AIR DATE:
EPISODE: Episode 35
This week Neil discusses his heroes across the Americas and boxing in general, and this episode profiles The Phantom of Philly, the former World Light Heavyweight Champion, Tommy Loughran, who amassed 121 wins from 169 total professional matches. Talkin’ Fight Monday to Friday on YouTube or LIVE at talkinfight.com/live Weekday’s at 7pm EST (6:30 on Fridays) #boxinghistory @The World of Boxing! @USA Boxing
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Transcribed:
Oh sorry about that guys, uh, welcome, call myself by surprise.
Welcome once again talk and fight fans uh, it’s friday in our part of the world and in the evening we’ve had snow for the past couple of days.
We live in canada, but we welcome you to our show from wherever you are in the world.
Another great episode of the meal of the deal where we’re profiling, uh fighters from across the americas, north america, south america and central america, and today we’re going to continue.
Uh in north america and profile a great fighter out of philadelphia, tommy lawken good evening, graham nice, to see you tonight, buddy how’s everything going you all right, warm staying warm over there.
Yes, i do have a sweater on today, but uh.
Yes, in general, staying warm inside yeah.
That’S it okay, guys out here where we are out in uh the big uh white north here in toronto and we’ve been snowing for a couple of days, guys so around the world.
If you guys are warm and you’re getting some sun, i wish i was out there with you, but i’m glad you’re here with us tonight anyways.
I got ta appreciate that so thanks for coming out uh neil the deal show final fans and the talking fight fans want to thank you again as usual for the uh all the likes, the shares the subscriptions uh.
All the comments have been really fantastic and, like graham was saying, we’ve been talking about the americas uh in the last uh ten days or so eight ten days.
So we’re going to continue that, with our number five fighter, that i’m going to do of the pennsylvania, philadelphia, philadelphia fight region, which is one of the world’s most well-known uh fighting meccas, i guess they would call it uh the guys that come out of philly, graham As we all know are very, very tough, they come from tough streets, they come from tough upbringings and they’re.
Tough people so got ta like it.
You know right.
Look at the pittsburgh, steelers they’re, pretty tough.
You know what i mean, so any anybody out of you know that pennsylvania that blue collar uh, you know, i thought i thought you were going to say broad street bullies there actually and the broad street bullies.
Of course we were going to talk about those guys in a minute too.
I was just going to say so what about the broad street bullies? There’S another bunch of guys that are pretty serious.
If you know what i mean, though so yeah so we we talked about a bunch of guys earlier on this week, uh.
I hope you guys were looking at some of the the fights that we had mentioned with uh some of these fantastic fighters out of philly.
So we’ll just go over the list that i’ve uh that i’ve decided is gon na, be my top five for philly.
So again we had uh bernard hopkins as number one.
We had joe fraser as number two larry holmes is number three uh jersey, joel walcott is number four and we’re gon na take this individual uh, who i really didn’t, know a lot about guys.
I did hear something of him just in reading and passing you know stuff about him, but i never really investigated who he was what he was all about and uh because of this philly situation.
We’Ve been doing this week, it’s interesting so now we’re we’re going to talk about him.
His name’s uh tommy, logren, tommy lagren.
They used to call him uh his his nickname back in the day, and it still is.
He has statues, i understand, graham in his hometown and uh, in philly there in front of the church uh in the in the parks and stuff and uh.
They call him the phantom of philly and uh.
He’S he’s a he’s, an amazing guy, the phantom affiliate.
So it’s he’s a very interesting individual, so guys kick back, enjoy yourselves and we’ll go through this uh with you for a quick little bit here.
So he was born thomas patrick longren, born on november 29, 1902 philadelphia pennsylvania.
He died july, 7, 1982 in altoona pennsylvania.
So i guess that’s a town outside or a small community or something in in pennsylvania, and he was uh 79 years old at the time of his passing so rip tommy thanks a lot for the great career that was awesome.
Man uh checking you out today was really cool the pictures i watched a couple fights of yours today and they were great awesome, so we’re going to go through that again later on in the in the show guys so keep an eye out for the notable fights Coming up all right, so he fought in two divisions.
He fought in the light heavyweight division as well as the heavyweight division.
He was one of seven children in his family and uh.
He was known like right off the hop when he became a boxer.
He’S been known, uh to have how to have had really really good footwork of the day.
His defense was amazing.
His uh swift, accurate punching was, was really good.
I noticed that in the fights i watched today like punching was amazing, and i i read where today, where a lot of modern day boxers look at his techniques, abraham and utilize.
His his actual technique of the day is something that they’re utilizing today.
So he’s he’s still a relevant individual when it comes to uh.
You know giving back to the boxing community even what 30 40 years after his death type of thing right, so that that was pretty interesting.
He beat some really uh, some really heavy duty fighters of the time he he beat the guy named gene tunney.
I don’t know if you know who he is guys, but he was a fantastic fighter.
Another guy that i remember as a my dad used to talk about this guy was harry greb harry grab.
He was, it was like a really hard puncher.
I know that um that lager and fought him like four or five times like i think the first fight he ever had was against harry grubb.
But harry grab was a really hard guy to deal with.
He was.
He was not an easy individual of the time to to deal with because he had such heavy hands.
So this guy fought him.
He also he beat.
He beat, i’m pretty sure he beat those guys.
He he beat max, bear okay, this guy he beat max bear and he beat uh james j braddock, the cinderella, man, and that was one of the fights i watched today and he beat him.
So i was like wow okay, so now we’re uh.
Now we’re talking.
Eventually, he got a title, he got, he got a shot at the title.
I guess against a guy named primo camara all right.
This is a really interesting story, graham apparently uh.
The only way that lagering could get the fight was to ensure that he threw the fight unless he was able to knock the guy out.
So he wasn’t going to win on any kind of a decision or split decision or mandatory points or whatever the only way.
He was to win the fight, he was told that was, you have to knock the guy out or you’re losing the fight, and he had to agree to that right for the fight to go on at that time.
So in 1972 he was interviewed by a some reporter or something about it, and he said it was no question that he actually won the fight like if it was.
If it wasn’t really fixed.
I guess then he would have won that fight.
So he kind of he’d be chuckled about it.
I mean he needed the money back in the day and right and the other crazy part about that.
Whole thing was when he fought this guy.
Graham, this was really crazy, guys you’re not going to believe this.
He was 84 pounds lighter than camara.
What did i just hear that okay, so the guy was in a fight against a guy who’s, 84 pounds bigger than him.
That is insane when you think about that, so that gram was a record which wasn’t broken until 2005, when uh, nikolai valuev fought john ruiz and the weight differential was 86 and a quarter pounds between those two fighters.
So i i don’t know man you can ask any pro you can ask, like is floyd mayweather gon na fight a guy who’s 85 pounds heavier than him? Does that make any sense? What like does that make any nobody does that at least not anymore? So well, i’m just thinking of butter bean but uh butter, bean, [, Laughter, ] butter bean, oh yeah.
I remember that guy with the american flag parents on yeah, i that i was a big boy right that guy was huge yeah.
So anyway, i’m just thinking there must have been some great weight differential between the guys.
He thought i was thinking.
Well, i guess there was maybe they’re not accounted in in the record books so to speak, because i know that’s that’s the record right.
There is value.
F versus a reason, 86 and a quarter pounds, and before that it was this individual, mr logren, at 80 or 86, and a quarter pounds and logger in at 84 pounds right, but it just it’s just that’s that’s an astronomical, like number that’d, be like a guy.
Like 120 fighting a guy, that’s 225.
, think about that and he actually went 15 rounds with the guy and beat him up and – and he couldn’t knock him out because he wasn’t wasn’t big enough.
I guess right.
That’S freaking nuts man when i you think about something like that, all right, so guys check check out these totals these totals impressed me uh graham check this out.
So uh pro fights, total fights, 169 bikes total like okay, and you know how many rounds that was.
He fought 1179 rounds, so i was like oh wow, like this.
Guy was fighting a lot at 169 fights total.
He won 121 fights now the other crazy part about a gram.
Is he only had 14 kos in 121? Wins 11.
That’S his knockout percentage! 11! That’S the lowest percentage, i’ve seen so far uh since we’ve been uh, we’ve been on the air here with everybody, so i don’t know the guy.
Obviously, just went the distance all the time and won fights, obviously because he didn’t knock many people out so so we had 32 32 losses, all right, uh, 14 draws and two no contests, but in back in those days 32 losses probably wasn’t that much graham really Um, you know they’re fighting every two three weeks or something in those days like we were thinking about her at once a month or something like you know what i mean like.
Even if you fought once a month for 10 years, that’s only 120 fights so we’d have to be once a month for, like i don’t know, 13 years straight every month, yeah, it’s like it’s like guys.
Don’T do that like guys fight two times a year once a year like if a guy fights four times a year, that’s like whoa, you know wow.
This guy can handle it.
You know what i mean so anyways talk a little bit about his uh his career.
His pro career 19, this is an interesting one.
Too 1957 he refereed um a match between floyd patterson and a guy named pete rackenmack raccoon maker rackenmeier, something like that peter.
He was the 1956 gold medalist in the heavyweight division, the 1956 gold, medalist and uh.
It was the first time in the history of the heavyweight championship, and i i think it still is: it’s still a record right now.
It was the first time that a gold medalist heavyweight champion in his pro debut came out and fought for the world title.
You know what i mean so his first fight after winning the gold medal was for the world title against lagren.
That’S just you know what i mean so nobody’s ever done that if you think about it – and i thought about it’s like yeah vander holyfield, he had a few.
You know he had to fight.
Everybody has to.
There might says everybody everybody who was ever in that had to zap judah everybody.
You know you don’t come off the olympics first fight and go to the fight for the title first fight like nobody.
I’Ve never even heard of that before.
So that’s another tommy logger in which i was like whoa.
So that’s a pretty interesting one, so he basically he became a really successful guy on wall street, graham he retired uh.
I think his career.
Let’S see, i don’t have the number on his actual career length, but i know that it was probably retired sometime in the late 50s, i’m assuming uh or middle 50s – probably um, i’m not sure, but anyways.
Apparently in the 60s he became very successful on wall street.
He was a an investor on wall street and he was into commodities into sugar and he made a huge fortune on sugar and uh.
Then he just basically retired back to pennsylvania and uh.
He goes to church he’s a very church-going guy right on buddy.
That was awesome thanks.
He goes to church and he likes the neighborhood and he, basically just you know, gave back to his community and stuff of that sort, and so he seemed like a really nice guy really, like you know, when you think about it.
He he had a good boxing career and then he became a businessman and he had a family and and then he just settled down so good for you, tommy right on and your career buddy was was crazy.
So we’re going to talk about the notable fights guys just quick.
We did talk about him a little bit here already, so we’ll just recap that so lagren versus camara, that was the one where he basically said he had to throw the fight uh.
That was for the title: uh braddock right, logren versus braddock, the one i watch – madison square gardens uh.
That was, let me see july 18th.
1929.
Now the interesting part about that, graham that date, 1929, that fight was going on logarin versus uh braddock.
That was the day my father was born wow july 18th, 1929.
So, as my dad was being born in the hospital, i guess these guys were fighting at madison square gardens.
Not you know, i just was like wow, okay, cool interesting little thing, so the other one that i i kind of liked was um the max bear fight.
I saw that a bit today, uh lagren versus max, bear um, like the all.
Those fights were great.
You know what i mean: the camaro fight was a unanimous decision, loss uh, the braddock fight.
He won unanimous decision again and and in the bear fight he uh.
He won unanimous decision in 10.
.
So, as you can see, they were all unanimous decisions, unanimous decisions and when i looked through his career they were all uds right and sds and mds right.
So i was like holy cow.
So that’s where i guess he came up with that 1100 rounds because he was going basically 15 rounds every fight, he fought.
Basically.
So what was the guy? We wanted, what was the guy that had the most again? Was it monzone to say uh? It was graham what was it now we’re going to lose our minds here, i’m going to go, get myself guys.
I know what is that that was like 1600 that was 1600 rounds.
Wasn’T it that’s the record right, look it up.
Maybe we can look it up.
Most most rounds ever fought.
I think it was more than that was it 2600 or something crazy.
1800 most rounds ever fought by a professional boxer.
Basically, we it was, we we had it.
It was uh.
It was like an astronomical number.
Well, while it while i’ve got it here, uh, i’m just gon na scroll down, but what popped up was.
The greatest number of rounds was 276 in a four hour four and a half hour fight when jack jones beat patsy tunney in 1825, before the queensbury rules were introduced.
But let’s have a quick look here and see if we can get the uh.
So there was a boxing match that was 234 rounds long or something 276 rounds, 276 rounds.
It lasted four and a half hours.
I guess those guys needed a shower after that.
No, you don’t have the uh.
Oh man come on it’s just slip in my mind, but i can uh.
If i really put some break, it was uh, it was just it was about a couple of weeks ago.
We were talking about it and we couldn’t believe it like.
If that was actually the real number right, remember yeah, as long as professional boxing, no most browns fought by a professional boxer, that’s wait, anyways guys all right! So i’m going to work on yeah! You keep talking monday monday, we’re going to uh we’re going to end up uh working on another uh city gram, we’re going to move to another city uh monday, so that’ll be a surprise for everybody could be anybody in the world really any city in the world.
So we’ll pick the top five out of that city starting next week and uh moving forward we’re going to try that uh there’s so many great boxing cities around the world.
Boxers come from all different uh demographics.
They come from different upbringings.
They come from different financial situations, obviously they come from all over and they all have a story which is an interesting story.
And that’s what i like to bring you guys every night and let you know about some of the guys that i grew up with and some of the guys i i would have liked to see and grown up with, but just keep her going so anyways.
Graham, i don’t think i think it was around uh.
I don’t know, i think it was 1800.
If i’m not mistaken, oh man, i’m going down i’m going to rabbit hole here, yeah! Well, i don’t know i don’t get it for a guy.
Who knows how to use the computer, i don’t know, hey man, i’m gon na leave it up to our viewers.
You should call your son.
How old is he he probably knows how to use a computer gon na we have to? We have to jump off anyway because, as you know, we’ve got a special guest coming on to our next show.
Yeah and uh, and he’s had a good one.
It’S gon na be a good one, guys out there all the neil the deal, fight fans and talk and fight fans.
Montel griffin is coming on the show tonight with the panel yep, so that’s uh we’re gon na bop off to those guys and see montel.
So thanks a lot for coming out guys, tommy logren check him out check out his fights thanks for the likes, the shares, keep beeping and bopping and having fun and don’t worry about it.
Having yourself a good weekend chill out, relax, have a drink, stay warm and stay safe.
You know what i’m saying: that’s that’s how we do it out here thanks neil appreciate it and uh we’ll see you on monday.
Absolutely graham thanks.
A lot have a good weekend.
Guys, thanks graham take care awesome thanks.
Neil
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