Edward Henry Greb (June 6, 1894 – October 22, 1926) was an American professional boxer. Nicknamed "The Pittsburgh Windmill", "The Smoke City Wildcat" and "The Pittsburgh Bearcat," he is widely regarded by many boxing historians as one of the best pound for pound boxers of all time.
He was the American light heavyweight champion from 1922 to 1923 and world middleweight champion from 1923 to 1926. He fought a recorded 298 times in his 13 year-career, which began at around 140 pounds. He fought against the best opposition the talent-rich 1910s and 20s could provide him and despite starting as a welterweight, he was frequently squaring off against and beating light heavyweights and even heavyweights.
Greb had a highly aggressive, very fast, swarming style of fighting and buried his opponents under a blizzard of punches. He was elusive with very good footwork to jump in and out on opponents. He was also a master at dirty fighting and had no qualms about employing all manner of dubious tactics, such as spinning his opponent and using the heel and laces of his gloves. Greb often got as much as he gave and unbeknownst to the press continued to fight a number of matches even as he became blind in one eye, due to an injury suffered in an earlier match. The 'Pittsburgh Windmill' was also very durable, suffering only 2 TKO losses in his whole career. The first was in his seventh bout when he was knocked out by an opponent who heavily outweighed him, 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's ultimate weakness may have been his lack of knockout power; although he was able to hurt and bust up many opponents due to the constant onslaught of clean punches he landed on them, he struggled to stop them but this was often due to the fact that his opponents were much larger than him. He launched a vicious beating on the light heavyweight Tunney on two occasions, cutting him and hurting him badly, but was unable to knock him out both times. It was the same process with many opponents.
Widely considered one of the best fighters of all time, Greb is currently ranked by BoxRec as the 5th greatest fighter of all time. Greb was also named the 2nd greatest fighter of the past 80 years by the Ring Magazine, the 5th greatest fighter of all time by historian Bert Sugar, the 4th greatest fighter of all time by historian and boxing commentator Max Kellerman and ranked as the #1 middleweight, the #3 light heavyweight, and the #2 pound-for-pound fighter of all time by the International Boxing Research Organization.
Professional career
Born as Edward Henry Greb to a German immigrant father and mother of German descent, Pius and Annie Greb, who raised him in a working class household. Blue collar Greb began his professional boxing 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 champion George Chip, whom he faced twice during 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 newspapers covering the fight would render a decision), 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 defeated opponents 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 heavyweight champion 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 draw against Mike O'Dowd, who would go on to win the middleweight title during the year, and a newspaper loss to Billy Miske, did not help in his effort. After that setback though, Greb would win his next 52 fights in a row. During that stretch, he beat future light heavyweight champion Mike McTigue, heavyweight contenders Billy Miske, Mike Gibbons, Bill Brennan, Jeff Smith, Leo Houck 3 times, and Battling Levinsky no less than four times during that stretch (6 times altogether) in newspaper decisions. Levinsky was the reigning light heavyweight champion at the time.