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Harry Greb was World Middleweight
boxing
Champion from 1923 to 1926 and American Light Heavyweight title
holder 1922 - 1923. He fought a recorded 303 times in his 13
year-career, against the best opposition the talent-rich 1910's
& 20's could provide him, frequently squaring off against
light-heavyweights and even heavyweights.
He had a highly aggressive, very fast, swarming style of a
fighter who buried his opponents under a blizzard of punches.
Greb was also a master at dirty fighting and had no qualms about
employing all manners of dubious tactics, such as spinning his
opponent and using the heel and laces of his gloves. The
'Pittsburgh Wildcat' was also very durable, suffering only 2 TKO
losses. The first was in his seventh bout and the second
happened 3 years later when Greb broke the radius of his left
arm. Greb finished the round but was unable to continue the
fight.
Greb began his pro career in 1913, fighting mostly around his
hometown of
Pittsburgh.
By 1915, he was fighting world class opposition, notably hall of
famer
Tommy Gibbons
and reigning middleweight champ George Chip, whom he faced twice
during the years 1915-1916 in non-title fights. Greb would lose
both fights by "newspaper" decision (at the time, the rendering
of an official decision at the end of a fight was prohibited, so
the newspaper(s) who covered the fight would determine who they
believed to be the winner), losses he would later avenge.
Greb would fight 37 times in the sole year 1917 (a record),
winning 34 of those fights either officially or unofficially.
Among his victims that year were the reigning light heavyweight
champion
Battling Levinsky
(in a non-title fight), former light heavyweight champion
Jack Dillon,
middleweight George Chip and heavyweight Willie Meehan, who had
beaten future champ
Jack Dempsey
earlier in the year.
Despite all these great results, Greb was still denied a
chance to fight for a title. A February 1918 newspaper loss to
Mike O'Dowd, who would go on to win the middleweight title
during the year, didn't help in his effort. After that setback
though, Greb would go unbeaten for over two years. During that
stretch, he would beat future light heavyweight champion
Mike McTigue,
heavyweight contenders
Gunboat Smith,
Billy Miske,
and Bill Brennan, and defeat Battling Levinsky no less than five
times in newspaper decisions. Levinsky was the reigning light
heavyweight champion at the time.
In 1921, during a fight with tough light heavyweight Kid
Norfolk (real name William Ward), he was thumbed in the right
eye and suffered a detached retina, which permanently blinded
him in that eye (Greb would later lose some of the vision in his
good eye and his gradual loss of sight led him to always go to
bed with the light on). But Greb fought on, winning by a KO in
the eleventh round, and he finally got a shot at a title.
On May 23rd, 1922, Harry Greb was matched with
Gene Tunney,
the undefeated American Light Heavyweight Champion (The World
title was then in the hands of Frenchman Georges Carpentier). At
the end of fifteen rounds, Tunney was a bloody mess and Greb was
champion. This was the only professional loss in Tunney's
career.
After defending his title against
Tommy Loughran,
Greb granted Tunney a rematch. In a hotly-disputed battle,
fought at
Madison Square Garden
in February 1923, Tunney regained his title by decision. The two
men would meet three more times, with Tunney successfully
defending his regained title in another fifteen round bout and
then splitting a pair of no decision battles (Greb got the nod
of two of three local newspapers in the fourth bout while Tunney
easily won the fifth, after which, Greb told Tunney that he
didn't want to fight him again, as he saw that Tunney was
better. The two became great friends). Tunney would go on to
beat
Jack Dempsey
for the heavyweight title. Greb remained the only man ever to
have beaten Tunney, and the latter would be among the
pall-bearers at Greb's funeral.
One month after losing his light heavyweight title to Tunney,
Greb faced Johnny Wilson for the World Middleweight Title, with
Greb winning a comfortable 15-round decision. Greb would defend
the title four times, most notably against reigning welterweight
champion,
Mickey Walker,
whom he outpointed in July 1925. Walker, a great fighter who
would win the middleweight title the following year, stumbled
upon Greb at a nightclub after their fight, and according to the
legend, fought an impromptu rematch there. Greb KOŽd him easily.
At 32, Greb was past his prime when he was matched with
tricky southpaw
Tiger Flowers
in Madison Square Garden in February 1926. Flowers, a defensive
specialist, countered the Smoke City Wildcat's attacks well and
won a disputed decision after fifteen rounds to annex Greb's
middleweight title. Flowers beat Greb again in their rematch six
months later - on an even more controversial decision - in what
was Greb's last fight.
Around that time, Greb had second thoughts about his career,
and began to claim he had retired following the second Flowers
loss. Having declined a job as Jack Dempsey's sparring partner
in preparation for Dempsey-Tunney I (Greb declaring: "I'd feel
like a burglar taking Jack's money. Nobody can get him in good
enough condition to whip Gene" -- And he was right), Greb
checked into an Atlantic City clinic for surgery to repair
damage to his nose and respiratory tract caused by his ring
career and several car crashes. However, complications occurred
and he died on
October 22,
1926,
never waking up from the anesthetic.
His official career record was 106 wins and 8 losses with 3
draws, but including newspaper decision wins brings his tally to
about 260 wins in around 300 fights. Most boxing historians
consider Greb the greatest middleweight in history (he is also
considered one of the 10 or 20 best light heavyweights of
all-time, despite being a natural 160-pounder).
Greb is buried in the Roman Catholic
Calvary Cemetery, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. |
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