I think there's some misconceptions and misinformation being thrown out there about ab's in this thread. A johnson dog, or a scott dog, or a hybrid or any other moniker does not a good protection dog make. Its the individual, and honestly finding a good, truly civil ab that can do serious protection work seems to be a rarity. They just don't have that depth of defense that type of work seems to call for. You can make a maneater out of some of them, but its not what they are really good at. In my opinion of course. As for the good ab's being recent crosses, and the ones with honest papers being junk...well I guess I'd say I disagree. I've seen just as many good as bad examples of either. And about the good ones coming from straight hunting stock...I guess that'd be dependant on what you consider good. Some of my favorite ab's in the breed didn't come from a hunting dog for 40 years. Most standard/scott american bulldogs don't even come from a strictly hunting background. Bill Hines did have rottweilers, no mistake there. But most of the black dogs that do go back to Hines dogs, are not colored because of the hines dogs behind them. Nor do they show any rottie traits IMO. And I'd be surprised to see any evidence of english bull terrier behind the american bulldog. And as for black lines having less mouth than a boxer and very flawed structure... I haven't seen them all, but the black dogs I have seen, comprising 3 different lineages and several different breeding directions, have all been correct and had considerably more mouth than any boxer I've yet seen. My best advice to the original poster, get out and see a bunch of ab's if thats what you think interests you...go to kennels, go to shows, and see for yourself. One man's trash is another man's treasure.