Jess Willard: A Disrespected Champion Redeemed

By Ian “The Boxing Historian” Murphy

If there is any former Heavyweight Champion that epitomizes Rodney Dangerfield’s famous “I get no respect” quip, it has to be Giant Jess Willard. The 6’6, 245lb Willard is usually lumped together with the likes of brave but dubiously crowned Primo Carnera, condor-like but limited Henry Akinwande, and plodding Russian mastodon Nikolai Valuev. He is not listed with legit and talented big men like Lennox Lewis. Willard is often ridiculed as an inept and clumsy brute who should be rated at the very bottom of the heavyweight heap. This view of Willard is not only unfair, but it is entirely untrue and smacks of revisionist ignorance. In reality, Jess Willard was a capable boxer with a great jab, good movement for a big man, and a quick and deadly straight right. Jess also had a heart the size of a lion’s. He was nobody’s fool, and was feared for being a very dangerous fighter. He knew how to use his height and tremendous strength to his advantage and kept in fantastic shape.

Before Jess Willard fought Jack Dempsey in 1919, he was a respected Heavyweight Champion, having beaten a consensus top-ten all-timer in Jack Johnson four years earlier by vicious knockout. Now, the common theory in regards to that match was that it was thrown by Johnson. I think this is likely to be untrue. If Johnson was throwing the fight, why did he try to take Willard out and bet $2500 on himself to win? Why did he wait twenty-six long rounds in the broiling Havana sun to take the dive? Why did he take such a crushing right hand from the younger, bigger challenger? The reason is plain and simple: Johnson just got beat. He was older, ill-prepared, and (at that time in his career) ill-equipped to deal with an opponent of Willard’s stature and skill set. Jess was 6’6 and over 240 lbs of lean, sinewy muscle. He had not an ounce of excess mass on his body, knowing it could only slow him down in a long fight and make him tire faster. Willard hit like a truck and on that day in 1915, he was a force to be reckoned with. All this being said, we must ask ourselves: why has Jess Willard been so maligned and disrespected?

Willard’s fight with Jack Dempsey is part of the answer to why he is viewed with such mockery. Jess Willard was 37 years old in 1919 and had not been a terribly active champion. The man he fought that hot July day was in the absolute prime of his career and arguably had his best fight. Combine that with the style matchup (Dempsey routinely destroyed bigger opponents with blistering speed, combinations, and concussive power) and Willard comes out looking like an overmatched tomato can. What Jess did show us that day was his great heart and conditioning. He might not have been Dempsey’s match as a fighter or as an athlete, but he was in amazing shape. No man could take the beating he did and survive without having been in perfect physical condition. So in short, it is partly Dempsey’s legend that dwarfs the truth about one of boxing’s better big men.

The other reason why Jess Willard is ridiculed and misunderstood is that there has been a great passage of time since he competed. He was at his best exactly one hundred years ago. Many people subscribe to the “newer is always better”philosophy, and in this case it is not the the truth. Willard is probably only behind Lennox Lewis as a big-man champion. Now you might ask “what about Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko?” Well, those two men were far more dominant than Willard and had longer careers, so they get the nod overall as better champions. However, I’d say that head to head, Willard knocks out Wladimir (who was KO’d by solid but unspectacular competition) and maybe loses a decision to Vitali, who had the chin to take Jess’s big power. If Jess could find Jack Johnson, he could find Wlad Klitschko. Wlad’s latest showing against the ungainly Tyson Fury shows that he cannot deal with a man his size or bigger that has some boxing skills. Yes, Klitschko is not in his prime anymore, but that was not what beat him. He lost because he could not adapt to an awkward opponent who didn’t stand there and let him hang on them and get jabbed to death. Willard had one thing that new champion Fury does not: power. Jess actually killed a man in the ring and was known for being a big hitter. Jack Dempsey admitted that he was petrified of Willard prior to their fight due to that reputation. Jess himself knew he had tremendous power and wanted legal immunity if he killed Dempsey in the ring that day.

As far as how Willard stacks up with other Heavyweight Champions, I feel he is in the bottom of the middle, ahead of many of the belt holders of the past thirty years and behind only the best and their contemporaries. He was not our best Heavyweight Champion, but was (despite common public opinion) far from the worst. Willard’s great strength, constitution, and underrated boxing skills would make him a tough match for anyone not considered a true Heavyweight great. Barring Lennox Lewis and maybe Vitali Klitschko, he especially outclasses the rest of the big men

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