Legendary boxing matches – Legendary boxers: The first heavyweight champion of the world

Author: Zizi

There are matches, which are never to be forgotten, and there are boxing icons, who are going to stay with us for eternity.

It would seem a simple task to find the first professional boxer, because the Ancient Greek champions and later the Roman boxing heroes do not count. But it is not so easy because in the modern era, when boxing became popular again, the rules were not the same as we use nowadays.

If we would like to find the first one, we must go back in time to the 19th century. John L. Sullivan is considered the first heavyweight champion of the world, but there are at least two problems with this statement.

The first one, the Boston Strong Boy was the hero of the bareknuckle era of boxing, and he won his title in this system in 1882, in Mississippi City, when he knocked out his opponent, Paddy Ryan in the 9th round. The second one, he refused to fight against the tough Australian Peter Jackson, who was also a famous heavyweight competitor.

Based on the above it is questionable whether we can talk about Sullivan as the first heavyweight champion of the world. Moreover, when he had his title defense match under the Queensberry rules (written by John Graham Chambers and considered the first modern rules of boxing) he was knocked out by the challenger, James J. Corbett in 1892, in New Orleans. Therefore, we should say that Gentleman Jim was the first heavyweight champion of the world.

Source: britannica.com