Evening star., 1915-06-13
MIKE GIBBONS IS TO FIGHT
FOR MIDDLEWEIGT1T TITLE
St. Paul Phantom Boxer Wants Clear Road
to Championship Before Retiring From
Ring Two Years Hence

recently been making great noise
about big losses sustained during the
lpast season and telling the fans how
they have gone along and stood for
the loss without ever having asked
the same fans to help them out. Why
should the fans help them out2 Don't
the fans pay big prices to see the
boxers in action and many times they
are given the worst OF 1t by mediocre
performances. 1t is the boxers who
should be held to account not the fans.
And talking of clubs taking losses.
! there is nothing startling about that.
The Cream City A. c. of Milwaukee
| has had some bumpers the past year
that would make the others shudder.
! During that time the Cream City club
| had loss of over $4,000 on the Willie
Ritchie-Charlie White match; $500 on
the second White-Welsh match and
$1,000 on the Jack Dillon-Gunbcat Smith
contest: a total of nearly $4,000, and
! the promoters have never asked the
of playing the sucker act to the big
demands of so-called stars, the same as
many big clubs about the country have
been doing.
Kid Williams. the bantamweight
| champion. has the Sam Langford idea
! about making matches, or perhaps 1t
might be better to say the Kids man
ager, Sammy Harris. has the idea. Will
hams met Louisiana in Philadelphia
and the latter was credited with hav-
| ing whipped the Kid. They met again
recently and the Kid turned the ia ables.
| Then came Jimmy Murray with a claim
| of beating the Kid in Philadelphia in
a short bout. They were matched
| again at Baltimore. and this time Mr..
| Williams made no bones about it, but
| took the decision in a ten-round match.
! When 1t comes right down to cases it
| will usually be found that the Balti-
! more Kid is there with the goods. The
| only question now as to his standing
in the bantam division is regarding the
weight. There are many who claim he
| cannot make the limit of 116 pounds,
| and his manager, Sammy Harris, does
not appear anxious to have him try It.
With a boxing union in control of af-
| fairs, such disputes could be settled
make the stipulated weights would be
| obliged to travel in the classes where
| they belonged.
Champion Willie Ritchie and Charlie
White of Chicago, which had been talk
| ed of for July 4, will have to be put
| over until fall. Willie was willing to
! finally decided that he would not take a
chance with the weather in midsum-
mer. claiming that it would interfere
| with his training, and he wants to be
White again. Ritchie remembers the
terrific battle he had with White be-
| fore the Auditorium Club in Milwau-
| kee, a little more than year ago,
when he struck the hottest day Of the
year, and he prefers to get away from
| the warm spell If possible. That is one
| reason why he refused to accept the
date in New York for return match
| with Welsh about July T.. 1T will be
hot spell" said Willie while discuss
| ing the matter here, .and then prepare
for a more busy season next fall.
! will go west and spend a few days
with my folks in Oregon. and then pro-
ceed to San Francisco. where will take
matters easy and probably spend
few weeks in the mountains. While up
in the mountains 1 will do some ad-
vance training, and then by september
1 will be ready for Mr.. White or who
ever may be at the top at that time"
Fred Fulton. the Minneapolis heavy
weight, is planning trip to New
hopes thereabo and try to impress
the fans of Gotham that he is entitled
to a crack at their star-Jim Coney
Fulton has had number OF scraps
around the northwest the past year and
has made a very good showing at
times and also q very poor showing at
other times. He seems to nave the
ability all right, but like many boxers
est confidence in himself. He out
boxed AL Palzer and Carl Morris COM
pletely until he became careless and
| lost his noodle. With proper guidance
he should have developed into fairly
| good heavyweight.
Joe Mandot, the southern lightweight.
| is one of the boxers who appears to
have everything that a champion
should have. but lacks some one point
| that prevents him from annexing the
title. Joe has put up some splendid
| battles against the best Of the light
weight crop, but when it came to a
| final show Joe did not have the punch
that wins. He put up great battle
| recently with Johnny Grihths at Men
phis, and with Red Watson at Supe-
rior. but he did not seem able to de-
| liver the punch that would speel
! sleep" His work against Joe Azede-
do at New Orleans was all could be
asked of him and now he is pulling for
match with Freddy Welsh over the
marathon route.
American boxers who visit Australia
will do well to follow the straight and
narrow path. The Australians are the
finest sporting patrons in the world:
| they like all kinds Of sport and are
! good spenders; but they want things
straight. There are bad ones. the
same as in every country, but 1t does
not take long to single them out. Some
time ago Young Abe Atteil. a San
! Francisco lightweight, went over to
Australia looking for matches and was
, contracted with for five contests. 1t
| developed that in his first clash with
Herb Mccoy he showed very well, but
| in his second match with Jack Clune he
| made very poor showing and 1t was
declared no contest" Regarding the
| matter Snowy Baker writes me as fol-
! lows: The matter was thoroughly in
vestigated by the board of directors
| of the stadium and it was decided to
| ship Attell back and give his percentage
to the Belgium fund. l was under no
| obligations to give him his transpora-
| tion back, but did this and also fixed
up few debts he had incurred here,
| as did not want to see him stranded
He seemed fairly good and straight
| fellow, but was no doubt Influenced
| by some of the foxy bookmakers in
Melbourne and carried away with their
, tales" The experience of Young Abe
| should be a lesson to other American
InquisitiUe Fans.