight through his defence. Stubborn pride got the better of Welsh, who jumped up without taking a count and walked straight into a firestorm. Leonard swept straight through Freddie’s brave defiance, cutting him down for the second time with another cracking right. It was a blow that sent Freddie’s mind into an inescapable fog. He was an easy target when he got to his feet and the final driving blow from Benny – a left this time – left the broken champion in an eerie limbo. Somehow he remained upright, but he was gone as he grabbed the ropes and staggered drunkenly against them. Leonard moved in to apply the coup de grace, but the referee intervened and stopped the fight just as it seemed that Welsh would tumble through the ropes. There would be other fights for Freddie. The temptation to come back is always a powerful drug for a fighter to get out of his system. He returned to action in 1920 but enjoyed only moderate success before retiring in 1922. The end? Oh no, not for someone like Welsh. He never did lose his love of physical fitness (including that odd glass of claret and Turkish cigarette) and enjoyed a nice old time as the boss of a health farm for millionaires in America. As Denzil Batchelor concluded: “God bless my soul, sir, there was only one Freddie Welsh in the world.
This is fascinating stuff, a Freddie Welsh vs Ad Wolgast fight advertisement in the sports section of a newspaper from 1916. Of course Ad Wolgast was a beast of a fighter with a hellish mindset, Wolgast was known for being able to dish out and absorb horrific punishment. Welsh beat him all three times they fought.
In 1916, Freddie Welsh defended the lightweight championship with a 20 round points decision over Charley White in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Part of the arena collapsed before the fight, killing two and injuring more than 100. Charley White was a thunderous puncher, his left hook was murder, White damn near flattened the great Benny Leonard with that left hook. This is a report from The New York Times journalism, as it originally appeared.
MILWAUKEE, Wis., Feb, 25.- Freddie Welsh outboxed Charlie White in a ten- round no-decision boxing contest at the Auditorium tonight according to the almost unanimous opinion of sporting writers. Welsh appeared to have had the advantage of five rounds, the third to the seventh inclusive. White shaded his opponent in the ninth and tenth and the first, second, and eighth appeared to be even. The Englishman had White at his mercy during most of the fight, being fast and clever and getting away without punishment. White was slow and seemed unable to solve Welsh's whirlwind style of attack. In the earlier rounds Welsh set a brisk pace, but found White willing to mix with him at all times. White waited carefully for openings, in the evident hope of shooting in the short left hook for which he is famous; but the champion's shifty footwork and clever blocking made many of his efforts of no avail.
In their only known fight, Freddie Welsh defeated Abe Attell by a 15-round decision on November 25, 1908. The featherweight bout took place at Jeffries' Arena in Vernon, California. Attell was the reigning featherweight champion at the time, though the fight did not have a title on the line. Abe Attell is another all-time great, he was a ruthless little fighter that ruled the featherweight division with an iron fist for the better part of twelve years, it was one of the most dominant runs in boxing history. But Welsh was a genius, beating Benny Leonard and Abe Attell, truly a special fighter.
Vincent Pettway scored one of the most frightening knockouts of all time when he defended the IBF junior middleweight by 6th round KO over Simon Brown at the US Air Arena in Landover, Maryland in 1995.
While the KO in this bout is extremely memorable, the fight itself was one of the most foul-filled bouts shown on television in the last few decades.
Brown was already a two-division champion known for scoring a huge upset of Terry Norris in 1993, but he lost a rematch the following year. The comparatively unheralded Pettway was on a good run after dethroning long-time champion Gianfranco Rosi to win the belt.
It was obvious from the opening bell what the fight would look like: Pettway moved his feet to keep away from Brown, who played the boxer-puncher in pursuit. But Pettway stood still a bit too long and Brown caught him with a left hand followed by a quick combination that sent him down. Brown attempted to follow up in round 2, but Pettway moved on him and stayed away. Brown tried to move back to the inside in round 3, but he ran into a right hand that put him on the canvas in return.
The firefight looked to be all but over in round 5 when Pettway was sent through the ropes following a low blow. Pettway got up and both fighters swiped at one another after the bell.
In a fateful 6th round, Pettway connected with a right hand off the ropes that bounced Brown onto the canvas. In a wild scene, Brown was on the canvas unconscious and flat on his back, yet still throwing punches in his sleep.
"He really surprised me in the first round," Pettway said. "(But the fouls) just made me come back and want to fight harder."
The Vincent Pettway-Simon Brown knockout, one of the most frightening knockouts you'll ever see. Brown was a great, great fighter, but sometimes you're the hammer and sometimes you're the nail, and Brown got caught cold and he was on the canvas and his brain was still reacting as if he was standing and fighting, he was still throwing punches even though he was unconscious.
The great Sam Langford, "The Boston Tar Baby", one of the most feared fighters in boxing history. Hit like a freight train. Quite a few people consider Langford to be the greatest pound-for-pound fighter in boxing history and he has an argument for that. While starting at 140lbs, he actually moved up and knocked out some of the best big Heavyweights of his time like George Godfrey, and Jim Johnson. He basically signed to fight every boogeyman fighter between 140lbs and 230lbs, and KO'd most of them. He was insane. Fair to have him on top.
"I fought most of the heavyweights including Dempsey and Johnson, but Sam could stretch a guy colder than any of them. When Langford hit me it felt like someone slugged me with a baseball bat. It was like taking ether. You just went to sleep." - "Fireman" Jim Flynn
Can't get enough of "Sailor" Tom Sharkey. Here he is talking about what it was like back then.
'I know this was the hardest fight I ever lost. It was against a fellow known as Mexican Pete - a tough guy. The referee was even tougher. He was Horse Johnson. Around the middle of the first round I got set and nailed Mexican Pete on the chin with a full left hand. The back of his head hit the floor and Mexican Pete was colder than a mackerel on ice. But Horse Johnson leaned down and lifted Mexican Pete's right hand. 'Here's the winner,' Johnson said.
I was ready to kiII him. I rushed at the referee and said, 'You're either crazy or crooked. That was a clean knockout.'
'I say Mexican Pete won,' Horse Johnson said. And as he said it he pulled out a forty-five and stuck it in the pit of my stomach. I didn't even think twice, for we were fighting in a tough town where everyone had backed Mexican Pete. 'You're right,' I said. 'Mexican Pete wins.'
Those were tough days in the fight game. We fought in rain and sleet and snow, and no champion ever aspired to be a gent. We fought with a bunch of guns around the ring, looking for trouble. They were hard days - very hard days.' - "Sailor" Tom Sharkey
"Sugar" Ray Leonard made his first defense of the WBC welterweight title with a truly brutal 4th round KO of Dave "Boy" Green in Landover, Maryland on March 31st in 1980.
Leonard dominated early, drawing blood from Green's nose in round 1. Leonard then continued to do damage with his jab, until round 4 when Leonard closed the show spectacularly.
A combination punctuated by a hook and an uppercut put Green to sleep for several minutes. There was no use for a count and no count was rendered.
"The majority of the time, my speed is the difference in any fight," Leonard said later. "My speed will overcome experience or power or whatever I meet in the ring. I'm not surprised that I got in the first punch or the most punches. That's the way I fight."
Prime Sugar Ray Leonard was an absolutely lethal finisher, if he had you hurt and smelled blood in the water, you were screwed. His knockout of Andy Price in 1979 is one of the most vicious and brutal knockouts I've ever seen. He pinned Price against the ropes, hurt him, and then machine gunned him into another dimension.
On October 3rd, 2020, Jose "Chon" Zepeda scored an incredible 5th round KO of Ivan Baranchyk in Las Vegas, Nevada. Both fighters were down four times apiece, and the memorable war was voted 2020's "Fight of the Year" by The Ring.
Leigh Wood rose from a knockdown and made a brutal defense of the WBA featherweight title when he scored a nasty 12th round TKO of Michael Conlan at the Nottingham Arena in Nottingham, England in 2022.
After hitting the deck in round 1, Wood struggled to right the ship and bank rounds as the former Olympian won some for himself. But the tide changed with passing rounds, and eventually Wood caught up as Conlan tired. In the 11th, Wood scored a knockdown, signaling that he saw a potential end to the fight. And in the 12th, he bashed Conlan through the ring ropes to get a stoppage.
"I hit him with everything, but he's so tough," Wood said. "I'm just thinking about Mick now. It was a bad knockout."
"Skinny" Joe Lynch, two-time bantamweight champion, tough as nails Irishman from Hell's Kitchen, one of the greatest Golden roosters to ever do it. He fought in the deepest and most stacked era in bantamweight history. Lynch had an aggressive style with good power, and an anvil for a chin, he had around 160 career fights and he was never knocked out.
From 50 greatest bantamweights of all-time.
13. Joe Lynch (1915-1926)
Joe Lynch is our first introduction to a true monster of a true golden age of the bantamweights, a series of champions and contenders that made for the best division in all of boxing in and around the 1920s.
Despite the consistently high level of competition, Lynch was champion of the world not once, but twice, first taking the title from the immortal Pete (Kid) Herman during Christmas of 1920 and then from the capable but less deadly Johnny Buff in the summer off 1922. His 1920 pass at the world championship may have been his best performance. Herman had suffered a ragged year and was likely past his absolute peak but he still had some exceptional nights before him. Tall, rangy, slender, Lynch was blessed with perhaps the best one-two in an era stuffed with technicians. An underdog, he landed enough of these punches to win as many as ten of the fifteen rounds.
Lynch, who struggled at the weight nevertheless spent around a decade at bantamweight and used similar tactics to build one of the single best win resumes in the history of the division. He defeated Pete Herman, Frankie Burns, Memphis Pal Moore, Kid Williams, Abe Goldstein, Charles LeDoux, Young Montreal, Joe Burman, Jack Wolfe and many more noted men of an era as stacked as any that has ever existed at any weight.
Taken in tandem with two stints as world champion it has resulted in his being ranked at #4 at the weight by Nat Fleischer, and #11 by the IBRO; here, he appears further down.
A great bantamweight – a bantamweight capable of beating literally any 118lb fighter who ever has lived.
The Rockland County Times
Our Forgotten but Notable Neighbors: Joseph Lynch
By Jerome Kleiman
In 2005, when Joe Lynch was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame, it was already 40 years since his death. He had twice been the Bantamweight Champion of the World back in the early 1920s, the Roaring Twenties, an era known as the Golden Age of Boxing, when boxing was the preeminent sport in the world, and when there was only one champion in each weight class. During this period Joe Lynch was a household name, known far and wide by both boxing fans and non-fans alike, so popular was the sport and so famous were its champions.
Although he has largely faded into obscurity, remembered mostly by sports historians, there is a side to Joe Lynch’s story that is very relevant to Rockland County, for he spent most of his life here as an extremely active and civic-minded resident of New City, NY. Joe Lynch was born in 1896 to an impoverished Irish immigrant family on Manhattan’s West Side. Today it is upscale and known as Hell’s Kitchen, but at the time it was a rough and poverty-stricken area in which one had to learn to defend himself to survive. Lynch is quoted as saying, “I had to fight in the neighborhood or wouldn’t have been a good Irishman.” But street fighting helped prepare him for his future profession. Always good with his dukes, he realized that if you are going to fight anyway, why not get paid for it, and hence he took an interest in boxing, the manly art of self-defense. In 1918, at the age of 18, and following a short stint as an amateur, he had his first play-for-pay fight
Always very skinny, Joe was able to box as a bantamweight, which has a 118lbs limit. At the time, unlike today, the smaller fighters were numerous and also extremely popular with the fans. Lynch had a major advantage over most of his opponents since at 5’8” he was several inches taller and had a significantly longer reach. Besides that, he packed an explosive right-hand wallop, was an intelligent ring gen- eral, and owned a chin of stone (he was never knocked-out). With all those tools, he rapidly made his way up the ladder in his division.
Fighting almost on a weekly basis, he perfected his skills — pacing, knowing when to attack and when to stay out of range, how to counterpunch and how to adjust his style to different opponents. World War I interrupted his career. Lynch became a Doughboy, serving in France for over a year as a member of the 27th h Infantry Division.
Once back in the states, he rapidly became a top contender. On December 22, 1920, at Madison Square Garden, despite fighting with a broken left thumb, Joe Lynch defeated Pete Herman of New Orleans in a 15-round deci- sion to become the Bantamweight Champion of the World. Lynch would defend his belt several times, only to lose it to Herman in a rematch. Then, on July 10, 1922, he regained the title by KO’ing the then World Champion Johnny Buff of Jersey City.
Two years later Joe relinquished the title again, this time losing a decision to Abe Gold- stein. By 1924, it was becoming very difficult for Lynch to make weight. Before the Goldstein fight, he had to spend hours in the steam room sweating off pounds to get down to 118lbs. In doing so he depleted his energy, which contributed to his loss to Bernstein, a man he had knocked out a few years before.
Joe had followed his father’s advice to save his money, and with in excess of 150 professional fights under his belt, at age 30 the frugal Mr. Lynch was already a very wealthy man. Realizing that it was becoming too difficult to continue as a Bantamweight and tired of starving himself before big fights, Lynch decided to retire.
In 1926, with his wife, the former Anna Harvey, who had been his childhood sweetheart, Lynch purchased over 70 acres of farmland in New City, bounded on the south by New Hempstead Road, opposite today’s Rockland County Courthouse and Government Office buildings, where the now deserted Sain building, and the Animal Medical of New City stand.
With no intention of personally doing any farming, they leased the fields to local farmers. Friendly, gregarious and now finally able to eat without having a trainer constantly looking over his shoulder, Joe Lynch joined many local civic groups in New City. Far away from the West Side slums, and the hustle and bustle of the big city, once relocating to the New City of nearly 100 years ago, a sparsely populated, rural community with trees instead of tenements, and fertile soil instead of hard asphalt side- walks, Joe spent a lot of time involved with the New City Fire Department and the local Democratic Party club.
In 1928, for a short while, Joe Lynch together with his partner, George M. Cohan, the most famous entertainer of the day, owned the Elms Hotel, across the street from the then newly build County Courthouse. Joe was a very ac- tive member of the fire department for many years, serving several terms as firehouse foreman and then fire chief. He was known as the “fire-fighting chief and fighting fire-chief”. He also served as president of the New City Democratic Club and V.P. of the Rockland County Democratic club. He even ran for County Constable and is said to have been a County Deputy Sheriff. In addition, among his other involvements, Lynch was a member of the Elks. In 1926 at the induction ceremony there were three new members, the former world boxing champion, a local judge and a priest from Nanuet — quite a threesome.
During the FDR administration, the Postmaster General was James “Big Jim” Farley from Stony Point. Back when Lynch had been champion, Farley had been the Chairman of the NY State Athletic Commission, and the two proud Irishmen had become acquainted. In the late 1930s, Postmaster General Farley appointed his old boxing buddy and now hard- working Democrat, Mr. Joseph Lynch, as the Postmaster of the New City Post Office. Lynch would continue in that position until the early 1950s. Following the election of Dwight Eisenhower as President, a Republican was appointed as the New City postmaster. Anna Lynch, who had been very active in local church activities, died in 1955. She and Joe never had children. Joe Lynch, after losing his Post-master position kept a low profile. He began to lose vision in one eye. Maybe the effects of absorbing punches in over 150 professional bouts were finally catching up to him. On September 1,1965, at the age of 68, he accidentally drowned in Sheepshead Bay where he had been visiting family members. For a few days, stories about the death of this once great boxer appeared throughout the nation and beyond. Joe Lynch is still considered one of the greatest Bantamweight boxers of all-time. The eminent boxing writer Nat Fleischer ranked him #4. Boxing Scene has him at #8. And, as previously mentioned, he was inducted into the Inter- national Boxing Hall of Fame in 2005. However, Joe Lynch would also want to be remembered as a proud, long-term resident of New City and Rockland County, as a neighbor who was very involved in civic activities, and as an indispensable part of his community. Joseph and Anna Lynch are buried in the St. Anthony’s Catholic Cemetery in Nanuet.
Sadly there's no footage of Joe Lynch, and when that happens all we have to go by are newspaper accounts from members of the press that attended the fights. This is a written account by the New York Times of the fight when Joe Lynch beat Pete "Kid" Herman for the bantamweight crown in 1920. It should be noted that like Lynch, Herman was a beast, one of the greatest bantams in the history of the sport. Both Lynch and Herman are legends in this sport. Pete (Kid) Herman is the same Kid Herman that produced the famous boxing card set of exhibit cards from the 1940s. I much prefer having footage of a fighter, but I really enjoy reading these articles, it's interesting in it's own way. You read these accounts and try to visualize what a fighter looked like in the ring, it's fascinating.
Pete (Kid) Herman on the left and Joe Lynch on the right
LYNCH TAKES TITLE FROM PETE HERMAN; West Side Boxer Wins Bantamweight Crown by Decision in Bout at Garden.VICTOR HAS WIDE MARGIN New Champion Outpoints Rival Decisively--Has Ten of the Fifteen Rounds. GREAT CROWD SEES BATTLE Throng of 15,000 Fills Big Arena--Wild Scene Follows Announcement of Judges' Verdict. Bout Not Out of Ordinary. Lynch Better Boxer. West Sider Aggressive. Herman Aggressor at First. Great Ovation for Lynch. Bantams Draw Big Crowd.
Dec. 23, 1920
A new world's bantamweight boxing champion was crowned last night in the ring of Madison Square before a palpitating crowd of 15,000 spectators who jammed and crammed every inch of the old fistic arena. Joe Lynch, a west side Irishman, gained the verdict of Judges Martin G. McCue and William Muldoon over Pete Herman of New Orleans, who has held the title for more than three years, after fifteen rounds of boxing that was in no sense above the ordinary. The decision, carrying with it the world's premier ring laurels in the bantam division of fistiana and a gold and diamond-studded championship belt donated by Promoter Tex Rickard, was vociferously received by the great throng which crowded the old amphitheater. Lynch had won and won cleanly. There could be no question of the west side boxer's right to the verdict, and the important distinction which it carried. The champion had been decisively outpointed by a margin of at least ten rounds to five, and there was, therefore, no excuse for any but a Lynch verdict. That the decision was popular was attested by the wild scene which ensued immediately Announcer Joe Humphries's clarion tones had been swallowed in a tumultuous shout which greeted the new bantam titleholder. Bout Not Out of Ordinary. The battle, as said before, did not reach a standard beyond the ordinary as far as actual work was concerned. There was none of the spectacular, sensational or dramatic about Lynch's triumph. Both boxers appreciated the importance of the match and their work reflected this feature in marked degree. Herman particularly was disappointing for he made no such real efforts to retain his laurels as would be expected of a champion. By this is meant that he failed to combat his opponent's attack with the sort of work commonly expected of a ring titleholder, whose means of livelihood depends on destruction and effect he accomplishes with his glove-encased fists. In only five rounds did Herman show to advantage, and in only two of these sessions did he work anything at all like a champion. Lynch, on the other hand, appreciated the opportunity open to him and worked accordingly. He took no chances beyond what he would take in the ordinary course of events against any other boxer. He boxed cautiously, following well-defined attack, in which his crushing right was the chief method of dealing out punishment. There was none of the sensational flurries Lynch showed against Sharkey or Goldstein. Both of whom crumpled before Lynch's blows in the same ring in recent bouts. Lynch earned ten of the fifteen rounds. He carried off the third, fourth, fifth, seventh, ninth, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth rounds. In these sessions Lynch carried the offensive and crashed home solid blows to the face and stomach which stung Herman. The latter refused to fight back, however, taking the punishment and falling into clinches, where he sought without effect to pepper Lynch about the midsection. Herman took the first, second, sixth, tenth and eleventh rounds. In the first three sessions which were his the dethroned champion did not impress by margin his superiority. He gained each of the three rounds by the smallest of margins and only after the hardest work. Lynch Better Boxer. In addition to the physical handicaps he was laboring under, Herman was at a further disadvantage in boxing ability. He was facing an opponent whose work was superior in every respect. The combination proved too great for the little New Orleans boxer to hurdle. Herman's greatest work was accomplished at close quarters. It was then that he peppered the west side lad about the stomach with rights and lefts until Lynch held to protect himself from the punishment. In this department Lynch was excelled, but the west side boy made up for the disparity in this respect through his work at long range. Lynch always kept his left hand extended, pawing and jabbing with the fist, always waiting for the opportunity to crash home a right. When the chance did present itself the west side Irishman would let fly with a crack which rattled Herman's teeth and shook the New Orleans Italian from head to heel. Repeatedly Herman sought the refuge of a clinch after receiving one of Lynch's terrific slams. Lynch's fast work with both hands, his speed of foot and the offensive which he carried over the greater part of the battle, gained him the honors of the bout and the title. He boxed rings around Herman at long-range boxing, albeit there were infrequent instances when Herman, with a swift left hook or plunging left jab, beat his bigger opponent to the punch. The power behind the west sider's right, however, discouraged Herman's efforts at long-range exchanges, and the result was that the New Orleans boxer confined himself for the most part to rapid work with both hands at close quarters. For this assault Lynch provided an effective defense after the third round. The west aider securely tied Herman's hands and had the Southerner powerless in the clinches. Herman earned but five of the rounds, and in three of these sessions his advantage was by the slimmest possible margin. The tenth and eleventh rounds were the best for the dethroned champion, but not even by his work in these two rounds could Herman make an impression on the margin Lynch accumulated in points. Lynch carried off the honors in every round except the first two, the sixth, tenth and eleventh. In the latter two sessions Herman pummeled his rival severely about the stomach with his peppery attack, and bobbed Lynch's head from side to side with left hooks. Occasionally the titleholder tried with a right for the jaw, but the blow never landed on its objective, sailing harmlessly past Lynch's protruding chin for the most part, or winding around the west sider's neck. West Sider Aggressive. In the third, fourth and fifth rounds Lynch brought the crowd to its feet in an orgy of cheering when he had Herman shaky from the terrific rights the west sider dealt out. Several times in the closing four rounds, too, Lynch snook Herman with his powerful right- hand drives, but the west sider was too eager and anxious in following up his advantages, and, as a result, was wild. Lynch implanted a wholesome respect for his punching power in Herman early In the bout. In the third session he crashed home a right which landed high on the temple. Herman's knees sagged and he gave an involuntary lurch forward, falling into a clinch. Lynch shook his rival off and tried to follow his advantage. Herman backed to the ropes Bout Not Out of Ordinary. Lynch Better Boxer. West Sider Aggressive. and Lynch, seeking to finish his rival, was wild and ineffective, while the crowd urged the west sider on in a terrific din of cheers. Herman protected himself effectively, drawing his gloved left hand up in a perfect defense for his jaw. The result was that Lynch's blows had no immediate effect and Herman recovered quickly. Several times in the fourth and fifth rounds Lynch crashed home his right, never quite on the vulnerable point of the chin, but always with stinging power back of the blow. Herman was sent crashing back on the ropes and was hard pressed to defend himself against a knockout. From the twelfth round to the finish Lynch repeated the dose, hitting the New Orleans lad savagely with stinging left-hand jabs and right crosses which took all the fight out of the defending champion and gave Lynch a lead in points which insured victory beyond doubt. Herman Aggressor at First. For the first two rounds Lynch did little. Herman was the aggressor and carried the fighting. The Southern boxer worked to close quarters, where he peppered Lynch about the mid-section with rapid-fire blows against which the west sider could not defend himself. Lynch contented himself with pecking away at long range, without accomplishing anything of moment. In the third Lynch landed his first real hard punch, a right to the temple, which made Herman waver for a fraction of a second. The crowd yelled wildly as the defending champion lurched forward and his knees sagged, but Lynch was wild in his effort to apply the finishing touches and Herman quickly recovered. Through the fourth and fifth sessions Lynch continued his offensive and several times shook Herman with jolting rights to the side of the face and jaw. The latter fought strictly on the defensive until the sixth round, when he took the lead and kept the fighting at close quarters, where Herman enjoyed a distinct advantage. Through the seventh, eighth and ninth rounds Lynch showed to advantage, jabbing with his left and seeking to force an opening for his crushing right. Herman was wary, however, and protected himself against possible attack on the jaw. In the tenth and eleventh rounds Herman again flashed in front, carrying Lynch before him in a hurricane offensive which completely surprised the west sider and threw him on the defensive. The milling in these two rounds was mostly at close quarters, and Lynch absorbed considerable punishment about the stomach. The west sider sought to keep Herman at bay with his left, but the Southerner came in steadily against the jab and worked diligently with both hands to the stomach. The recovery was only a flash in the pan, however, and from the twelfth session to the final bell Lynch was clearly entitled to the honors. Several times in the closing four rounds Lynch landed with his right, but always the blow was robbed of its power because it had to advance past Herman's protecting upraised left. The west sider repeatedly forced Herman to the ropes, and while holding the Southerner there, tried to force openings for his right, but invariably the blows went wild or high and had little effect. In the fourteenth round Herman was shaken with a heavy right to the jaw and he showed he did not relish the punishment by falling into a clinch. Emerging, he danced out of danger until his head had cleared. The final round found Lynch still the aggressor and seeking to land a finishing blow on his elusive rival, but Herman guarded well and frustrated his rival's efforts in this direction. Great Ovation for Lynch. Seldom has Madison Square Garden, the scene of some of the greatest ring combats in history, witnessed an orgy quite the parallel of that which greeted the crowning of the new champion. Friends of Lynch, of whom there was an overwhelming majority scattered through the capacity crowd, rushed pell-mell past all restraining hands to the ringside in an effort to clutch their idol in their embrace. Two of the joy-crazed Lynch admirers broke past the outspread arms of special policemen with their night sticks poised, and, clambering into the ring, grabbed Lynch In an embrace which threatened physical injury for the lad who had just attained the ambition of a lifetime. Lynch was madly separated from the morose Herman by a husky who wanted to dance a jig and kiss the west sider all in the same motion. The new title holder finally gained his freedom and again clasped the lifeless hand of Herman. Then, moving to the side of the ring, he leaned down between the ropes and grabbed Assemblyman McCue's right hand in a warm clasp. Flushed with the joy of victory, Lynch then strode across the ring to where Judge Muldoon stood, carried out of his ringside seat by the surging tide of humanity about him after he had handed up the slip which had its share in giving Lynch the title. A hearty shake, and then Lynch stepped down out of the ring into the wildest commotion imaginable. Everybody wanted to grab the new champion and hoist him aloft on sturdy shoulders. For a time Lynch successfully defended himself against this friendly assault, but in the end he had to submit and, atop the broad backs of his friends from the west side of the city, Lynch was carried back to his dressing room. It was a wonderful Christmas present and none appreciated it more than Joe Lynch.
On July 10th, 1922, Joe Lynch defeated Johnny Buff by TKO in the 14th round to win the World Bantamweight Championship for a second time in Velodrome New York. Lynch, who had a height and reach advantage, used effective defense and counterpunching to control the fight, which ended when he landed a decisive left hook to Buff's jaw. Lynch is pictured here on the left, facing off with Buff before the fight. Johnny Buff had recently won the bantamweight title from Pete Herman. Some felt that fighting Lynch so soon after winning the title was poor matchmaking for Buff, and indeed that was the case.
Barbados Joe Walcott, aka "The Barbados Demon", he was nicknamed that for a reason. The guy was a damn demon. He was a small guy, he started out at lightweight, but man could he hit. Fearless son of a gun, he'd fight anyone, he fought heavyweights, he knocked them out. He turned pro in 1890 at the age of just seventeen, and within five years he had established himself as one of the most fearsome and powerful battlers in America. Fight fans and pundits of the day regarded him as nothing less than the hardest-hitting welterweight they had ever seen, and he carried his power with him up through the weight divisions, a true monster puncher. Walcott’s abilities stemmed in large part from his physical gifts which had nothing to do with size and weight and everything to do with natural strength, power, stamina and durability. Standing under 5’2″, Walcott sported a massive upper body for his stature with an 18 inch neck, a 41 inch chest, and long, powerful arms. Nat Fleischer, the founder of Ring magazine, once called Walcott a "sawed-off Hercules." One of the great pound-for pound-fighters in boxing history, this guy is the reason the great Arnold Cream fought under the name Jersey Joe Walcott, as a tribute to the legendary Barbados Joe Walcott.
Joe Walcott, The Barbados Demon...“The Bigger They Are The Harder They Fall.”
By: Monte D. Cox
It was Joe Walcott, the Barbados Demon, welterweight champion of the world from 1901-1904, who actually coined the phrase "the bigger they are the harder they fall." Bob Fitzsimmons certainly popularized the saying before he faced Jim Jeffries, but it was Walcott who first said it. The phrase belonged to Walcott, who despite his short stature was extremely successful against much larger and heavier opponents. He had fantastic stamina and durability as well as a proven punch. A natural welterweight, he was one of the greatest "pound for pound" fighters in boxing history and fought men weighing from lightweight to heavyweight during his career.
Joe Walcott, the "original", had the power to beat heavyweights; in fact he scored a first round kayo over 180 pound Tom McCarthy fairly early in his career. Walcott fought a number of other light heavyweights and heavyweights. Walcott's manager, Tom O'Rourke, also handled heavyweight contender Sailor Tom Sharkey, whom some historians compare favorably to Rocky Marciano. Sharkey twice went the distance with heavyweight champion Jim Jeffries. O'Rourke once stated, (Fleischer, p. 198-199), "I had to stop Walcott from sparring with the sailor because Joe dumped him on his ear one afternoon in the gym." Walcott hit hard enough to knock out heavyweights. Can one picture modern welterweights such as De La Hoya, Felix Trinidad or even Ray Robinson ko'ing a 180 plus pounder? Robinson ventured up to light heavyweight once, running out of gas against Joey Maxim. He never again moved beyond the middleweight limit.
Walcott often gave weight to opponents and came out victorious. For one of his fights against Dick O'Brien, considered one of the best fighters of his weight, The Aug. 28, 1895 Boston Herald reported "Walcott, according to Tom O'Rourke, weighed 138 pounds, against O'Brien's 150 pounds. This ordinarily would be considered a great handicap. Few fighters would care to give away a dozen pounds. But so certain was O'Rourke that his man would win that he waived the weight." Walcott knocked out O'Brien in 2 minutes and 25 seconds of the first round.
The Aug, 28, 1895 Police News stated, "Walcott now surpasses any of our welterweights, unless it be (Mysterious) Billy Smith, in the telling execution of a single blow. I do not see how he is to be beaten by any foeman who will give him hit for hit. Any man except a very big man whom he gets his right hand on to fairly and squarely isn't coming up for much more. Walcott in his dumpy, dwarf monitor build, his hardness of flesh, his power of punching and the small surface he offers for return hits, is in a class by himself-different from anything else in the field."
McCallum wrote (p. 194), “Walcott was something of a physical freak. Despite his size, he had the stamina of a bull.”
The National Police Gazette Oct 27, 1894, supports this view “His neck is 18 inches and his chest expanded is 41 inches, which is remarkable for a man of his weight”
The April 20, 1895 Gazette described Walcott’s power thusly, “His delivery was terrific having the force of a pile driver.” One blow from Walcott was said to be equal “to five” of his opponent’s.
Nat Fleischer called Walcott, (Black Dynamite Vol 3. p 196), "a sawed off Hercules, an abnormally powerful puncher." He also said, "Men who fought him were sorely handicapped...for all his opponents were taller, and their blows usually landed on his shoulders or on top of his granite skull. Probably more men ruined their hands on Walcott than on any other scrapper of that day."
Walcott was widely recognized as the best welterweight in the world long before he won the title. The Jan. 11, 1902 Police Gazette stated, "From a techincal standpoint three or four fighters have been recognized as welterweight champion, but it was apparent to men who have knowledge of prize ring affairs that they only held that tile on sufferance because of an obvious desire to avoid meeting with a black man who was conceded to be their superior." Walcott won the championship on a fifth round stoppage of Rube Fern in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The Gazette reported that Walcott turned "Fern into a jelly in five rounds."
Such was Walcott's reputation as a fierce puncher that he claimed in newspaper reports that "Since no welterweight or middleweight will fight me I am compelled to go to the next class. Will any heavyweights fight me?" See Police Gazette Oct 13, 1900. Walcott issued challenges to Tom Sharkey, Gus Ruhlin and even champion Jim Jeffies, though they all declined to meet him in the ring.
Some claim Walcott's record is spotty. Research by Tracy Callis puts his record at 96-24-24 (62 Ko's) with 22 ND and 3 NC. Most however fail to realize that the many of his losses came after Walcott severely injured his right hand in a gun accident in late 1904. Initial news reports, such as the Oct 18, 1904 Philadelphia Record indicated that his hand might have to be amputated, although his hand was saved Walcott wasn't same fighter after this, and in fact he did not fight again for two years.
In his 15 round fight against Jack Bonner the Gazette reported that "Barbados Demon shows his ability to fight faster than ever." He fought at a fast pace throwing many punches and only the final bell saved Bonner from certain knockout defeat.
Walcott also had a good number of unrecorded fights. The Police Gazette reported, “While on the road he knocked out at least 100 men. Among the high-class men he has beaten are Dick O’Brien, Mike Walsh, Mike Harris, and Tom Tracy of Australia.”
Some of his losses were actually wins where he was the victim of bad decisions because he was a black fighter. A number of his draws are rather dubious too. SEE BELOW for an example:
Apr 20 Jim Watts New York, NY D 4
"Walcott pounded Watts and floored him repeatedly during the first three rounds; In round four Watts went down to avoid being knocked out; While he was on the floor, Walcott struck him lightly on the jaw; Watts was down for at least twenty seconds; The crowd called for a foul; Referee Richard Roche knew Walcott was clearly winning and Watts was going down deliberately; He ordered the men to continue; Watts would not; So, he called it a draw." --Research by Tracy Callis.
Welterweight Walcott actually had a remarkable record:
One of Walcott's greatest victories was against Joe Choynski. Choyinski had gone 28 rounds against Jim Corbett, and drew with the likes of Bob Fitzsimmons and Al "Kid" MCcoy and would knock out a young Jack Johnson the following year. Choyinski outweighed Walcott 173 to 137 pounds and was a 5-1 favorite to beat the game little Walcott. The "Barbados Demon" demonstrated his impressive punching power by flooring Choyinski several times in the first round and gave the latter a terrific beating before stopping him in the 7th round.
Tommy West was a pretty good middleweight who had fought 17 rounds with Tommy Ryan for the middleweight title, and Walcott clearly dominated him, winning three times, once by ko, with 1 decision loss, 1 draw, and 1 ND.
Walcott also fought a draw with middleweight (and future light heavyweight champion) Philadelphia Jack O'Brien over 10 rounds.
Walcott beat a number of other top middleweights including Jack Bonner, Kid Carter, George Cole, and the ever-durable Joe Grim.
Walcott fought light-heavyweight champ George Gardner twice, winning once by 20 round decision and losing by the same. He also defeated light-heavyweight Young Peter Jackson. One wonders whether modern era welterweight champions would have success against the reigning light-heavyweight champion if their opponents weighed in at 175?
Mysterious Billy Smith was a very dirty fighter. In fact he lost 10 times on fouls. Smith was good enough to win the welterweight championship, and once beat Tommy Ryan, flooring him three times in the process, (it was ruled a NC because the police intervened when they saw Ryan was about to be ko'd). Smith also had a knockout over Kid Lavigne. Walcott and Smith fought numerous times with Walcott proving to be the much better fighter, winning 3 times, twice by Ko, with 2 draws, and one loss by decision.
Walcott's only significant losses were to George "Kid" Lavigne, and Dixie Kid. His fights against Lavigne were "handicap" bouts where, because of contractual agreements, Walcott was forced to come in greatly under his normal weight. Walcott, a natural welter because of his brawny build, trained down to 136 for the first fight which he lost on a 15 round decision. He had to "kill himself" to make the weight and was physically drained before the fight started. The second fight was for Lavigne's World Lightweight title, which means Walcott had to weigh 133 pounds (then the lightweight limit) on the day of the fight. Walcott had no strength and faded badly in losing by 12th round Tko. The loss to Dixie Kid is significant because Walcott lost the title, though by foul in the 20th round.
Sam Langford was already a great fighter by the time Walcott fought him to a draw. It was only two years later that Langford was able to go 15 rounds with future heavyweight champion Jack Johnson, and went on to become the most feared fighter in the world, knocking out nearly all the top heavyweights.
Three weeks after fighting Langford, Walcott fought lightweight champ Joe Gans to a draw. That is the equivalent of Delahoya fighting Felix Trinidad and the winner facing Shane Mosley within a month. Two weeks later Walcott badly injured his right hand in the aforementioned gun accident, yet he still was able to defeat many top fighters.
Walcott was just under 5' 2", and never weighed more than 148 pounds. His long reach and Herculean physique gave him tremendous power. He had great durability that allowed him to absorb the kind of punishment that would have finished most fighters.
He was also an accomplished boxer who studied and learned from the likes of George Dixon and Bob Fitzsimmons. His success against men of much higher weights leads one to believe that no modern welterweight could have gone the 20 round distance with him.
Perhaps the Chicago Herald-Examiner wrote a fitting epitaph on Aug 22, 1932 when Joe was hospitalized with a heart attack, "Some veteran boxing experts rate Walcott as the greatest fighter of his weight the ring ever knew. Only a "heavy" lightweight, Walcott earned the sobriquet "Giant Killer" by the easy manner in which he topped light heavyweights and heavyweights."
Joe died on Oct. 4, 1935 after being struck by a car in Manssillon, Ohio.
Both Nat Fleischer and Charley Rose rated Joe Walcott the # 1 all time welterweight. Walcott finished # 4 in the 2005 IBRO (International Boxing Research Organization) poll of its members. Cox's Corner considers him among the top 5 all time welterweights.
Barbados Joe Walcott is fascinating, he looks almost like a kid, but man his reputation is fearsome in the boxing universe. "Chrysanthemum Joe" Choynski was one the hardest hitting heavyweights of all-time and Barbados Joe Walcott knocked him out. "The Barbados Demon" scored a fantastic upset when he ran through the larger Joe Choynski and tabbed a 7th round TKO at the Broadway Athletic Club in New York, New York in 1900. Choynski was initially a heavy favorite at about 10-to-3, but after Walcott put him down five times in round 1, the odds shifted sharply in Walcott's favor. Choynski rebounded well in round 2, but he then soaked up a beating. Walcott cut Choynski over the eye in the 5th, and then in round 7 Walcott sent Choynski down for a final time. The larger man got up, clearly hurt, and Walcott went after him to force a stoppage.
Great image here of Barbados Joe Walcott on the right, the small guy. He's pictured here with Harry Wills, aka "The Black Panther", Wills is an all-time great heavyweight. But just look how small Walcott is next to Wills, yet Walcott used to fight and knock guys out that were as big as Wills. Considering Walcott was only 5"2' and weighed around 140 pounds while fighting bigger men, he was almost certainly pound-for-pound a murderous puncher. The fact bigger men feared him probably tells you all you need to know. Jack Johnson and Sam Langford both named him as one of the hardest punchers they ever faced. He actually began as a lightweight and grew into a small welterweight, yet he KO'd former Commonwealth heavyweight champion Dan Creedon in 1 round and dropped the 16 pounds heavier Joe Choynski 5 times on the way to stopping him in 7 rounds. A 5"2' lightweight/welterweight KO'ing much bigger fighters who had success at heavyweight suggests he hit pretty damn hard relative to his size.
For the record, here is what the immortal heavyweight Jack Johnson, "The Galveston Giant", said about who was the hardest punchers he ever faced:
"Jeffries number one? No, sir. Give me Joe Choynski anytime,” Johnson said. “I faced both and I should know. Jeffries had a powerful wallop, but Choynski had a paralyzing punch. His left hand was a corker. He was the hardest puncher in the last fifty years, with Joe Walcott a close second. I think his left hook was even more effective than Dempsey’s. Choynski could paralyze you, even if he didn’t catch you flush.” So Johnson named Barbados Joe, a natural welterweight, the second hardest puncher he ever faced. A big heavyweight saying a natural welterweight is the second hardest puncher he ever faced, that should give you a good indication of how hard this little guy could whack, and that's why they called him the demon.
This is an absolute gem of a photo, Sam Langford, aka "The Boston Terror" on the left, and Barbados Joe Walcott on right. Two of the greatest pound-for-pound fighters in boxing history, also two of hardest punchers in boxing history.
On this day in October 21st, 2000, one of the most dramatic things I've ever seen in sports history occured when Danny Williams faced Mark Potter in a history-making British & Commonwealth title fight.
In the third round, Williams dislocated his right shoulder, it popped out of it's socket, leaving him with a single arm to fight, his left arm.
Despite this, in the sixth round, he caught and hurt Potter with a uppercut from his healthy arm, a true Hail Mary. Potter was able to get up but Williams quickly put him back down twice more and the fight was stopped.
"I had the towel in my hand ready to throw it in when I saw the shoulder pop in the sixth," said Jimmy McDonnell, Williams's trainer. "But I kept hearing Danny telling me 'Jim, I need just one punch, just one punch and I can knock him out'."
Giovani Santillan makes a statement by taking out Alexis Rocha in round six of their welterweight contest.
In a spirited 147-pound match-up of top 5-ranked contenders under the WBO at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California in 2023, Giovani Santillan took the fight to Alexis Rocha.
The respective Southern California-bred pressure fighters stood in front of each other and traded power punches to the head/body for pretty much the entirety of their scrap however it was the heavier firepower possessed by the stronger Santillan AKA 'El Gallo de Oro' that proved to be the difference.
The assortment of two-fisted hooks and uppercuts that Santillan landed to the face of the very game Rocha, who had been on the ascend prior to bout, bloodied the Santa Ana native's nose early in round 2 while helping to also produce a trio of knockdowns in round 5 and 6. The final knockdown in the sixth frame led to veteran referee Ray Corona waving a halt to the fan-friendly affair.
With his statement-making, career-igniting TKO victory, Santillan captured the WBO-NABO Welterweight title.
Suffering bleeding of the eye so bad he couldn’t see, Henry Cooper is told enough is enough after five rounds against Muhammad Ali in 1963. Cooper protested and did not want the fight to be stopped, but to no avail.
One of the scariest knockouts in boxing history happened on Halloween night, 2020, at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas, when Gervonta "Tank" Davis knocked out Leo Santa Cruz in the sixth round of their bout with a powerful and perfectly timed left uppercut. In the sixth round, as Santa Cruz leaned in to throw a right hand with his back against the ropes, Davis slipped the punch and unleashed a devastating counter-uppercut that landed flush on Santa Cruz's chin, knocking him out cold instantly. Tank Davis is one of the most powerful and dangerous punchers in lightweight history, his uppercut comes hard, fast, and out of nowhere.
Here is the Gervonta"Tank" Davis- Leo Santa Cruz knockout. I remember watching this as it happened and literally hoping Santa Cruz would survive it, which he did thank goodness. There's a saying in boxing that the most dangerous punch is the one you never see coming, and that was the case right here, Santa Cruz never even saw the uppercut that turned his lights completely out.
Speaking of uppercuts, the 1960's Italian middleweight champion Nino Benvenuti had one of the most beautiful and vicious uppercuts in boxing history, his uppercut also came hard, fast, and out of nowhere. Here he is pictured landing his uppercut on the great Emile Griffith after defeating Griffith for the middleweight crown in 1967, Benvenuti became the first Italian middleweight champion in history that night. Benvenuti and Griffith are both all-time greats, Benvenuti actually had a record of 65-0 before suffering his first defeat.
In 1965, Nino Benvenuti took out Sandro Mazzinghi with that uppercut, it was similar to the Tank Davis-Leo Santa Cruz knockout, just boom, an uppercut out of nowhere and Mazzinghi was out cold.
I actually own this original type 1 photo of Nino Benvenuti after he lifted the middleweight crown from Emile Griffith, it's one of my favorite items in my collection, I love watching Benvenuti throw that famous uppercut. He also had a great left hook, but that uppercut is a thing of beauty.
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László Papp, the brilliant Hungarian southpaw who was the first fighter to win gold medals at three successive Olympics; and he might have achieved even greater success as a professional of Hungary's Communist government had not refused him permission to fight for a world title in 1965.
"I was one step away from a world title shot but it would have meant going to America and my government didn't approve," Papp said in an interview after the fall of communism in Hungary in 1989. "I think it was just jealousy. I was earning more money than most of them. There was a lot of antagonism.”
"I believe I had a good chance of winning the title as I had defeated others who defeated Joey Giardello," he said. "This is my one big regret in life." He retired undefeated having won 27 fights, 15 by knockout, with two draws.
"El Maromero" Jorge Páez, eccentric 1980s and 90s featherweight champion from Mexicali, México who was born into a family that operated a circus.
Páez was able perform many of the tricks and acts in his family's circus, like juggling, flips and other acrobatic stunts. His nickname "maromero" means "acrobat," and he would often enter the ring in elaborate costumes and/or with a funny haircut.
Love him or hate him, Páez truly was an entertainer.
Jorge “Maromero” Páez — The Champion Who Danced Through Life and History
Before he became one of Mexico’s most electrifying boxing legends, Jorge “Maromero” Páez was a circus artist — literally born under the big top. From acrobatics to uppercuts, from laughter to legacy, his journey embodies the purest form of Mexican passion, resilience, and showmanship.
The Circus Kid Who Shook the Boxing World
Growing up surrounded by performers, Páez developed the agility and charisma that would later make him a global boxing sensation. As a child, he performed stunts and worked as a security guard at his family’s circus. His uncle, recognizing his potential, trained him to box — and the ring became his new stage.
A True Fighter’s Story
In 1988, Páez achieved immortality when he defeated the undefeated American Calvin Grove, who held an impressive 34–0 record. Though behind on all judges’ cards, Maromero’s fearless attack in the final rounds floored Grove three times, earning him the IBF Featherweight World Title. He defended it eight times, each fight blending entertainment and endurance — dancing, jumping, even entering the ring in wedding dresses or clown outfits.
The Showman of the Ring
Fans didn’t just watch Páez fight — they watched him perform. His eccentric haircuts, acrobatic moves, and fearless attitude turned every bout into a celebration of life and Mexican spirit. He wasn’t just a boxer; he was a cultural icon — an artist in gloves, an entertainer who reminded the world that joy and courage belong in every fight.
A Life Beyond Boxing
After retiring with a record of 79 wins, 14 losses, and 5 draws, Páez found faith and humility. When asked why he didn’t seek fame like other idols, he replied:
“I don’t want to be an idol for anyone — God doesn’t like that.”
Legacy of a Legend
Maromero’s story is not only about titles or knockouts. It’s about transformation — from a circus boy to a world champion, from a showman to a man of faith. His life reminds every Mexican that greatness is born from hard work, heart, and the courage to be yourself.
“El Maromero” didn’t just fight — he flew. And when he did, all of Mexico flew with him.
Jorge Paez enters the ring in one of his entertaining outfits, a Vampire costume. He was entertaining as heck, but don't let the clowning around fool you, he was one hell of a warrior, IBF featherweight champion, defended his title 8 times with wins over solid fighters. Jorge Paez was a colorful character in boxing, but he was fearless, tough as nails, had good boxing skills, good power, he iced 52 opponents. He had a very unorthodox style, combining acrobatics with solid boxing fundamentals, it confounded opponents and delighted fans. He was a hard slugging showboater, he would throw six or seven shots at you in succession like a machine gun, loved it when he did that. You never knew what you were going to get when you watched a Paez fight, however, you knew something exciting was going to happen.
The famous Jorge Paez ring entrance in the wedding dress, Paez was a trip, you never knew what wild outfit he was going to show up in.
"After my victories I would always do the backflip. I wanted the fans to know I was a performer. I was there to give a show and I was from the circus. I wanted to be different from other fighters. Other fighters wore the same trunks almost all the time; I wanted to be different. I wanted to put on not only a good fight but a good show.' I was criticized a lot for being a clown, but I wasn't just a clown. I was a good clown who also came to fight." - Jorge Paez
Fascinating fighter.
Jorge Paez, "El Maromero", the man, the myth, the legend.
Freddie Welsh, "The Welsh Wizard", featherweight and lightweight in the early 1900s, one of the greatest to ever do it. The man holds wins over Benny Leonard, Ad Wolgast, Willie Ritchie, Johnny Dundee, Abe Attell, and Charlie White. That's one f... of a resume. Freddie Welsh a great practitioner of defensive boxing. In the ring, he was calm, elusive and a frustrating opponent for those who relied on power and aggression. He welcomed the opportunity to fight a brawler, fully confident that he would be able to out-slick him. Born in Wales on March 5, 1886, Frederick Hall Thomas came to America as a teenager and fell in love with boxing after witnessing a workout inside a Philadelphia gym. He turned pro in 1905 and fought under the name of Freddie Welsh. He was also known as "The Welsh Wizard." Welsh never shied away from tough competition, meeting Benny Leonard, Willie Ritchie and Ad Wolgast three times and Packey McFarland twice. A true boxing scientist, Welsh was a clever counterpuncher who believed in feinting and shifting his body to draw his opposition out of position. He campaigned in Pennsylvania through 1906, and for a brief period in 1907 he fought a series of bouts in his birthplace of Pontypridd, Wales. The slick boxer returned to the United States and rose to prominence in 1908 after the McFarland bouts. He lost the first contest but fought to a 25-round draw with the great McFarland in their second encounter. Welsh closed out the year with a 15-round decision win over reigning featherweight champ Abe Attell in a non-title fight. In 1909, he won the British lightweight title and in his first defense he faced Jem Driscoll, who was disqualified in the 10th round. In 1914, Welsh won the world lightweight title by decisioning Willie Ritchie in London. He sandwiched successful title defenses against Wolgast and Charlie White around a non-title win over Leonard. But when he met Leonard again in 1917, with the title on the line, Leonard scored a ninth-round knockout. Among the other legends Welsh met were Johnny Dundee, Battling Nelson, Rocky Kansas and Johnny Kilbane. Welsh served as a lieutenant in World War I and helped disabled veterans at Walter Reed Hospital. He was discharged a captain and returned to the ring in December of 1920. He fought five times over the ensuing 16 months and retired after dropping a 10-round decision to Archie Walker in 1922. Welsh went on to manage Jimmy Goodrich, who won the New York State lightweight title left vacant by Benny Leonard. Despite making a fortune in the ring, Welsh hit hard times and tragically died penniless and alone in a New York City hotel room at the age of just 41 in 1927. It was a sad ending to the life of one of the greatest fighters to ever step foot in a boxing ring.
Fast Freddie: Why Welsh Was A Wonder
By Mike Casey - There was that famous first fight between the two masters, and the fight before that with which many boxing fans of today might not be familiar. Before Benny Leonard figured out Freddie Welsh and took away his lightweight championship, Freddie had figured out Benny. It is so often the way it goes between two titans who are thrown together in the same little pocket of time. x Both men were geniuses of their profession, and I don’t describe them thus lightly. The once prized word of ‘genius’ has sadly lost much of its gloss in our super/brilliant/fantastic 24/7 era of eternal blue sky thinking. We like to think that geniuses come strolling down the trail every five minutes because it shields us from the uncomfortable fact that most of today’s ‘world champions’ fall woefully short of the mark. Boxing geniuses, for one thing, know how to throw a left jab properly. Most of us, I hope, appreciate the genius of Benny Leonard, although I have encountered a few starry-eyed souls who have told me that Benny would have been sent packing by Floyd Mayweather Jnr. But how many know of Freddie Welsh and all his glorious fistic and social contradictions? Pale and lean as a greyhound, Freddie was a fascinating conundrum in and out of the ring. Born in Pontypridd, Wales, he grew to be a master boxer, a brilliant exponent of the left jab and equally adept at scrapping and spoiling in the trenches. He could make hearts soar with the elegance and cleverness of his work or he could severely test the patience of his audience by cynically shutting his opponent down with artfully executed fouls and general negativity. That lively and intelligent brain in Freddie’s head was always buzzing and at war with itself. One could imagine Welsh constantly changing his mind and quickly tiring of trivial pursuits that failed to challenge his intellect. Freddie claimerd to be teetotal, a committed vegetarian and a non-smoker. And for most of the time, he was. He saw his body as a temple, long before such terminology became cool among the keep fit brigade. But this didn’t stop Welsh from partaking of the occasiomnal juicy chop, downing a nice glass of claret or puffing contentedly on those pleasantly lung-busting firworks known as Turkish cigarettes. Always a crafty operator, the young Freddie got the idea to set himself up as an instant expert on physical fitness and culture, buying a book on the subject and making himself sound suitably worldly. Then one of the students in his regular class threw a spanner in the works by suggesting that speed balls were needed to hone hand and eye co-ordination. There’s always an awkward one. Welsh, the great expert on such matters, had never punched a speed ball in his life. What he did next was typical of the way his mind worked. When the speed balls arrived, he bought himself time by dismissing them as sub-standard and demanding replacements. In the interim period he set about punching a speed ball assiduously in his own time until he had mastered the art. For one whose introduction to boxing and its paraphernalia was accidental, it is generally agreed that Freddie Welsh did pretty well thereafter. But let us get back to the business and beauty of the left jab. Thing of Beauty Back in the early days of 1965, Mel Beers wrote a nice little article on Welsh for the sadly long defunt Boxing International magazine. Here is what Beers had to say about the most important punch in the boxer’s repertoire: “The left jab, properly used, is a thing of beauty in motion. It is boxing’s basic punch and those who mastered it usually went on to become world champions or leading contenders. Billy Conn and Willie Pep mastered the jab. So did Abe Attell, Packey McFarland and Benny Leonard. Tommy Loughran was another who built his boxing wizardry around a jab that shot straight and true to any part of the opponent’s anatomy. “Who had the best left jab of all? It is impossible to say, but after plowing through piles of yellowed newspaper clippings and talking to scores of experts with long memories, the name of Freddie Welsh comes up more than any of the others.” Now, add that great jab of Freddie’s to his athleticism, quick mind and natural cleverness, and you begin to see why he was so special. He was also a tough and rugged man into the bargain. It is quite extraordinary how the simplest of weapons, when correctly employed, can not only endure throughnthe ages but completely negate and befuddle supposedly superior alternatives. Back in the mists of time, there was a fascinating little sparring match between an old and rusting Jem Mace and the brilliant Jem Driscoll. Such was Driscoll’s sublime skill that he made even Abe Attell look pedestrian in their classic New York encounter of 1909. Yet the few who were privileged to watch the session between Mace and Driscoll were astonished by Driscoll’s inability to keep Mace’s metronome of a left jab out of his face. The rise of Freddie Welsh to the top of the tree was not meteoric or sensational. Like a surgeon perfecting his trade, Freddie picked his way through the ranks slowly, cautiously and often drearily. The chess-playing side of Welsh wasn’t always appreciated by impatient crowds who had paid their money to see some good old-fashioned violence. But Freddie kept winning and then learned his business in earnest when he travelled to America and began to beat the cream of the crop. Boxing historian Mike Silver believes that Freddie Welsh is one of the most interesting characters to have ever won a boxing title. Here are Mike’s thoughts on the Welsh Wizard: “Welsh’s impressive performance against six of the greatest fighters of his generation says it all. During his prime he was a marvellous ring scientist whose mixture of orthodox and unorthodox moves puzzled and frustrated opponents for years. He possessed one of the keenest boxing minds in the history of the sport and was a true pioneer of his art. “After losing a newspaper decision to a near prime Benny Leonard in 1916, Freddie figured out the chess moves for the return match and outpointed Leonard. News reports of that ‘no decision’ fight stated that Welsh had outboxed the future lightweight champion. How many fighters can make that claim? He did the same to Abe Attell and Johnny Dundee. The Welsh Wizard also held Packey McFarland to a 20-round draw. “But perhaps Freddie’s most impressive performance of all was the time he made boxing master Jem Driscoll lose his cool. In their 1910 fight Driscoll was so frustrated by Welsh’s unorthodox methods and his ability to neutralise his great jab that Jem deliberately butted Welsh and was disqualified in the tenth round. It is obvious that even against great fighters, Welsh had the ability to make them fight his fight.” Riotous The fight with Driscoll was a riotous affair both in and out of the ring. Jem must have wondered how he ever contrived to lose the fight after the first five rounds in which his beautiful left jab ruled the roost. Freddie couldn’t get anywhere near the Peerless one. But then Welsh finally got inside and hammered Jem with a series of hard kidney punches. Encouraged by not getting so much as a warning from referee ‘Peggy’ Bettinson, Freddie upped the ante as the fight rumbled on by roughing up Driscoll in the clinches with some artfully executed head butts to the chin. Still referee Bettinson would not issue a warning as the crowd hooted and jeered Welsh’s foul tactics. From ringside, Jem’s reddened kidneys were clearly visible and it was clear to him that his complaints to Bettinson would continue to fall on deaf ears. For probably the only time in his professional career, Driscoll allowed his temper to fray. The red mist descended and all thoughts of science were discarded as he ripped into Welsh in a blind fury in the tenth round, pounding Freddie’s ribs with a succession of steaming hooks and swings. The comical part of all this, as only true devotees would notice in such a bedlam, was that Jem never stopped punching correctly. Such was his God-given grace, he could swing ‘em in from the bleachers and still look a picture of technical perfection. Then he gave Welsh some of his own medicine by butting him under the chin and throwing him across the ring. At long last, referee Bettinson woke up – and disqualified Driscoll! What followed, and what continued for some time, was a gorgeous brawl between irate Irishmen and Welshmen throughout the hall, until a team of Cardiff police constables finally broke it up. Mike Silver reminds us, quite correctly, that Welsh’s cagey and original style was a hybrid of both the English and American schools. Freddie took the classic elements of each and stirred them into his very own brew. “There was an unpredictable and deceptive quality to his work,” Mike notes. “An opponent never knew what he was going to do next. He could be a fine stand-up counter puncher and jab artist if it suited him, but he could also quickly morph into an aggressive in-fighter and mauler. “His brilliant defence, the key to everything he did in the ring, kept him world champion even after he’d passed his prime. He utilised footwork – blocking, ducking, swaying and side-stepping to great effect. No one was able to stop him and take the title in a no-decision fight until Leonard figured out how to do it.” Welsh’s great sense of timing and distance judgement were two other formidable assets that allowed him to maintain the ferocious schedule that was expected of the fighters of his era. Mike Silver reminds us of Freddie’s run-up to the world title, which required him to calculate his way through a minefield of golden talent: “After winning the newspaper nod over Johnny Dundee in January 1914, Welsh fought five more times that month! Four fights later, after having outpointed Joe Rivers and Leach Cross in 20-round bouts, he outfoxed Willie Ritchie for the lightweight title in yet another 20 rounder. That type of schedule would wreck today’s top fighters.” Mountain Freddie Welsh climbed to the top of the mountain when he dethroned Willie Ritchie and finally toppled off its peak against a Benny Leonard who was approaching his untouchable best. Both fights became etched in the memories of those who saw them. Welsh’s disciplined mind was geared to expecting any opponent to be at his very best. He had heard of Willie Ritchie’s punching power and his big right hand. But Willie was a slow starter and he knew it himself as he prepared in his dressing room on the night of July 7, 1914, at Olympia in Kensington. He reportedly boxed the equivalent of six rounds with selected sparring partners as he awaited his call to the ring. By contrast, Welsh, who might have made a good Mr Spock if he had come along later in life, was his usual precise self. A series of breathing exercises were followed by exactly 10 minutes’ sleep before he and Ritchie were notified that referee Eugene Corri had entered the ring. Artful Freddie, who had injured his left eye in training, climbed through the ropes with a piece of sticking plaster over his right eye. The pattern of the battle was quickly set as Welsh employed his nimble footwork and quick hands to outbox the plodding Ritchie. For all his exertion in the dressing room, Willie just couldn’t seem to get out of the starting blocks. With uncanny instinct, Freddie appeared able to anticipate Ritchie’s punches before Willie had even begun to twitch. On the rare occasions when Ritchie cornered Welsh, the skilful challenger demonstrated his all round ability by dropping the fancy stuff and fighting his way out. But Ritchie’s reputation as a battler to be feared was not the stuff of myth. In the fourth round, he suddenly speeded up and became a more dangerous proposition, his streaking attacks making the contest a much more competitive affair. Welsh always retained the edge, but now it was a splendid duel of exciting out-fighting and intelligent close quarter work. Watching the action was a good old writer of the time called Denzil Batchelor, who wrote: “There was no clinching. It was a beautiful fight to watch and as rare as it was beautiful. How many of the most eagerly anticipated fights of a lifetime consist, when we get down to statistics, of seventy per cent hugging and thirty per cent boxing? Referee Corri had told these two exceptionally intelligent boxers that at a tap on the shoulder from him they must break instantly. They obeyed him to the letter.” While Ritchie’s famous right hand was always a threat to Welsh, Batchelor compared Freddie’s talent for blocking that punch with his left forearm as being almost the equal of Jack Johnson. Only once, in a torrid tenth round, did Welsh get seriously caught. A peach of a right from Willie slammed against Freddie’s jaw and might have put him in serious jeopardy. But Welsh turned his head a vital fraction before the moment of impact, taking just enough steam out of the blow. Fighting back bravely but always intelligently, Freddie steered his way through the remainder of the battle to earn Corri’s decision and the world lightweight championship. Freddie reigned for three years before Benny Leonard came calling again. Old gunfighters never stop being challenged and finally get beaten to the draw. Welsh had fought off opposition of mighty quality throughout his illustrious career, but even the engine rooms of the cleverest men eventually malfunction and wear down. In short, Freddie was in the autumn of his fighting years while brilliant Benny was just beginning to soar to those giddy heights that only the special few ever reach. On May 28, 1917, in old New York, the 21-year old Leonard set a ferocious pace and made Welsh’s lean body the principal target. Punching hard and fast, Benny fired in accurate shots to the ribs and stomachs as he pursued the 31-year old champion constantly. Seeking to smash through the champion’s ring of confidence, the sprightly challenger cheekily stuck out his chin as an inviting target. Welsh was a boxer who rarely miscued tactically, but now he was being lured into errors by a similarly clever and agile mind. In the fourth round, Leonard nailed Freddie with that flashing right counter that would become a potent trademark of the brilliant New Yorker. Freddie’s head was thrown back and his knees dipped from the force of the blow. He couldn’t make his legs work for a few desperate seconds, but then he showed all his ring savvy as he bluffed and hustled his way through the crisis. In truth, however, the old stager was just delaying the inevitable, as great and proud champions do. He must have known it was over, just as the equally instinctive Leonard must have realised that this was his big night. He was on Freddie in a flash at the start of the ninth, knocking the Welshman down with a right that cut straight through his defence. Stubborn pride got the better of Welsh, who jumped up without taking a count and walked straight into a firestorm. Leonard swept straight through Freddie’s brave defiance, cutting him down for the second time with another cracking right. It was a blow that sent Freddie’s mind into an inescapable fog. He was an easy target when he got to his feet and the final driving blow from Benny – a left this time – left the broken champion in an eerie limbo. Somehow he remained upright, but he was gone as he grabbed the ropes and staggered drunkenly against them. Leonard moved in to apply the coup de grace, but the referee intervened and stopped the fight just as it seemed that Welsh would tumble through the ropes. There would be other fights for Freddie. The temptation to come back is always a powerful drug for a fighter to get out of his system. He returned to action in 1920 but enjoyed only moderate success before retiring in 1922. The end? Oh no, not for someone like Welsh. He never did lose his love of physical fitness (including that odd glass of claret and Turkish cigarette) and enjoyed a nice old time as the boss of a health farm for millionaires in America. As Denzil Batchelor concluded: “God bless my soul, sir, there was only one Freddie Welsh in the world.
This is Freddie Welsh posing on a rooftop, fighters used to pose a lot on rooftops in the early days of the sport.
This is fascinating stuff, a Freddie Welsh vs Ad Wolgast fight advertisement in the sports section of a newspaper from 1916. Of course Ad Wolgast was a beast of a fighter with a hellish mindset, Wolgast was known for being able to dish out and absorb horrific punishment. Welsh beat him all three times they fought.
In 1916, Freddie Welsh defended the lightweight championship with a 20 round points decision over Charley White in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Part of the arena collapsed before the fight, killing two and injuring more than 100. Charley White was a thunderous puncher, his left hook was murder, White damn near flattened the great Benny Leonard with that left hook. This is a report from The New York Times journalism, as it originally appeared.
MILWAUKEE, Wis., Feb, 25.- Freddie Welsh outboxed Charlie White in a ten- round no-decision boxing contest at the Auditorium tonight according to the almost unanimous opinion of sporting writers. Welsh appeared to have had the advantage of five rounds, the third to the seventh inclusive. White shaded his opponent in the ninth and tenth and the first, second, and eighth appeared to be even. The Englishman had White at his mercy during most of the fight, being fast and clever and getting away without punishment. White was slow and seemed unable to solve Welsh's whirlwind style of attack. In the earlier rounds Welsh set a brisk pace, but found White willing to mix with him at all times. White waited carefully for openings, in the evident hope of shooting in the short left hook for which he is famous; but the champion's shifty footwork and clever blocking made many of his efforts of no avail.
Good shot of Freddie Welsh in his prime.
Freddie Welsh (left) and Benny Leonard, two all-time greats. They fought each other twice, Welsh won the first fight and Leonard won the second.
Great up close shot of Freddie Welsh.
In their only known fight, Freddie Welsh defeated Abe Attell by a 15-round decision on November 25, 1908. The featherweight bout took place at Jeffries' Arena in Vernon, California. Attell was the reigning featherweight champion at the time, though the fight did not have a title on the line. Abe Attell is another all-time great, he was a ruthless little fighter that ruled the featherweight division with an iron fist for the better part of twelve years, it was one of the most dominant runs in boxing history. But Welsh was a genius, beating Benny Leonard and Abe Attell, truly a special fighter.
All-time great fighters usually have books written about them, and Freddie Welsh, "The Welsh Wizard", is no exception.
Vincent Pettway scored one of the most frightening knockouts of all time when he defended the IBF junior middleweight by 6th round KO over Simon Brown at the US Air Arena in Landover, Maryland in 1995.
While the KO in this bout is extremely memorable, the fight itself was one of the most foul-filled bouts shown on television in the last few decades.
Brown was already a two-division champion known for scoring a huge upset of Terry Norris in 1993, but he lost a rematch the following year. The comparatively unheralded Pettway was on a good run after dethroning long-time champion Gianfranco Rosi to win the belt.
It was obvious from the opening bell what the fight would look like: Pettway moved his feet to keep away from Brown, who played the boxer-puncher in pursuit. But Pettway stood still a bit too long and Brown caught him with a left hand followed by a quick combination that sent him down. Brown attempted to follow up in round 2, but Pettway moved on him and stayed away. Brown tried to move back to the inside in round 3, but he ran into a right hand that put him on the canvas in return.
The firefight looked to be all but over in round 5 when Pettway was sent through the ropes following a low blow. Pettway got up and both fighters swiped at one another after the bell.
In a fateful 6th round, Pettway connected with a right hand off the ropes that bounced Brown onto the canvas. In a wild scene, Brown was on the canvas unconscious and flat on his back, yet still throwing punches in his sleep.
"He really surprised me in the first round," Pettway said. "(But the fouls) just made me come back and want to fight harder."
The Vincent Pettway-Simon Brown knockout, one of the most frightening knockouts you'll ever see. Brown was a great, great fighter, but sometimes you're the hammer and sometimes you're the nail, and Brown got caught cold and he was on the canvas and his brain was still reacting as if he was standing and fighting, he was still throwing punches even though he was unconscious.
The great Sam Langford, "The Boston Tar Baby", one of the most feared fighters in boxing history. Hit like a freight train. Quite a few people consider Langford to be the greatest pound-for-pound fighter in boxing history and he has an argument for that. While starting at 140lbs, he actually moved up and knocked out some of the best big Heavyweights of his time like George Godfrey, and Jim Johnson. He basically signed to fight every boogeyman fighter between 140lbs and 230lbs, and KO'd most of them. He was insane. Fair to have him on top.
"I fought most of the heavyweights including Dempsey and Johnson, but Sam could stretch a guy colder than any of them. When Langford hit me it felt like someone slugged me with a baseball bat. It was like taking ether. You just went to sleep." - "Fireman" Jim Flynn
Can't get enough of "Sailor" Tom Sharkey. Here he is talking about what it was like back then.
'I know this was the hardest fight I ever lost. It was against a fellow known as Mexican Pete - a tough guy. The referee was even tougher. He was Horse Johnson. Around the middle of the first round I got set and nailed Mexican Pete on the chin with a full left hand. The back of his head hit the floor and Mexican Pete was colder than a mackerel on ice. But Horse Johnson leaned down and lifted Mexican Pete's right hand. 'Here's the winner,' Johnson said.
I was ready to kiII him. I rushed at the referee and said, 'You're either crazy or crooked. That was a clean knockout.'
'I say Mexican Pete won,' Horse Johnson said. And as he said it he pulled out a forty-five and stuck it in the pit of my stomach. I didn't even think twice, for we were fighting in a tough town where everyone had backed Mexican Pete. 'You're right,' I said. 'Mexican Pete wins.'
Those were tough days in the fight game. We fought in rain and sleet and snow, and no champion ever aspired to be a gent. We fought with a bunch of guns around the ring, looking for trouble. They were hard days - very hard days.' - "Sailor" Tom Sharkey
"Sugar" Ray Leonard made his first defense of the WBC welterweight title with a truly brutal 4th round KO of Dave "Boy" Green in Landover, Maryland on March 31st in 1980.
Leonard dominated early, drawing blood from Green's nose in round 1. Leonard then continued to do damage with his jab, until round 4 when Leonard closed the show spectacularly.
A combination punctuated by a hook and an uppercut put Green to sleep for several minutes. There was no use for a count and no count was rendered.
"The majority of the time, my speed is the difference in any fight," Leonard said later. "My speed will overcome experience or power or whatever I meet in the ring. I'm not surprised that I got in the first punch or the most punches. That's the way I fight."
Prime Sugar Ray Leonard was an absolutely lethal finisher, if he had you hurt and smelled blood in the water, you were screwed. His knockout of Andy Price in 1979 is one of the most vicious and brutal knockouts I've ever seen. He pinned Price against the ropes, hurt him, and then machine gunned him into another dimension.
On October 3rd, 2020, Jose "Chon" Zepeda scored an incredible 5th round KO of Ivan Baranchyk in Las Vegas, Nevada. Both fighters were down four times apiece, and the memorable war was voted 2020's "Fight of the Year" by The Ring.
Leigh Wood rose from a knockdown and made a brutal defense of the WBA featherweight title when he scored a nasty 12th round TKO of Michael Conlan at the Nottingham Arena in Nottingham, England in 2022.
After hitting the deck in round 1, Wood struggled to right the ship and bank rounds as the former Olympian won some for himself. But the tide changed with passing rounds, and eventually Wood caught up as Conlan tired. In the 11th, Wood scored a knockdown, signaling that he saw a potential end to the fight. And in the 12th, he bashed Conlan through the ring ropes to get a stoppage.
"I hit him with everything, but he's so tough," Wood said. "I'm just thinking about Mick now. It was a bad knockout."
"Skinny" Joe Lynch, two-time bantamweight champion, tough as nails Irishman from Hell's Kitchen, one of the greatest Golden roosters to ever do it. He fought in the deepest and most stacked era in bantamweight history. Lynch had an aggressive style with good power, and an anvil for a chin, he had around 160 career fights and he was never knocked out.
From 50 greatest bantamweights of all-time.
13. Joe Lynch (1915-1926)
Joe Lynch is our first introduction to a true monster of a true golden age of the bantamweights, a series of champions and contenders that made for the best division in all of boxing in and around the 1920s.
Despite the consistently high level of competition, Lynch was champion of the world not once, but twice, first taking the title from the immortal Pete (Kid) Herman during Christmas of 1920 and then from the capable but less deadly Johnny Buff in the summer off 1922. His 1920 pass at the world championship may have been his best performance. Herman had suffered a ragged year and was likely past his absolute peak but he still had some exceptional nights before him. Tall, rangy, slender, Lynch was blessed with perhaps the best one-two in an era stuffed with technicians. An underdog, he landed enough of these punches to win as many as ten of the fifteen rounds.
Lynch, who struggled at the weight nevertheless spent around a decade at bantamweight and used similar tactics to build one of the single best win resumes in the history of the division. He defeated Pete Herman, Frankie Burns, Memphis Pal Moore, Kid Williams, Abe Goldstein, Charles LeDoux, Young Montreal, Joe Burman, Jack Wolfe and many more noted men of an era as stacked as any that has ever existed at any weight.
Taken in tandem with two stints as world champion it has resulted in his being ranked at #4 at the weight by Nat Fleischer, and #11 by the IBRO; here, he appears further down.
A great bantamweight – a bantamweight capable of beating literally any 118lb fighter who ever has lived.
The Rockland County Times
Our Forgotten but Notable Neighbors: Joseph Lynch
By Jerome Kleiman
In 2005, when Joe Lynch was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame, it was already 40 years since his death. He had twice been the Bantamweight Champion of the World back in the early 1920s, the Roaring Twenties, an era known as the Golden Age of Boxing, when boxing was the preeminent sport in the world, and when there was only one champion in each weight class. During this period Joe Lynch was a household name, known far and wide by both boxing fans and non-fans alike, so popular was the sport and so famous were its champions.
Although he has largely faded into obscurity, remembered mostly by sports historians, there is a side to Joe Lynch’s story that is very relevant to Rockland County, for he spent most of his life here as an extremely active and civic-minded resident of New City, NY. Joe Lynch was born in 1896 to an impoverished Irish immigrant family on Manhattan’s West Side. Today it is upscale and known as Hell’s Kitchen, but at the time it was a rough and poverty-stricken area in which one had to learn to defend himself to survive. Lynch is quoted as saying, “I had to fight in the neighborhood or wouldn’t have been a good Irishman.” But street fighting helped prepare him for his future profession. Always good with his dukes, he realized that if you are going to fight anyway, why not get paid for it, and hence he took an interest in boxing, the manly art of self-defense. In 1918, at the age of 18, and following a short stint as an amateur, he had his first play-for-pay fight
Always very skinny, Joe was able to box as a bantamweight, which has a 118lbs limit. At the time, unlike today, the smaller fighters were numerous and also extremely popular with the fans. Lynch had a major advantage over most of his opponents since at 5’8” he was several inches taller and had a significantly longer reach. Besides that, he packed an explosive right-hand wallop, was an intelligent ring gen- eral, and owned a chin of stone (he was never knocked-out). With all those tools, he rapidly made his way up the ladder in his division.
Fighting almost on a weekly basis, he perfected his skills — pacing, knowing when to attack and when to stay out of range, how to counterpunch and how to adjust his style to different opponents. World War I interrupted his career. Lynch became a Doughboy, serving in France for over a year as a member of the 27th h Infantry Division.
Once back in the states, he rapidly became a top contender. On December 22, 1920, at Madison Square Garden, despite fighting with a broken left thumb, Joe Lynch defeated Pete Herman of New Orleans in a 15-round deci- sion to become the Bantamweight Champion of the World. Lynch would defend his belt several times, only to lose it to Herman in a rematch. Then, on July 10, 1922, he regained the title by KO’ing the then World Champion Johnny Buff of Jersey City.
Two years later Joe relinquished the title again, this time losing a decision to Abe Gold- stein. By 1924, it was becoming very difficult for Lynch to make weight. Before the Goldstein fight, he had to spend hours in the steam room sweating off pounds to get down to 118lbs. In doing so he depleted his energy, which contributed to his loss to Bernstein, a man he had knocked out a few years before.
Joe had followed his father’s advice to save his money, and with in excess of 150 professional fights under his belt, at age 30 the frugal Mr. Lynch was already a very wealthy man. Realizing that it was becoming too difficult to continue as a Bantamweight and tired of starving himself before big fights, Lynch decided to retire.
In 1926, with his wife, the former Anna Harvey, who had been his childhood sweetheart, Lynch purchased over 70 acres of farmland in New City, bounded on the south by New Hempstead Road, opposite today’s Rockland County Courthouse and Government Office buildings, where the now deserted Sain building, and the Animal Medical of New City stand.
With no intention of personally doing any farming, they leased the fields to local farmers. Friendly, gregarious and now finally able to eat without having a trainer constantly looking over his shoulder, Joe Lynch joined many local civic groups in New City. Far away from the West Side slums, and the hustle and bustle of the big city, once relocating to the New City of nearly 100 years ago, a sparsely populated, rural community with trees instead of tenements, and fertile soil instead of hard asphalt side- walks, Joe spent a lot of time involved with the New City Fire Department and the local Democratic Party club.
In 1928, for a short while, Joe Lynch together with his partner, George M. Cohan, the most famous entertainer of the day, owned the Elms Hotel, across the street from the then newly build County Courthouse. Joe was a very ac- tive member of the fire department for many years, serving several terms as firehouse foreman and then fire chief. He was known as the “fire-fighting chief and fighting fire-chief”. He also served as president of the New City Democratic Club and V.P. of the Rockland County Democratic club. He even ran for County Constable and is said to have been a County Deputy Sheriff. In addition, among his other involvements, Lynch was a member of the Elks. In 1926 at the induction ceremony there were three new members, the former world boxing champion, a local judge and a priest from Nanuet — quite a threesome.
During the FDR administration, the Postmaster General was James “Big Jim” Farley from Stony Point. Back when Lynch had been champion, Farley had been the Chairman of the NY State Athletic Commission, and the two proud Irishmen had become acquainted. In the late 1930s, Postmaster General Farley appointed his old boxing buddy and now hard- working Democrat, Mr. Joseph Lynch, as the Postmaster of the New City Post Office. Lynch would continue in that position until the early 1950s. Following the election of Dwight Eisenhower as President, a Republican was appointed as the New City postmaster. Anna Lynch, who had been very active in local church activities, died in 1955. She and Joe never had children. Joe Lynch, after losing his Post-master position kept a low profile. He began to lose vision in one eye. Maybe the effects of absorbing punches in over 150 professional bouts were finally catching up to him. On September 1,1965, at the age of 68, he accidentally drowned in Sheepshead Bay where he had been visiting family members. For a few days, stories about the death of this once great boxer appeared throughout the nation and beyond. Joe Lynch is still considered one of the greatest Bantamweight boxers of all-time. The eminent boxing writer Nat Fleischer ranked him #4. Boxing Scene has him at #8. And, as previously mentioned, he was inducted into the Inter- national Boxing Hall of Fame in 2005. However, Joe Lynch would also want to be remembered as a proud, long-term resident of New City and Rockland County, as a neighbor who was very involved in civic activities, and as an indispensable part of his community. Joseph and Anna Lynch are buried in the St. Anthony’s Catholic Cemetery in Nanuet.
Sadly there's no footage of Joe Lynch, and when that happens all we have to go by are newspaper accounts from members of the press that attended the fights. This is a written account by the New York Times of the fight when Joe Lynch beat Pete "Kid" Herman for the bantamweight crown in 1920. It should be noted that like Lynch, Herman was a beast, one of the greatest bantams in the history of the sport. Both Lynch and Herman are legends in this sport. Pete (Kid) Herman is the same Kid Herman that produced the famous boxing card set of exhibit cards from the 1940s. I much prefer having footage of a fighter, but I really enjoy reading these articles, it's interesting in it's own way. You read these accounts and try to visualize what a fighter looked like in the ring, it's fascinating.
Pete (Kid) Herman on the left and Joe Lynch on the right
LYNCH TAKES TITLE FROM PETE HERMAN; West Side Boxer Wins Bantamweight Crown by Decision in Bout at Garden.VICTOR HAS WIDE MARGIN New Champion Outpoints Rival Decisively--Has Ten of the Fifteen Rounds. GREAT CROWD SEES BATTLE Throng of 15,000 Fills Big Arena--Wild Scene Follows Announcement of Judges' Verdict. Bout Not Out of Ordinary. Lynch Better Boxer. West Sider Aggressive. Herman Aggressor at First. Great Ovation for Lynch. Bantams Draw Big Crowd.
Dec. 23, 1920
A new world's bantamweight boxing champion was crowned last night in the ring of Madison Square before a palpitating crowd of 15,000 spectators who jammed and crammed every inch of the old fistic arena. Joe Lynch, a west side Irishman, gained the verdict of Judges Martin G. McCue and William Muldoon over Pete Herman of New Orleans, who has held the title for more than three years, after fifteen rounds of boxing that was in no sense above the ordinary. The decision, carrying with it the world's premier ring laurels in the bantam division of fistiana and a gold and diamond-studded championship belt donated by Promoter Tex Rickard, was vociferously received by the great throng which crowded the old amphitheater. Lynch had won and won cleanly. There could be no question of the west side boxer's right to the verdict, and the important distinction which it carried. The champion had been decisively outpointed by a margin of at least ten rounds to five, and there was, therefore, no excuse for any but a Lynch verdict. That the decision was popular was attested by the wild scene which ensued immediately Announcer Joe Humphries's clarion tones had been swallowed in a tumultuous shout which greeted the new bantam titleholder. Bout Not Out of Ordinary. The battle, as said before, did not reach a standard beyond the ordinary as far as actual work was concerned. There was none of the spectacular, sensational or dramatic about Lynch's triumph. Both boxers appreciated the importance of the match and their work reflected this feature in marked degree. Herman particularly was disappointing for he made no such real efforts to retain his laurels as would be expected of a champion. By this is meant that he failed to combat his opponent's attack with the sort of work commonly expected of a ring titleholder, whose means of livelihood depends on destruction and effect he accomplishes with his glove-encased fists. In only five rounds did Herman show to advantage, and in only two of these sessions did he work anything at all like a champion. Lynch, on the other hand, appreciated the opportunity open to him and worked accordingly. He took no chances beyond what he would take in the ordinary course of events against any other boxer. He boxed cautiously, following well-defined attack, in which his crushing right was the chief method of dealing out punishment. There was none of the sensational flurries Lynch showed against Sharkey or Goldstein. Both of whom crumpled before Lynch's blows in the same ring in recent bouts. Lynch earned ten of the fifteen rounds. He carried off the third, fourth, fifth, seventh, ninth, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth rounds. In these sessions Lynch carried the offensive and crashed home solid blows to the face and stomach which stung Herman. The latter refused to fight back, however, taking the punishment and falling into clinches, where he sought without effect to pepper Lynch about the midsection. Herman took the first, second, sixth, tenth and eleventh rounds. In the first three sessions which were his the dethroned champion did not impress by margin his superiority. He gained each of the three rounds by the smallest of margins and only after the hardest work. Lynch Better Boxer. In addition to the physical handicaps he was laboring under, Herman was at a further disadvantage in boxing ability. He was facing an opponent whose work was superior in every respect. The combination proved too great for the little New Orleans boxer to hurdle. Herman's greatest work was accomplished at close quarters. It was then that he peppered the west side lad about the stomach with rights and lefts until Lynch held to protect himself from the punishment. In this department Lynch was excelled, but the west side boy made up for the disparity in this respect through his work at long range. Lynch always kept his left hand extended, pawing and jabbing with the fist, always waiting for the opportunity to crash home a right. When the chance did present itself the west side Irishman would let fly with a crack which rattled Herman's teeth and shook the New Orleans Italian from head to heel. Repeatedly Herman sought the refuge of a clinch after receiving one of Lynch's terrific slams. Lynch's fast work with both hands, his speed of foot and the offensive which he carried over the greater part of the battle, gained him the honors of the bout and the title. He boxed rings around Herman at long-range boxing, albeit there were infrequent instances when Herman, with a swift left hook or plunging left jab, beat his bigger opponent to the punch. The power behind the west sider's right, however, discouraged Herman's efforts at long-range exchanges, and the result was that the New Orleans boxer confined himself for the most part to rapid work with both hands at close quarters. For this assault Lynch provided an effective defense after the third round. The west aider securely tied Herman's hands and had the Southerner powerless in the clinches. Herman earned but five of the rounds, and in three of these sessions his advantage was by the slimmest possible margin. The tenth and eleventh rounds were the best for the dethroned champion, but not even by his work in these two rounds could Herman make an impression on the margin Lynch accumulated in points. Lynch carried off the honors in every round except the first two, the sixth, tenth and eleventh. In the latter two sessions Herman pummeled his rival severely about the stomach with his peppery attack, and bobbed Lynch's head from side to side with left hooks. Occasionally the titleholder tried with a right for the jaw, but the blow never landed on its objective, sailing harmlessly past Lynch's protruding chin for the most part, or winding around the west sider's neck. West Sider Aggressive. In the third, fourth and fifth rounds Lynch brought the crowd to its feet in an orgy of cheering when he had Herman shaky from the terrific rights the west sider dealt out. Several times in the closing four rounds, too, Lynch snook Herman with his powerful right- hand drives, but the west sider was too eager and anxious in following up his advantages, and, as a result, was wild. Lynch implanted a wholesome respect for his punching power in Herman early In the bout. In the third session he crashed home a right which landed high on the temple. Herman's knees sagged and he gave an involuntary lurch forward, falling into a clinch. Lynch shook his rival off and tried to follow his advantage. Herman backed to the ropes Bout Not Out of Ordinary. Lynch Better Boxer. West Sider Aggressive. and Lynch, seeking to finish his rival, was wild and ineffective, while the crowd urged the west sider on in a terrific din of cheers. Herman protected himself effectively, drawing his gloved left hand up in a perfect defense for his jaw. The result was that Lynch's blows had no immediate effect and Herman recovered quickly. Several times in the fourth and fifth rounds Lynch crashed home his right, never quite on the vulnerable point of the chin, but always with stinging power back of the blow. Herman was sent crashing back on the ropes and was hard pressed to defend himself against a knockout. From the twelfth round to the finish Lynch repeated the dose, hitting the New Orleans lad savagely with stinging left-hand jabs and right crosses which took all the fight out of the defending champion and gave Lynch a lead in points which insured victory beyond doubt. Herman Aggressor at First. For the first two rounds Lynch did little. Herman was the aggressor and carried the fighting. The Southern boxer worked to close quarters, where he peppered Lynch about the mid-section with rapid-fire blows against which the west sider could not defend himself. Lynch contented himself with pecking away at long range, without accomplishing anything of moment. In the third Lynch landed his first real hard punch, a right to the temple, which made Herman waver for a fraction of a second. The crowd yelled wildly as the defending champion lurched forward and his knees sagged, but Lynch was wild in his effort to apply the finishing touches and Herman quickly recovered. Through the fourth and fifth sessions Lynch continued his offensive and several times shook Herman with jolting rights to the side of the face and jaw. The latter fought strictly on the defensive until the sixth round, when he took the lead and kept the fighting at close quarters, where Herman enjoyed a distinct advantage. Through the seventh, eighth and ninth rounds Lynch showed to advantage, jabbing with his left and seeking to force an opening for his crushing right. Herman was wary, however, and protected himself against possible attack on the jaw. In the tenth and eleventh rounds Herman again flashed in front, carrying Lynch before him in a hurricane offensive which completely surprised the west sider and threw him on the defensive. The milling in these two rounds was mostly at close quarters, and Lynch absorbed considerable punishment about the stomach. The west sider sought to keep Herman at bay with his left, but the Southerner came in steadily against the jab and worked diligently with both hands to the stomach. The recovery was only a flash in the pan, however, and from the twelfth session to the final bell Lynch was clearly entitled to the honors. Several times in the closing four rounds Lynch landed with his right, but always the blow was robbed of its power because it had to advance past Herman's protecting upraised left. The west sider repeatedly forced Herman to the ropes, and while holding the Southerner there, tried to force openings for his right, but invariably the blows went wild or high and had little effect. In the fourteenth round Herman was shaken with a heavy right to the jaw and he showed he did not relish the punishment by falling into a clinch. Emerging, he danced out of danger until his head had cleared. The final round found Lynch still the aggressor and seeking to land a finishing blow on his elusive rival, but Herman guarded well and frustrated his rival's efforts in this direction. Great Ovation for Lynch. Seldom has Madison Square Garden, the scene of some of the greatest ring combats in history, witnessed an orgy quite the parallel of that which greeted the crowning of the new champion. Friends of Lynch, of whom there was an overwhelming majority scattered through the capacity crowd, rushed pell-mell past all restraining hands to the ringside in an effort to clutch their idol in their embrace. Two of the joy-crazed Lynch admirers broke past the outspread arms of special policemen with their night sticks poised, and, clambering into the ring, grabbed Lynch In an embrace which threatened physical injury for the lad who had just attained the ambition of a lifetime. Lynch was madly separated from the morose Herman by a husky who wanted to dance a jig and kiss the west sider all in the same motion. The new title holder finally gained his freedom and again clasped the lifeless hand of Herman. Then, moving to the side of the ring, he leaned down between the ropes and grabbed Assemblyman McCue's right hand in a warm clasp. Flushed with the joy of victory, Lynch then strode across the ring to where Judge Muldoon stood, carried out of his ringside seat by the surging tide of humanity about him after he had handed up the slip which had its share in giving Lynch the title. A hearty shake, and then Lynch stepped down out of the ring into the wildest commotion imaginable. Everybody wanted to grab the new champion and hoist him aloft on sturdy shoulders. For a time Lynch successfully defended himself against this friendly assault, but in the end he had to submit and, atop the broad backs of his friends from the west side of the city, Lynch was carried back to his dressing room. It was a wonderful Christmas present and none appreciated it more than Joe Lynch.
A few photos of the great Joe Lynch in his prime.
Lynch on the right skipping rope.
Two exhibit cards of Joe Lynch from the time period, the top one is autographed by Lynch himself.
Good up close shot of Joe Lynch at his peak, a monster bantam.
On July 10th, 1922, Joe Lynch defeated Johnny Buff by TKO in the 14th round to win the World Bantamweight Championship for a second time in Velodrome New York. Lynch, who had a height and reach advantage, used effective defense and counterpunching to control the fight, which ended when he landed a decisive left hook to Buff's jaw. Lynch is pictured here on the left, facing off with Buff before the fight. Johnny Buff had recently won the bantamweight title from Pete Herman. Some felt that fighting Lynch so soon after winning the title was poor matchmaking for Buff, and indeed that was the case.
This is a cool piece of memorabilia from Joe Lynch's time in the military, he was a doughboy during WW1.
I love flipping through these old issues of Ring magazine, this is a 1965 edition with an article about Joe Lynch.
One last photo of Lynch and we'll move on, such a great fighter.
Barbados Joe Walcott, aka "The Barbados Demon", he was nicknamed that for a reason. The guy was a damn demon. He was a small guy, he started out at lightweight, but man could he hit. Fearless son of a gun, he'd fight anyone, he fought heavyweights, he knocked them out. He turned pro in 1890 at the age of just seventeen, and within five years he had established himself as one of the most fearsome and powerful battlers in America. Fight fans and pundits of the day regarded him as nothing less than the hardest-hitting welterweight they had ever seen, and he carried his power with him up through the weight divisions, a true monster puncher. Walcott’s abilities stemmed in large part from his physical gifts which had nothing to do with size and weight and everything to do with natural strength, power, stamina and durability. Standing under 5’2″, Walcott sported a massive upper body for his stature with an 18 inch neck, a 41 inch chest, and long, powerful arms. Nat Fleischer, the founder of Ring magazine, once called Walcott a "sawed-off Hercules." One of the great pound-for pound-fighters in boxing history, this guy is the reason the great Arnold Cream fought under the name Jersey Joe Walcott, as a tribute to the legendary Barbados Joe Walcott.
Joe Walcott, The Barbados Demon...“The Bigger They Are The Harder They Fall.”
By: Monte D. Cox
It was Joe Walcott, the Barbados Demon, welterweight champion of the world from 1901-1904, who actually coined the phrase "the bigger they are the harder they fall." Bob Fitzsimmons certainly popularized the saying before he faced Jim Jeffries, but it was Walcott who first said it. The phrase belonged to Walcott, who despite his short stature was extremely successful against much larger and heavier opponents. He had fantastic stamina and durability as well as a proven punch. A natural welterweight, he was one of the greatest "pound for pound" fighters in boxing history and fought men weighing from lightweight to heavyweight during his career.
Joe Walcott, the "original", had the power to beat heavyweights; in fact he scored a first round kayo over 180 pound Tom McCarthy fairly early in his career. Walcott fought a number of other light heavyweights and heavyweights. Walcott's manager, Tom O'Rourke, also handled heavyweight contender Sailor Tom Sharkey, whom some historians compare favorably to Rocky Marciano. Sharkey twice went the distance with heavyweight champion Jim Jeffries. O'Rourke once stated, (Fleischer, p. 198-199), "I had to stop Walcott from sparring with the sailor because Joe dumped him on his ear one afternoon in the gym." Walcott hit hard enough to knock out heavyweights. Can one picture modern welterweights such as De La Hoya, Felix Trinidad or even Ray Robinson ko'ing a 180 plus pounder? Robinson ventured up to light heavyweight once, running out of gas against Joey Maxim. He never again moved beyond the middleweight limit.
Walcott often gave weight to opponents and came out victorious. For one of his fights against Dick O'Brien, considered one of the best fighters of his weight, The Aug. 28, 1895 Boston Herald reported "Walcott, according to Tom O'Rourke, weighed 138 pounds, against O'Brien's 150 pounds. This ordinarily would be considered a great handicap. Few fighters would care to give away a dozen pounds. But so certain was O'Rourke that his man would win that he waived the weight." Walcott knocked out O'Brien in 2 minutes and 25 seconds of the first round.
The Aug, 28, 1895 Police News stated, "Walcott now surpasses any of our welterweights, unless it be (Mysterious) Billy Smith, in the telling execution of a single blow. I do not see how he is to be beaten by any foeman who will give him hit for hit. Any man except a very big man whom he gets his right hand on to fairly and squarely isn't coming up for much more. Walcott in his dumpy, dwarf monitor build, his hardness of flesh, his power of punching and the small surface he offers for return hits, is in a class by himself-different from anything else in the field."
McCallum wrote (p. 194), “Walcott was something of a physical freak. Despite his size, he had the stamina of a bull.”
The National Police Gazette Oct 27, 1894, supports this view “His neck is 18 inches and his chest expanded is 41 inches, which is remarkable for a man of his weight”
The April 20, 1895 Gazette described Walcott’s power thusly, “His delivery was terrific having the force of a pile driver.” One blow from Walcott was said to be equal “to five” of his opponent’s.
Nat Fleischer called Walcott, (Black Dynamite Vol 3. p 196), "a sawed off Hercules, an abnormally powerful puncher." He also said, "Men who fought him were sorely handicapped...for all his opponents were taller, and their blows usually landed on his shoulders or on top of his granite skull. Probably more men ruined their hands on Walcott than on any other scrapper of that day."
Walcott was widely recognized as the best welterweight in the world long before he won the title. The Jan. 11, 1902 Police Gazette stated, "From a techincal standpoint three or four fighters have been recognized as welterweight champion, but it was apparent to men who have knowledge of prize ring affairs that they only held that tile on sufferance because of an obvious desire to avoid meeting with a black man who was conceded to be their superior." Walcott won the championship on a fifth round stoppage of Rube Fern in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The Gazette reported that Walcott turned "Fern into a jelly in five rounds."
Such was Walcott's reputation as a fierce puncher that he claimed in newspaper reports that "Since no welterweight or middleweight will fight me I am compelled to go to the next class. Will any heavyweights fight me?" See Police Gazette Oct 13, 1900. Walcott issued challenges to Tom Sharkey, Gus Ruhlin and even champion Jim Jeffies, though they all declined to meet him in the ring.
Some claim Walcott's record is spotty. Research by Tracy Callis puts his record at 96-24-24 (62 Ko's) with 22 ND and 3 NC. Most however fail to realize that the many of his losses came after Walcott severely injured his right hand in a gun accident in late 1904. Initial news reports, such as the Oct 18, 1904 Philadelphia Record indicated that his hand might have to be amputated, although his hand was saved Walcott wasn't same fighter after this, and in fact he did not fight again for two years.
In his 15 round fight against Jack Bonner the Gazette reported that "Barbados Demon shows his ability to fight faster than ever." He fought at a fast pace throwing many punches and only the final bell saved Bonner from certain knockout defeat.
Walcott also had a good number of unrecorded fights. The Police Gazette reported, “While on the road he knocked out at least 100 men. Among the high-class men he has beaten are Dick O’Brien, Mike Walsh, Mike Harris, and Tom Tracy of Australia.”
Some of his losses were actually wins where he was the victim of bad decisions because he was a black fighter. A number of his draws are rather dubious too. SEE BELOW for an example:
Apr 20 Jim Watts New York, NY D 4
"Walcott pounded Watts and floored him repeatedly during the first three rounds; In round four Watts went down to avoid being knocked out; While he was on the floor, Walcott struck him lightly on the jaw; Watts was down for at least twenty seconds; The crowd called for a foul; Referee Richard Roche knew Walcott was clearly winning and Watts was going down deliberately; He ordered the men to continue; Watts would not; So, he called it a draw." --Research by Tracy Callis.
Welterweight Walcott actually had a remarkable record:
One of Walcott's greatest victories was against Joe Choynski. Choyinski had gone 28 rounds against Jim Corbett, and drew with the likes of Bob Fitzsimmons and Al "Kid" MCcoy and would knock out a young Jack Johnson the following year. Choyinski outweighed Walcott 173 to 137 pounds and was a 5-1 favorite to beat the game little Walcott. The "Barbados Demon" demonstrated his impressive punching power by flooring Choyinski several times in the first round and gave the latter a terrific beating before stopping him in the 7th round.
Tommy West was a pretty good middleweight who had fought 17 rounds with Tommy Ryan for the middleweight title, and Walcott clearly dominated him, winning three times, once by ko, with 1 decision loss, 1 draw, and 1 ND.
Walcott also fought a draw with middleweight (and future light heavyweight champion) Philadelphia Jack O'Brien over 10 rounds.
Walcott beat a number of other top middleweights including Jack Bonner, Kid Carter, George Cole, and the ever-durable Joe Grim.
Walcott fought light-heavyweight champ George Gardner twice, winning once by 20 round decision and losing by the same. He also defeated light-heavyweight Young Peter Jackson. One wonders whether modern era welterweight champions would have success against the reigning light-heavyweight champion if their opponents weighed in at 175?
Mysterious Billy Smith was a very dirty fighter. In fact he lost 10 times on fouls. Smith was good enough to win the welterweight championship, and once beat Tommy Ryan, flooring him three times in the process, (it was ruled a NC because the police intervened when they saw Ryan was about to be ko'd). Smith also had a knockout over Kid Lavigne. Walcott and Smith fought numerous times with Walcott proving to be the much better fighter, winning 3 times, twice by Ko, with 2 draws, and one loss by decision.
Walcott's only significant losses were to George "Kid" Lavigne, and Dixie Kid. His fights against Lavigne were "handicap" bouts where, because of contractual agreements, Walcott was forced to come in greatly under his normal weight. Walcott, a natural welter because of his brawny build, trained down to 136 for the first fight which he lost on a 15 round decision. He had to "kill himself" to make the weight and was physically drained before the fight started. The second fight was for Lavigne's World Lightweight title, which means Walcott had to weigh 133 pounds (then the lightweight limit) on the day of the fight. Walcott had no strength and faded badly in losing by 12th round Tko. The loss to Dixie Kid is significant because Walcott lost the title, though by foul in the 20th round.
Sam Langford was already a great fighter by the time Walcott fought him to a draw. It was only two years later that Langford was able to go 15 rounds with future heavyweight champion Jack Johnson, and went on to become the most feared fighter in the world, knocking out nearly all the top heavyweights.
Three weeks after fighting Langford, Walcott fought lightweight champ Joe Gans to a draw. That is the equivalent of Delahoya fighting Felix Trinidad and the winner facing Shane Mosley within a month. Two weeks later Walcott badly injured his right hand in the aforementioned gun accident, yet he still was able to defeat many top fighters.
Walcott was just under 5' 2", and never weighed more than 148 pounds. His long reach and Herculean physique gave him tremendous power. He had great durability that allowed him to absorb the kind of punishment that would have finished most fighters.
He was also an accomplished boxer who studied and learned from the likes of George Dixon and Bob Fitzsimmons. His success against men of much higher weights leads one to believe that no modern welterweight could have gone the 20 round distance with him.
Perhaps the Chicago Herald-Examiner wrote a fitting epitaph on Aug 22, 1932 when Joe was hospitalized with a heart attack, "Some veteran boxing experts rate Walcott as the greatest fighter of his weight the ring ever knew. Only a "heavy" lightweight, Walcott earned the sobriquet "Giant Killer" by the easy manner in which he topped light heavyweights and heavyweights."
Joe died on Oct. 4, 1935 after being struck by a car in Manssillon, Ohio.
Both Nat Fleischer and Charley Rose rated Joe Walcott the # 1 all time welterweight. Walcott finished # 4 in the 2005 IBRO (International Boxing Research Organization) poll of its members. Cox's Corner considers him among the top 5 all time welterweights.
Barbados Joe Walcott is fascinating, he looks almost like a kid, but man his reputation is fearsome in the boxing universe. "Chrysanthemum Joe" Choynski was one the hardest hitting heavyweights of all-time and Barbados Joe Walcott knocked him out. "The Barbados Demon" scored a fantastic upset when he ran through the larger Joe Choynski and tabbed a 7th round TKO at the Broadway Athletic Club in New York, New York in 1900. Choynski was initially a heavy favorite at about 10-to-3, but after Walcott put him down five times in round 1, the odds shifted sharply in Walcott's favor. Choynski rebounded well in round 2, but he then soaked up a beating. Walcott cut Choynski over the eye in the 5th, and then in round 7 Walcott sent Choynski down for a final time. The larger man got up, clearly hurt, and Walcott went after him to force a stoppage.
Great image here of Barbados Joe Walcott on the right, the small guy. He's pictured here with Harry Wills, aka "The Black Panther", Wills is an all-time great heavyweight. But just look how small Walcott is next to Wills, yet Walcott used to fight and knock guys out that were as big as Wills. Considering Walcott was only 5"2' and weighed around 140 pounds while fighting bigger men, he was almost certainly pound-for-pound a murderous puncher. The fact bigger men feared him probably tells you all you need to know. Jack Johnson and Sam Langford both named him as one of the hardest punchers they ever faced. He actually began as a lightweight and grew into a small welterweight, yet he KO'd former Commonwealth heavyweight champion Dan Creedon in 1 round and dropped the 16 pounds heavier Joe Choynski 5 times on the way to stopping him in 7 rounds. A 5"2' lightweight/welterweight KO'ing much bigger fighters who had success at heavyweight suggests he hit pretty damn hard relative to his size.
For the record, here is what the immortal heavyweight Jack Johnson, "The Galveston Giant", said about who was the hardest punchers he ever faced:
"Jeffries number one? No, sir. Give me Joe Choynski anytime,” Johnson said. “I faced both and I should know. Jeffries had a powerful wallop, but Choynski had a paralyzing punch. His left hand was a corker. He was the hardest puncher in the last fifty years, with Joe Walcott a close second. I think his left hook was even more effective than Dempsey’s. Choynski could paralyze you, even if he didn’t catch you flush.” So Johnson named Barbados Joe, a natural welterweight, the second hardest puncher he ever faced. A big heavyweight saying a natural welterweight is the second hardest puncher he ever faced, that should give you a good indication of how hard this little guy could whack, and that's why they called him the demon.
This is an absolute gem of a photo, Sam Langford, aka "The Boston Terror" on the left, and Barbados Joe Walcott on right. Two of the greatest pound-for-pound fighters in boxing history, also two of hardest punchers in boxing history.
This is my favorite photo of Barbados Joe Walcott, dressed impeccably with the mustache and cigar.
Time for a music break.
On this day in October 21st, 2000, one of the most dramatic things I've ever seen in sports history occured when Danny Williams faced Mark Potter in a history-making British & Commonwealth title fight.
In the third round, Williams dislocated his right shoulder, it popped out of it's socket, leaving him with a single arm to fight, his left arm.
Despite this, in the sixth round, he caught and hurt Potter with a uppercut from his healthy arm, a true Hail Mary. Potter was able to get up but Williams quickly put him back down twice more and the fight was stopped.
"I had the towel in my hand ready to throw it in when I saw the shoulder pop in the sixth," said Jimmy McDonnell, Williams's trainer. "But I kept hearing Danny telling me 'Jim, I need just one punch, just one punch and I can knock him out'."
Here it is, round six of Danny Williams vs Mark Potter, I still get goosebumps when I watch this.
The agony of defeat.
Giovani Santillan makes a statement by taking out Alexis Rocha in round six of their welterweight contest.
In a spirited 147-pound match-up of top 5-ranked contenders under the WBO at the Kia Forum in Inglewood, California in 2023, Giovani Santillan took the fight to Alexis Rocha.
The respective Southern California-bred pressure fighters stood in front of each other and traded power punches to the head/body for pretty much the entirety of their scrap however it was the heavier firepower possessed by the stronger Santillan AKA 'El Gallo de Oro' that proved to be the difference.
The assortment of two-fisted hooks and uppercuts that Santillan landed to the face of the very game Rocha, who had been on the ascend prior to bout, bloodied the Santa Ana native's nose early in round 2 while helping to also produce a trio of knockdowns in round 5 and 6. The final knockdown in the sixth frame led to veteran referee Ray Corona waving a halt to the fan-friendly affair.
With his statement-making, career-igniting TKO victory, Santillan captured the WBO-NABO Welterweight title.
Suffering bleeding of the eye so bad he couldn’t see, Henry Cooper is told enough is enough after five rounds against Muhammad Ali in 1963. Cooper protested and did not want the fight to be stopped, but to no avail.
One of the scariest knockouts in boxing history happened on Halloween night, 2020, at the Alamodome in San Antonio, Texas, when Gervonta "Tank" Davis knocked out Leo Santa Cruz in the sixth round of their bout with a powerful and perfectly timed left uppercut. In the sixth round, as Santa Cruz leaned in to throw a right hand with his back against the ropes, Davis slipped the punch and unleashed a devastating counter-uppercut that landed flush on Santa Cruz's chin, knocking him out cold instantly. Tank Davis is one of the most powerful and dangerous punchers in lightweight history, his uppercut comes hard, fast, and out of nowhere.
Here is the Gervonta"Tank" Davis- Leo Santa Cruz knockout. I remember watching this as it happened and literally hoping Santa Cruz would survive it, which he did thank goodness. There's a saying in boxing that the most dangerous punch is the one you never see coming, and that was the case right here, Santa Cruz never even saw the uppercut that turned his lights completely out.
Speaking of uppercuts, the 1960's Italian middleweight champion Nino Benvenuti had one of the most beautiful and vicious uppercuts in boxing history, his uppercut also came hard, fast, and out of nowhere. Here he is pictured landing his uppercut on the great Emile Griffith after defeating Griffith for the middleweight crown in 1967, Benvenuti became the first Italian middleweight champion in history that night. Benvenuti and Griffith are both all-time greats, Benvenuti actually had a record of 65-0 before suffering his first defeat.
In 1965, Nino Benvenuti took out Sandro Mazzinghi with that uppercut, it was similar to the Tank Davis-Leo Santa Cruz knockout, just boom, an uppercut out of nowhere and Mazzinghi was out cold.
I actually own this original type 1 photo of Nino Benvenuti after he lifted the middleweight crown from Emile Griffith, it's one of my favorite items in my collection, I love watching Benvenuti throw that famous uppercut. He also had a great left hook, but that uppercut is a thing of beauty.