September 2026

A SLICE OF BOXING

Heavyweight champ Jack Johnson on his way to stopping former champ James J. Jeffries in Reno, Nevada, in 1910.

best man of all of them that I have met. If Fitz had only been a little bit bigger, he would have achieved even greater fame.” Thereafter, the two men toured together and became friends. Fitzsimmons even helped train Jeffries for several fights. And unlike champions before him, Fitzsimmons enjoyed more ring glory after losing the heavyweight crown. In 1903, at age 40, he defeated George Gardner on a 20-round decision to claim the world light heavyweight throne. Sadly, he kept fighting and, at age 44, was knocked out in two rounds by Jack Johnson. Johnson later wrote in his autobiography, “I do not take much credit to myself for this bout, but it seemed necessary at the time in clearing the course that was before me.” So … How good was Fitzsimmons? And how do the other early gloved champions from Sullivan through Dempsey compare with one another? No one is better qualified to answer those questions than Pollack, who has been studying these men for decades. So I asked him, “What would happen if each of these fighters fought the other eight when they were in their prime?” That’s 36 hypothetical fights. “It’s all educated guessing,” Pollack responded. “And the outcomes could

have been different from day to day. That’s part of what makes boxing great. Just like today, certain fighters and fight outcomes will surprise you. And there are questions like, “Are these fights to the finish? Twenty rounds? Forty-five rounds? Glove size? Referee? Which era’s scoring criteria are we using? There’s very little film footage for most of these men and none at all for Sullivan. But if you put a gun to my head …” The first thing Pollack did was designate the period when each fighter was in his prime. For Sullivan, that was the early-1880s, almost 10 years before he lost to Corbett (whose prime was 1891-1893). Fitzsimmons had the longest prime of any of the early gloved champions, encompassing most of the 1890s. Jeffries, Pollack says, always had power but was at his best once he matured as a boxer and was still at his physical peak. During that time (1899- 1903), Jeffries beat Fitzsimmons and Corbett twice each. Hart peaked when he defeated a young Jack Johnson and Jack Root in 1905. The best years for Burns were 1906 through 1908 when he lost to Johnson (who Pollack also sees as peaking between 1906 and 1908). Willard was at his best in 1915 when he dethroned Johnson. The prime years for

Willard. Johnson was fat and old when he and Willard fought. “Sullivan-Dempsey, I’d love to see that fight. Who wins? There are no films of Sullivan, so I can only go off of what people wrote about him. But Sullivan was bigger than Dempsey. And people said Dempsey was the second coming of Sullivan, so that tells you something. And if you look at the generation after these guys, the Jack Dempsey who Gene Tunney fought was 31 years old and hadn’t fought in three years. Maybe prime Dempsey beats prime Tunney. But we’ll never know.” Pollack’s fight-by-fight appraisal can be seen in the accompanying chart. Fighters were awarded one point for each win and a half-point for each draw (too close to call). The point totals for his selections are:

at a time when there were no interim weight classes and only one champion in each division. Fitzsimmons earned his first title as a middleweight when he stopped “The Nonpariel” Jack Dempsey in 1891. Six years later, he claimed the heavyweight crown, knocking out James Corbett with a body shot in the 14th round. Fitzsimmons’ weight then was a matter of conjecture, since he refused to step on the scales before heavyweight fights. The record book lists him as weighing 167 pounds when he beat Corbett. But it was likely more than that. He was a small heavyweight. But he could punch. Hard. Very hard. Bob Fitzsimmons: Part II begins with a particularly good retelling of Fitzsimmons losing his championship to Jeffries on an 11th-round knockout in his first title defense. Jeffries was the younger man by 12 years and a giant for his time – 6-foot-2, 220 pounds. “I have no excuses to make,” Fitzsimmons said after the loss. “I forced the fighting, took my punishment like a man, got licked, and that’s all there is to it.” Three years later, Jeffries knocked Fitzsimmons out again; this time in eight rounds. “The best man won,” Fitzsimmons acknowledged. “I wasn’t right the first time he put me out. This time, I was as fit as I ever was in my life. Then he was a novice. Now he is a finished fighter. I don’t think that I ever punched anyone harder than I did him in the first four rounds. But he kept coming back. There is no one fighting in the world that has a chance against him. I couldn’t do it. And if I can’t, there is no one that can.” Jeffries responded with equal respect, saying, “I would rather fight 10 Sharkeys, a dozen Corbetts, and all the McCoys you could bring before me than fight Fitz again. Fitz is one of the hardest men to beat the ring ever knew. He is the

Adam Pollack on Boxing’s Early Gloved Heavyweight Champions By Thomas Hauser

James Jeffries .............. 7 Jack Johnson. ..............7 Jack Dempsey. .............6½ John L. Sullivan.............5 Bob Fitzsimmons. .........4½ Jess Willard. .................3 Tommy Burns................1½ Marvin Hart...................1 James Corbett..............½

I t’s possible that no one has studied boxing’s early gloved champions more thoroughly than Adam Pollack. Pollack is an Iowa attorney who, when it comes to boxing, is not just a historian and writer. He won the Iowa Golden Gloves in the 139-pound division when he was in law school. As a coach, he guided two fighters to the quarterfinals of the men’s National Golden Gloves. A female charge won multiple national and international amateur championships. These are good credentials, considering the limited talent pool in Iowa. Pollack is also one of the better (albeit not better known) referees working today. As of this writing, according to BoxRec.com, he has refereed 239 professional fights. Over the past 20 years, Pollack has written biographies of John L. Sullivan, James Corbett, Bob Fitzsimmons, James

Dempsey were 1919 (when he beat Willard) through the Firpo fight in 1923. Some of Pollack’s choices reverse history. “Sullivan at his best beats Corbett,” Pollack says. “It took Corbett 21 rounds to beat an old empty shell. And I have the utmost respect for Jack Johnson in terms of the hard road he traveled and great fighters he had to fight to get to the title. But by the time he and Jeffries fought, Jeffries had as much chance of winning that fight as Muhammad Ali had of beating Larry Holmes. Jeffries at his best was Johnson’s equal. That one is too close to call. And Johnson at his best would have easily outboxed

Let the debate begin. Even Pollack has doubts. “Maybe I’m being too hard on Corbett,” he says. “I think, on the right day, he outboxes some of these guys. He had a frustrating style with a lot of defense, head movement, footwork, clinching and fast punching. He could be a pain in the rear for anyone. Anyone who could go 61 rounds with Peter Jackson, not be beaten and be willing to continue after four hours would be a tall order.” Thomas Hauser’s email address is thomashauserwriter@gmail.com. His most recent book – The Most Honest Sport: Two More Years Inside Boxing – is available on Amazon.com and other platforms. In 2019, Hauser was selected for boxing’s highest honor – induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.

Jeffries, Marvin Hart, Tommy Burns, Jack Johnson and Jack Dempsey. Jess Willard is missing from the list because Adam figured he’d said what he had to say about Willard in his Johnson and Dempsey books. But he’s thinking of going back and filling in that gap. He devoted three volumes (almost 2,000 pages) to Dempsey and two volumes (more than 1,500 pages) to Johnson. Now he has written Bob Fitzsimmons: Part II. Fitzsimmons was born in England in 1863 and moved to New Zealand with his family when he was 10. Above the waist, he was built like a 200-pound man with a broad chest and wide shoulders. But he had narrow hips and long, spindly legs. Those dimensions enabled him to become the first man to win world championships in three different weight classes. And he did it

Jeffries Johnson Dempsey Sullivan Fitz. Willard Burns Hart Corbett

Jeffries 7

Johnson 7

Dempsey 6-1/2

Sullivan 5

Fitz 4-1/2

Willard 3

Burns 1-1/2

Hart 1

Corbett ½

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