In excitement about the upcoming rematch between Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury (a rematch George Foreman refers to as one of his top 3 most anticipated of all time!), lets go back to another big rematch in boxing history, Jack Demspey vs Gene Tunney II for the World Heavyweight Championship. More info below...
Jack Dempsey is still regarded as one the best Heavyweight Champions of all time. He turned pro in 1914 and established himself as one of the hardest hitting fighters of the era. He was knocking men out cold left, right and centre. He may not have been undefeated, and he certainly had his fair share of draws, but he had the hardest chin in the division and his all out action style was a crowd pleaser from the get go. He really was the Mike Tyson of the 1910's and 20's. He was also not above bending the rules and a couple of his wins, and even at least one of his losses, are still debated to this day around the manner in which he won and lost. Probably the most controversial was his win over Jess Willard in 1919 when he won the World Heavyweight Championship - a fight in which years later Jack Dempey's manager, Jack Kearns, would admit that Dempsey's gloves were "loaded", in this case meaning his hand wraps were treated in plaster of Paris effectively making them as hard as concrete! Jack Dempsey would deny this but Jess Willard certainly took a far worse beating than any other Dempsey victim... Since winning the World title, Dempsey would go on to defend it successfully 5 times over the next 4 years. But when Gene Tunney came along in 1926, Dempsey had been inactive for 3 years, not having fought since September 1923. In September 1926 Tunney scored an upset, easily outpointing Dempsey over 10 rounds to win the World Heavyweight Championship. It was rumoured Dempsey was poisoned by one of his bodyguards the morning of the fight but there was no evidence to substantiate this even though Dempsey said he was unwell post fight... 10 months later Dempsey fought the rugged Jack Sharkey with the winner getting a shot at Tunney for the World title. Dempsey was being out-boxed and man-handled by Sharkey early on who was the clear aggressor but in Rd 6 Dempsey started to claw his way back in thanks to a focused body attack and in Rd 7 he scored a knockout thanks to a left hook to the jaw... Sharkey would complain he was intentionally hit low before the knockout. Dempsey had secured his rematch with Tunny and went into the rematch with a 54-5-8 record.