New Britain herald., 1927-07-29
Speaking
Of Sports

y p
3of Sports !
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Despite the continuous boosting Of
Jack Sharksy. Boston Lithuanian,
that he sands ready and willing to
fight Dempsey again. there will al
ways be Z question IN minds, Of fol-
lowers o. the fight game whether
he will be able to fight again. At
least for = long. long time. The
reason for this doubt. is the fact
that when Dempsey put them out,
apparently they stay put"
Demsey's knockout victims have
literally all been killed ~ far as
their pugilistic aspirations are con-
cerned. After standing up before
him ana his terrific body punching
power, they have never seemed able
to come back to meet with any sue
cess In the ring.
Take the case Of Jess Willard.
Dempsey knocked him out In To-
ledo. O.. in four rounds, thereby
winning tho worlds heavyweight
title. That was the beginning OF the
end for bulky JesS. jess did come
back and beat Floyd johnson, but
he curled right up before Luis An
gel F1rpo.
Carpenter, French idol, was
clean fighter before he met Demp-
sey at Boyle's Thirty acres in New
jersey. Carpenter came out of the
fight with broken heart and
broken body. He tried several come
backs but was met with failure at
every turn.
Tom Gibbons stood up before
Dempsey for Is rounds out in Shell
by, Montana, but he didn't amount
to much after that fight. He could
MT wear 4 hat on his head for weeks
and couldn't tighten the belt Of his
trousers. 1t was only short time
thereafter that he was knocked out
by Gene Tunney. present heavy
weight champion.
Frpo, strongest brute-man that
Dempsey ever faced, wasshammered
numerically In their memorable
fight. Dempsey took every possible
advantage of him and there Is
strong argument that he could have
been disqualified for three separate
offneses. Nevertheless, Firpo was
completely shattered after that
fight. The Bull of the Pampas didn't
have a thing left after that fight.
Jack Renault, the Canadian
Northwest Mounted Policeman, was
at one time conner in the ranks,
but he was punched out from acting
as a sparring. partner to Dempsey in
his training grinds. Harry Drake
another good number in the heavy
weight ranks played the role of
punching bag when Dempsey was In
training for the go with Tom Glib
bons.
Gene Tunney survived the Demp
sey attack, but the merits of Demp-
sey's showing in Philadelphia last
year will always be disputed. Demp-
seys fists did very little work that
night and Tunney took the lead
away from the ex-champion and
held it.
Last comes Sharkey. His stomach
has been. badly injured. The bleed
ing and hemorrhages which he has
suffered after the fight of little
more than a week ago. speaks vol
umes for the hammering he suf-
fered before he was knocked out.
With a weak stomach. shaky legs
and a whole lot Of force taken out
of his punches, he may come back
to make plenty of trouble for the
heavyweights still in the business,
but the odds are greatly against
him.
Dempsey may be a wreck. but he
has wrecked more good men in the
fight game than any other fighter In
the history Of pugilism. He still re-
tains his terrific punch as he DEM
onstrated in the fight with Sharkey
and any man who gets In his way
will suffer a like fate.
The big question lis whether
Dempsey can hit Tunney or not. If
he is able to get close to Gene like
he did to Sharkey, then Tunney will
most probably be numbered among
the "has-beens' victims Of pair
Of mauling fists.
Still again comes word from Chi
cago that the old bug-a-boo OF
Dempseys failure to shoulder gun
in the late war would stop him
from meeting Tunney on Soldiers
Field. Once again We call to mind
at least 25 great athletes who never
moved towards getting into the SER
vice during the war. We again ask,
why pick on Dempsey all alone?'
The Church league managers I'M
dertook the delicate business Of re-
versing umpires' decisions last night,
ordering two games replayed because
the officials had failed to call base
runners out for interfering with
f1elders. Had 1t been a question of
whether the jumps saw the play or
not. no kick could have been forth
coming. but in each instance the UNI
pire saw the play and called 1t in
correctly.
The rules state specifically that If
the base path is occupied by field
er in the act Of fielding a ball, the
base runner must run out of line and