Marcel Cerdan and His Historical Placement

7th is way up there for someone who only stepped up quite late into his career, top30/40 seems about right to me. he does look good on film.

i did meet someone once who was adamant he was the best boxer of all time, which was weird.
one of the worst nicknames ever too.

 

Im 23 years old and before I ever did any research on Marcel Cerdan I knew him as a fighter Jake Lamotta beat.

 

Overrated and nowhere near a top 10 middleweight.

 

You could post a poll and I believe even here most have him outside of top 10. 1. GGG (still not convinced ? some might be in 2-3 years from now) 2. Loyd Marshall 3. Hagler 4. McCallum 5. Tommy West 6. Rick Ihetu 7. Nunn 8. Toney 9. Reggie Johnson 10. Kalambay 11. Burley 12. Fitzsimmons 13. McClellan 14. Eubanks 15. Pavlik 16. Taylor 17. Greb 18. Monzon 19. Robbie Sims 20. Artie Levine 21. WSJ 22. Tony Thornton 23. Bennie Briscoe 24. Fullmer 25. Hopkins 26. Jorge Castro 27. Sergio Martinez 28. Rubin Cater 29. Dwight Davison 30. Sanderline Williams 31. Eddie Booker 32. Freddie Steele 33. Fred Apostoli 34. Al Hostak 35. Ketchell 36. Papke 37. Joey Giardello 38. Joey Archer 39. Langford 40. Jack Chase 41. Ken Overlin

 

It wasn't Randy it was his brother.

 

It's a tough question. Certain things need to be factored in, most notably, a fading force became champion. It wasn't just Zale who creaked. On closer inspection, what you had was a rather small middleweight, purportedly better as a welterweight, not without his fair share of hand trouble, climb to the top.

The negatives are easy to identify. It wasn't a long stay as champion, and key victories over Williams and Zale are tainted by the victims' mileage, though victory over Abrams was top draw.

The biggest contrast today is what fans make of the available evidence and what contemporaries thought who followed Marcel from the gym to the ring. Opinions were very complimentary. Many were convinced that LaMotta would never have got his mitts on the gold had he not caused that little tumble.

 

This is the most overblown excuse for Cerdan. If you go back and read what Cerdan actually said immediately after the bout you would see that Cerdan said he injured his shoulder BEFORE he fell to the canvas when throwing a punch. It had nothing to do with LaMotta. It also excuses the fact that LaMotta fought that fight with a broken hand. In reality had LaMotta gotten his title shot 3 or 4 years earlier instead of being leap frogged by smaller, less deserving fighters in Cerdan and Graziano, we would have never heard of Cerdan, Graziano, or the Zale-Graziano trilogy.

Characterizing Williams and Zale as past it but calling his win over Abrams class is a major stretch. Abrams was well past his prime at this point which is the reason why Cerdan, who had never been seen in the USA was made a favorite over him. And lets also not forget that when Cerdan faced the aging Abrams and was shown to be very hittable, suffered cuts around both eyes, and won a close decision (two judges had the fight even on rounds, and some people complained that Cerdan should have lost points due to low blows) he used the same excuse as he did against LaMotta, an injured shoulder. It gets so tiresome hearing the same old party line repeated about how LaMotta wouldnt have won had Cerdan not injured his shoulder. It totally ignores that LaMotta was absolutely kicking the **** out of Cerdan before he ever injured his shoulder and that the fall happened because Cerdan was trying to hold on for dear life to halt the ass kicking he was getting and LaMotta wrestled him off.

 

How to rate Marcel Cerdan ? I saw him ringside when he won a tough decision from Georgie Abrams, a TOUGH MW who gave Ray Robinson hell,
fought a draw with Charley Burley, and Abrams would certainly be MW champ today, with the possible exception of my man GGG. Cerdan ruined a fine MW
neighbor of mine Harold Green who bested Rocky Graziano 2 times, and Marcel kod a great MW prospect LaVerne Roach, who died a few months later.
I still believe that if Jake LaMotta and Cerdan met for their return match, a healthy Marcel would have decisioned LaMotta. And Marcel would have given Ray Robinson a helluva match if fate hadn't intervened...

 

Klompton, I disagree with a few of your points. I read the day after reports of this fight closely and there was no such thing as laMotta beating the 'carp' out of him in the first or Cerdan hanging on, just that Jake rushed Cerdan. The injury was said to have come from a missed left hook that Cerdan threw followed by a push to the canvas from Jake. It also stated that Cerdan won rounds 2, 3 and 5 one-handed, but it was in the 2nd that the 'elevator' muscle in the left arm went out completely. Red Smith wrote a sentence that stuck with me. He said something to the effect of "it is hard to believe with the amount of sucker right hands that Cerdan landed on jake, that a two-handed Cerdan could not beat him."

Also, you mentioned Georgie Abrams to be aging and washed up when the two met. In fact Georgie was 28 with about 55 fights behind him, whereas Cerdan was 30 with 99 bouts. Georgie, if anything, may have lacked match sharpness. I believe he served in the Navy for 4 years, but he had four good 10 rounders behind him since coming back, and in fact he was coming off one of his greatest wins with a 10 round win over the outstanding top contender Steve Belloise and would go on to fight his arguably greatest fight against Sugar Ray, losing a debatable decision by all accounts. So, Georgie had a lot in the tank. He probably required a few more fights for sharpness, but he was good. And this fight definitely deserved a rematch.

 

In addition to what scartissue wrote, the available film shows that Cerdan could barely get anything on his left and virtually stops using it. Lamotta however, despite his injury, happily bangs away with both hands for the duration.

Perhaps some were too dismissive Jake because of the injury, but you have to believe the complexion of the fight changes dramatically if Cerdan's left is good.

 

My new vote for worst post ever.