Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1920-01-24
OUT BASEBALL AS GREAT NATIONAL PAST1
ONL Y BOXER
TO HURT L.DElMPSEy
Wilies Rap Caused Champion to Go Easy and Ass,uo
Covering-Up Position-Neuer Has Had His
Can-Tnle-It AbiIity Tested ~,
BY GRANTI.AND RICE

"TN REGARD to that Can Take 1t
L arrangement. mentioned some days
ago writes n correspondent, please
answer this:
Every one knows that Jack Demp-
sey can give it with something to spare
but SO far has he ever had the chance
to prove he could also take it in the
right way?"
In his earlier and unknown days
Dempsey undoubtedly had to take his
share, but since working his way up
| forward in a championship direction he
has never been called upon to offer any
direct proof.
In his last two stands against Fulton
and Willard there wasn't glove laid
upon him with the intent to annoy.
He nailed Fulton before that worthy
had n chance to start swing. And
while willard paved at him in strictly
| futile and desultory fashion once or
twice, the big kansan had not landed
in any way worth mentioning before
Dempsey knocked him down.
A FTER that Willard toas in no
"A shape 10 hit anything ercept
| the floor.
One WalIop
SCOOPS GLEASON, ono Of the lead
~ ing experts of the Pacific coast, re
iates one blow that Dempsey received
with no great pleasure.
| Willie Meehan was in exclusive con-
troll of this punch. Dempsey says
Gleason. had knocked Meehan down
in the first round. He looked to close
out the entertainment in the second.
But very much to his surprise Meeban
| Joeb in, ropnnd T1op,,yay ~, tho IN, VI,
and upset the early scheme. From that
point on Dempsey assumed a cautious
attitude, so cautions, in fact, that Nee
han got the four round decision"
No One Knows
60 NO one knows definitely beyond a
~ rebuttal what Dempsey might do if
suddenly attacked on the point of the
jaw with an output of high explosive.
No one knows whether he could take
n bad beating and still come back with
enough to win, because he has so far
refrained from indulging himself that
| pleasure.
| So far he has been content to permit
the other fellow to take it. Just how
he could weather gale has yet to be
written for the book.
That soul crushing punch which he
carries, delivered generally within a
minute or two of the battles start, has
so far relieved him from offering any
such proof.
TACK may haze chance to shoD
y his Can Take : II quality
against the fast, hard hitting Car
pentier. Propided n sieur Carpen-
tier isn't called upon to respond
first.
Willard as Receiver
WILLARD was more of Had To
w Take-I than a Can Take 1t. He
absorbed more punishment in his out
spread system than any heavyweight
champion ever had to take before.
He took it in amazing quantities.
But after that first wallop he took most
of it in the attitude of one who was
wondering what it was all about.
While Willard will never rise to be a
popular hero, it took a certain amount
of gameness, even if it was dazed game
ness. to lift his battered frame out, of
the resin seven times in the wake of
seven knock downs.
The average heavyweight would have
given the matter Of arising serious and
careful thought after the second or third
knock down. No great number would
have risen after the fourth or fifth.
WILLARD can undoubtedly be
w registered ,oith the Did Take
Its. ,ohntever else you might care to
add to his life story.
Heavyweight Gameness
QUESTIONING the gameness of any
~ heavyweight champion in the ring
Is a waste of time.
No man lacking gameness is ever
going to reach this pinnacle. Any mum
Der have had all the rest of it, but
inability TO stand punishment has
banished them off the gravel path into
the ditch.
Fitzsimmons took bad beating from