The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-10-08

Just now the boxing game is coming in for great deal of criticism in almost every section of the country. There arc great many people who believe that the sport should be abolished entirely. This should not be so, for boxing when rroperly conducted, is the greatest ath- letic sport in the world.
 The trouble with the game is the fact that all boxers, managers and promoters are not honest. The better element is making drastic efforts to drive out ;he crooks and the hoodlums, but they nave not yet completed their task.
 Some reformers would limit the au1n- Der of rounds and do away with giving decisions. The first idea has some good and some bad points to it. Personally l believe in finish fights. But, if we are to save the sport we must have plenty oI six, eight and ten round bouts.
 When a title is at stake, however, be- lieye in the men fighting to a. finish, where the man with the most strength, skill and all round ability is certain to come out on top.
 A large majority of people have the inn pression that the man with the most brute strength is sure to win out in a nhisl fight. This is not so. If a lighter mas not a good knowledge of self defense anu ls fighting a clever man he will be rlddieo to pieces and forced to go down for the count before many rounds have been com pleted even though he may be one Of inc toughest scrappers in the world.
 Four and five years ago there were a great many more high class pugliists t.a,i now. You can almost count the present day stars on the fingers of your TWO hands The second raters number about 30. while there are about 300 third rater-' who pick up dollar here and there snow ing at the midnight clubs.
 Jack Johnson appears to have little on every white and black heavyweight in the country The white heayies are poor lot and most of them wouldn't have had a ghost of a chance of gaining a liYeii- hood if they had been in the game ten years ago. Some of them have weight and bulging muscles, but that is abous al A heavyweight who can't hit, stand punishment, can't get around the ring with some pretense at speed, Is not worth the name. .'.'f
 There are great many people who believe that Sam Langford will some day defeat Johnson. If Johnson and Lang ford were to meet tomorrow would place my money on the Galveston black, but if the meeting comes off in a year or two 4 may be q different thing.
 Ever since Johnson won the fight al Reno he has been touring the world and living like a prince. Nothing has beer too good for him. This kind of dissipation is sure to tell on mans constitution after awhile. It is more true of q boxer, who must take some hard beatings, than 1t is of a person in some other walk of life. At his best, Johnson isn't much of a champion. He has never decisively de- feated man who amounted 10 anything | His victory over Jeffries was task | which could have been accomplished by almost dozen men, And what glory car Jack claim by defeating Tommy Burns never first class man? None at all Burns claimed the heavyweight tltle wher there was hardly man in the class worthy of mention.
 The heavyweight title rlghtfuly belongs to Langford. Sam has licked every mar of his weight in the world and has also gone out of liis class and administered sound thrashings to about every heavy weight who would agree to meet him.. | Jack OBrien was the last challenges | that Sammy sent to Slumberland. Tn his day O'Brien was q great boxer but he never was much of Q hitter
 ! The muddle In the middle weight divis. lon is the greatest In years. There is not a man In the class that looks like real champion. Fakes showing against