Need Of Good Heavyweights

Manawatu Times, Volume LV, Issue 6864, 21 May 1932, Page 13

Need Of Good Heavyweights

False View Of Camera; Glance At Harmful Modem Tendencies

HEAT BRITAIN has held the “horizontal heavy- ■ JvWvs] "'eight” boxing cliampionI z!/i 1 ship of the world for so ■OttuOW long that its sense of heavyweight values seems KSmSmSII {o have become distorted. Tile British public still has plentv of enthusiasm for boxing, but when‘it regards heavyweights it allows its discrimination to be swamped by its enthusiasm and its almostdespairing desire to see at last a British boxer of genuine championship class. How else can one account fo r its being gulled bv such farcical match-making as that of Reggie Mccn with Prirno C?rnera and of George Cook with Camera ! Even experienced British writers on boxing have had tlicir vision clouded. Here is an extract from one well-known Critic’s description of the farce in which Camera disposed of Cook in less than four rounds: — Camera Is vastly different from the clumsy novice we saw against Stribling, ot even against Reggie Mccn. He lias trained down to the ffgure of a vast hut magnificent athlete, and. apart from the comparattve poorness of his punching, he can box as well as fight. Another critic, who lately bemoaned the lack of intelligence in latter-day British heavyweight hoxers, had this sclf-contradicting passage in his report: The most definite impression was that this was a fight that should never have been started. Cook was much too small and too moderate a fighter to have a ghost of a chance against Camera, who, on his showing last night, is a heavyweight of world’s championship class. When Cook’s limitations are considered, all this really means no more than that Camera is a better boxer, and better trained, than he was a year ago, without showing any reliable evidence that he is even on the threshold of world’s championship class. As a fighter, he cannot be judged by comparing him with Cook. * * * „ C* ONSIDER the facts. At his very best, Cook was never a first-rate heavyweight. One hesitates to say that he was even better than a third-rate fighter at the zenith of his career; nowadays he certainly is no better. In sonic of the

he passed his zenith as a fighter six years ago.

Cook is no more than 5.91 in height, and is short-armed even for that height. His want of sufficient reach has made him depend greatly upon speed of footwork. Wanting a real knock-out punch, he has also needed the stamina to maintain his speedy footwork throughout a contest.

Even if Cook were at his best what chance would he have of making a good fight with such a huge man as Camera, nine inches taller and sst heavier? His lack of reach would be accentuated, and he would have to he even speedier than against six-footers, in order to reach his man often enough with hard blows to slow him down and make the opponent’s .own blows less effective. Obviously, at 32 or 34, his speed must he diminished, not increased, and in comparison Camera, now that he has trained down and has improved his boxing, would look faster than before. It is preposterous, then, to judge Carncra on his bout with Cook.

Nearer to a test for Camera will he his match with Jack Dempsey, if the arrangements for that do not break down. True Dempsey is even older than Cook —lie is 37 —but he is_ immeasurably a better fighter than Cook, he has much greater punching power, and he has sufficient reach.

FIRST-RATE heavyweight _ fighters are needed hi all the boxing countries; Great Britain is not alone in its cry for better big men, although it has, in proportion to its population and to the popularity of the sport, the greatest dearth of men of this stamp in the ring. The shortage has become chronic, and probably incurable without a drastic change in the conditions under which modern ring-battles arcarranged. The trouble is not, I think, that the physique of any of the races concerned has declined, but that “high finance” has made the game top-heavy. The higher the weight-class, the greater is the effect of this “top-liamper.” The old-time fighter worked up to the higher rungs of the pugilistic ladder by dint of many fights for purses small in comparison with those given nowadays. It was largely a matter of the survival of the fittest, and in the struggle for survival the fitter men throve and toughened, in a fighting sense, on their battles- The man who could not improve with experience soon dropped out. And since the purses were comparatively small, the champions themselves had to fight _ more often, and there was also less objection to two good men meeting more than once, until one had proved himself definitely the better. Another good training-ground, especially in Great Britain, for promising young boxers was the travelling boxing-booth, in which men widened their experience and developed their punching ability. This is not nearly so much in fashion now. With the passing of control _ of big matches to syndicates—sometimes ostensibly to individual promoters—who were more concerned with the making of big profits, by giving large purses and charging proportionately more for the extra accommodation they arranged for the public, heavyweight boxing entered upon a new era that was not for the good of the sport, however much it benefited the pockets of the promoters and the holders of ring titles. The general public’s expenditure upon admission to heavyweight fights was concentrated from many fights to a few; the champions had fewer battles; and, smaller promoters following a similar line of conduct, the opportunities that promising young fighters had for acquiring experience were lessened. A new circle, but this time a vicious one. so far as its effect upon the “crop” of likely young fighters is concerned, was completed. A.L.C.

record books Cook is said to have been born in 1900, but a week or two before his recent fight with Camera he was stated to be 34 years of age, and that probably is correct. At any rate, he appeared in bouts of some little interest in Australia, his native country, in 1918. Ten years ago he was knocked out. in four rounds, by Georges Carpentier, who then was 28 years of age, and who was over a stone lighter. In any case,