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Show JESS INCLINED TO FAVOR MIKE TODAY Has High Regard for Phantom's Punch and Cleverness; Clev-erness; Firmly of Opinion That All Championship Champion-ship Battles Should Be Finish Matches; Thinks He May Be Called On to Meet Les Darcy Some Time. By TESS WTLLARD, Heavyweight Champion of the World. (Copyright. 1915, by A. Merritt. All rights reserved.) TONIGHT Packey MeFarland and Mike Gibbons are scheduled to meet in a ten-round bout at Brighton Beach, Xew York. It is a hard fight to figure out. Gibbons should win, inasmuch as he has been fighting continuously of late, while MeFarland Me-Farland has been out of the ring for two years. But I wonder if it is going to be a , good fight to watch? Here are two of I the cleverest men the game ever produced. pro-duced. But it may be that thev are too clever for each other. It often happens hap-pens that when two extremely clever men hitch up they are so careful that the affair looks slow. Still, it ought to be a great scrap. There's no love lost between the pair. Thev have always knocked each other. . Gibbons came along at his best about ; the time MeFarland quit the ring. Nat-urallv Nat-urallv thev challeneged each other time and "again. But it took a daring promoter pro-moter to clinch the match. The daring promoter is W. C. Marshall, Mar-shall, a wealthy New Yorker, who is giving the men $32,500. MeFarland is to receive (17,500 and Gibbons lo,-000. lo,-000. I can't figure how Marshall is to get out on the proposition. He will have to draw a $45,000 Pate at least to break even. But they tell me that he is in the game for the fun of it and that if he loses he doesn't carp a rap, as long as the scrap is a good one. Mike Has Better Punch. Gibbons is a much better puncher than MeFarland. In fa-t. Packey never was much of a hitter. He could easily oiitbox and outrouph the men of his class, but there are mighty few "K. O. V alongside of his name in the record rec-ord book. On tbe othpr hand. Gibbons, besides being a great boxer, is the most scientific scien-tific hitter of the present -lay fighters, all classes included. He hits like Gans j:j tu U AaBTt t kava tn travel , Fitzsimmons. N It's Just possible that he will be one of the men to fight me for the title within the next couple of years. It is not unlikely that Darcy will grow so heavy in the noxt six months that he will be too big for Gibbons. Right now, however, a fight between this pair would be a corker. MeFarland declares that he will never enter the ring again after his fight with Gibbons at Brighton Beach. Well, if he wins. 1 think he should keep on for a while. Packey has always taken good care of himself. He and dissipation dissipa-tion are total strangers and he should I have a good manv years of fighting still left in him. Here's hoping that both men try their hardest and that the fans will be rewarded. Favors Finishes for Titles. All championship battles should be to a finish. I do not believe it fair for a man to lose his title on a decision in a ! ten-round bout. Any clever felloj is I likely to outpoiut a champion in ten : rounds, whereas he wonldn 't have a chance in the world in a finish fight. I see that .limmv I Tabby the Hammond, Ham-mond, Tnd., middleweight, is bitterly op-I op-I posed to the ten round game. He is j quoted as follows: 'The recent heavyweight ehampion-j ehampion-j ship bout bears out my oft-repeated ar- gument that a championship battle can-', can-', not be decided in a short go. Any I shadow boxer with a set of parlor tricks ! can make a showing over the ten-t ten-t round route. Even a physical wreck can make a wonderful display in that I time. j "If the Havana fight had gone but ten rounds -lack .Inhnson would still be champion. Wiilard would have looked like an awkward, blundering school boy with a pair of soap boxes instead of gloves on his hands. Instead, today he is held up as the marvel of the ape. When Johnson got through with his clever stuff the reliable generalship showed and the wallop that was there all the time had a chance to be put over. flabby is right when he says that Johnson would have won had the battle .u. t T .!,, 'f think I Was quite a clumsy as he states. Still, he expresses my opinion whan he says that championships should not exchange hands in short bouts. Ten rounds is plenty long enough for IQtne fights. Twenty rounds is often , far enough to decide other bouts. But I where there is a title at stake I believe! it should be won only by a knockout. a 4 I UIU. 1 lie 4TUHV.U i overr six inches to floor an opponent. And Mike knows how and when to put knockout force behind his wallops. But Mike has a bad habit of not trving to win by n wide margin in some of his fights. Not that he is faking, fak-ing, or anything like it. He simply be-lieves be-lieves in playing matters safe. He seldom sel-dom fails, however, to give a elassv exhibition ex-hibition of boxing. But often he for gets that he packs the kick of a heavyweight. heavy-weight. . It is inst nossihle that GtiDbona hits too hard for his hands. It may be that he is afraid of breaking his maulers. But he ought o take every chance in the world against MeFarland. If he should stop the "Chicago Whirlwind he would be in demnB all over the world. A knockout fofhim would mean a fortune. . , '' This Australian middleweight. Les Darcy, who stopped Eddie McGoorty, and Gibbons, would draw a tremendous house anvwhere in the world if Gibbons should decisiveh- wallop MeFarland. J bop1 that Mike thinks of this when he is fighting MeFarland. Darcy Great Fighter. This Darcy lad must be a great fight er I didn't think anv man of bis weight he tins the beam st 160 pounds when in condition could stop McGoorty McGoor-ty so easilv. He hails from Maitland, a citv about 100 miles from Sydney, in New South Wales. He is an apprentice appren-tice to a blacksmith and onlv 19 years old He will not. be able to leave Australia Aus-tralia until he is 21. He must serve out his time. In fact, he cannot even fight unless his employer gives his per-mission. per-mission. Iarov"s phy sical development is won derful. He carries a terrific punch and is fast picking up the scientific end of the ianie. He has whipped all the good middleweigbt in A.utralia, mcinains Mick Kinc, who is considered a (frSt fighter over there. Ho lianrlo-l .loft Smith, tho American middlowpilfht. "iioh a ivaliopint: that Jeff fouled himself out of a knockout. At least that it what the Australian papers had to say thr: dav after the fisht. . tlarey will probftbty take on weight as he grows older and It mav he thai lie will turn oul I" Vie another Mnl |