THE 100 GREATEST BOXERS OF ALL TIME #6: HARRY GREB
“THE HUMAN WINDMILL”
108 WINS (48 BY KO), 8 LOSSES, 3 DRAWS, 190 NO-DECISIONS
World Middleweight Champion 1923–1926
International Boxing Hall of Fame Inductee 1990
They called Harry Greb the “Human Windmill,” but the “Human Woodchipper” would have been a more accurate nomme de guerre. Greb’s opponents were not so much matched with him as they were fed to him like useless lumber, coming out of the other side of their encounters with him nothing more than shredded and crushed piles of gore. Even Gene Tunney, the future heavyweight champion of the world left the ring an unrecognizable mass of raw flesh and open wounds following his first encounter with Greb in 1922. That it was the only loss the supremely skilled Tunney would suffer in 85 professional contests speaks to the irrepressible violence of the Greb attack.
Greb might have scoffed at Tunney’s 85-fight total. With 309 known bouts credited to him by boxing historians, he engaged in more fights than any other boxing champion in history, including the second most fights against world champions and Hall of Famers (56). Greb fought in the era of no-decisions, when states like New York and Pennsylvania (Greb’s home) outlawed official decisions, and fans relied on their favorite newspaper writer for picking a winner. Thus, well over one hundred wins (and maybe a dozen or so losses and draws) are not included in his record.
He put together an impressive 40-bout undefeated streak between December 1913 and December 1915 and engaged in 44 contests in the year 1917 alone. That is more fights than many modern champions have in their entire careers. He again went undefeated in 45 bouts in 1919, eleven of those against world champions or Hall of Famers. Many were no-decision bouts, but even the sportswriters had to admit Harry did not lose one of those meetings. Some have called Greb’s 1919 the greatest single year of boxing for any fighter in history. In his 309 pro bouts, Greb was only stopped twice (by Joe Chip and Kid Graves).
He was not a heavy hitter. Greb outfought and out-willed opponents, treating the Queensbury Rules more as overly polite suggestions than regulations, and swarming fighters with non-stop punches from all angles until they did not even have enough breath left to cry “uncle.” His limitless stamina and terrifying will to win meant that no fighter from middleweight up to heavyweight was safe from his wrath.
Tunney could attest to Greb’s relentlessness after the Pittsburgher thrashed him for the light heavyweight championship of America on May 23, 1922 in New York’s Madison Square Garden. Johnny Wilson lost the world’s middleweight title to him in the open-air Polo Grounds in New York on August 31, 1923, when Harry was already a decade into his career. Fellow all-time great Mickey Walker failed to take the title away in a classic 1925 war of all-out brawlers, also in the Polo Grounds. Following a series of frightening sparring sessions with Greb, even heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey, the ferocious “Manassa Mauler,” was said to want no part of the Pittsburgh middleweight in a real fight.
It is a morbid fact that dying young can give your legacy a big boost in any entertainment field, and Greb checked off that box too in 1926 at just 32 years of age, never waking after a surgical procedure. Only then did doctors reveal the fact that truly proved Harry Greb’s greatness: Since 1921, he had been fighting while blind in one eye.
Harry Greb’s record vs. Hall of Famers & World Champs:
1/12/1915 — No-Decision 6 — Billy Miske
10/18/1915 — No-Decision 6 — George Chip
11/16/1915 — No-Decision 10 — Tommy Gibbons
6/26/1916 — No-Decision 10 — George Chip
2/10/1917 — No-Decision 6 — Mike Gibbons
4/30/1917 — No-Decision 10 — Al McCoy
5/19/1917 — No-Decision 10 — Jeff Smith
5/22/1917 — No-Decision 10 — George Chip
7/30/1917 — No-Decision 10 — Jack Dillon
9/6/1917 — No-Decision 10 — Battling Levinsky
9/11/1917 — No-Decision 10 — Jeff Smith
11/19/1917 — W 10 — George Chip
2/25/1918 — No-Decision 10 — Mike O’Dowd
3/4/1918 — No-Decision 12 — Jack Dillon
3/11/1918 — No-Decision 10 — Mike McTigue
5/13/1918 — W 10 — Al McCoy
8/16/1918 — No-Decision 6 — Battling Levinsky
9/21/1918 — No-Decision 10 — Billy Miske
1/14/1919 — W 12 — Leo Houck
2/17/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Battling Levinsky
3/6/1919 — No-Decision 6 — Leo Houck
3/31/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Billy Miske
4/25/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Leo Houck
4/28/1919 — No-Decision 12 — Battling Levinsky
6/23/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Mike Gibbons
7/14/1919 — No-Decision 6 — Battling Levinsky
9/1/1919 — No-Decision 12 — Jeff Smith
9/3/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Battling Levisnky
12/12/1919 — No-Decision 10 — Mike McTigue
5/15/1920 — No-Decision 10 — Tommy Gibbons
7/31/1920 — No-Decision 10 — Tommy Gibbons
12/25/1920 — No-Decision 10 — Jeff Smith
2/25/1921 — W 10 — Jeff Smith
8/29/1921 — No-Decision 10 — Kid Norfolk
2/20/1922 — No-Decision 10 — Jeff Smith
3/13/1922 — W 15 — Tommy Gibbons
5/23/1922 — W 15 — Gene Tunney
7/10/1922 — No-Decision 8 — Tommy Loughran
1/15/1923 — No-Decision 10 — Tommy Loughran
1/30/1923 — No-Decision 15 — Tommy Loughran
8/31/1923 — W 15 — Johnny Wilson
10/11/1923 — L 10 — Tommy Loughran
12/10/1923 — L 15 — Gene Tunney
12/25/1923 — W 10 — Tommy Loughran
1/18/1924 — W 15 — Johnny Wilson
4/19/1924 — L (DQ) 6 — Kid Norfolk
8/21/1924 — No-Decision 10 — Tiger Flowers
9/3/1924 — W 6 — Jimmy Slattery
9/17/1924 — No-Decision 10 — Gene Tunney
10/13/1924 — D 10 — Tommy Loughran
3/27/1925 — No-Decision 10 — Gene Tunney
4/17/1925 — W 10 — Johnny Wilson
7/2/1925 — W 15 — Mickey Walker
7/16/1925 — No-Decision 10 — Maxie Rosenbloom
2/26/1926 — L 15 — Tiger Flowers
8/19/1926 — L 15 — Tiger Flowers
