School me on Henry Maske...

Excellent amateur

Olympic gold medalist
World amateur gold medalist
2 x European gold medalist

Real good pro too who avenged his only loss, a razor-close loss at that, to Virgil Hill 10 years later in his first fight back.

Maske was an absolute superstar in his homeland and by far the most popular fighter over there at the time and arguably the most popular ever, and if not definitely #2 behind Max Schmeling. Hill had won a very close fight with Maske 10 years earlier in Germany and trust me they worshipped Maske like a god over there and they really did not want their golden boy to lose, to lose his unblemished record and his farewell fight. However, despite that they still did not rob Hill like Kovalev was robbed of all his world titles over in the US against Ward for instance.

Fought the vast majority of his fights at home but when you're averaging 17.8m viewers, peak at 23m (yeah you read that right), revered like a god, you're the champ and are earning big, maybe just maybe, god forbid, these other have gloves won't travel warriors from other parts of the world can get their passports out for a change and prove that they can win without their stacked decks. And he did actually fight outside of Germany 4 times earlier on in his career: The US, France and the UK x 2 the later of which he actually made his pro debut in, albeit against low level opposition. 4 times>>0 or 1 or 2.


'The German boxing business really started in 1992 when my dad did the deal for [German boxer] Henry Maske with [TV channel] RTL," insists Kalle Sauerland, whose father Wilfred kept the business ticking over for 15 years before the Maske deal. "There are three people responsible for boxing in Germany: Wilfred Sauerland, Henry Maske and Hans Mahr of RTL because he took the risk and it looked like a risk at the time." Maske went on and had 12 world title fights between 1993 and 1996 and averaged 17.8m viewers, with a peak at 23m.

"When Henry boxed it was like a national holiday," remembers Sauerland


Maske vs Hill was a unification match up with both Hill's WBA belt and Maske's IBF on the line and obviously a huge event for German boxing. In fact, it was the most expensive one in German boxing history.

'MUNICH, GERMANY. On the evening of Saturday, November 23th, Germany`s Henry Maske and Virgil Hill from the USA were scheduled to meet in the ring for the unification of their IBF & WBA Light Heavyweight world titles. Maske had planned this to be his farewell match (`My greatest dream is to retire as an undefeated world champion.`). As usual, a whole bunch of stars and wannabe-stars were showing up at ring-side, surrounded by patriotic fans on the cheaper places. The rest of the nation was at home watching TV, where the fight was not broadcasted but celebrated.'


Henry Maske Shocks The World, Beats Hill


In a fight that many are calling one of the biggest upsets of the last few years, former light heavyweight champion Henry Maske (31-1, 11 KOs) returned to the ring after a 10-year layoff to win a unanimous decision over the reigning WBA cruiserweight champion Virgil Hill (50-6, 23 KOs). The fight was a non-title affair at the Olympic Hall in Munich, Germany.

The fight was marred with criticism from Germany and several countries abroad. Most said that Maske was far too old to be competitive after being away from the ring for a decade. Maske's own countrymen, like retired former champion Sven Ottke, felt Maske had little chance of winning.

"This is not good for the sport. If things go normally, Henry doesn't have a ghost of a chance. He can't have any reflexes left," said Ottke.

Thousands of Germans were polled and only 26 percent of believed that Maske could pull off the upset win. Ten-years ago, Maske was one of the biggest stars in Germany, and was beginning to get recognition as one of the best light heavyweights in the world from experts outside of the country.

It wasn’t too long after the 1988 Middleweight Olympic Gold Medalist went pro, that many Germans were considering him the best fighter in the country and were beginning to bestow a legendary status upon him. Maske’s career is credited by many experts around the world as the reason why boxing is currently so big in Germany.

Then the unexpected happened. Maske, then the IBF light heavyweight champion, met WBA champion Virgil Hill in a unification showdown on Nov. 23, 1996, and lost a split-decision victory in front of his home crowd at the Olympic Hall in Munich, Germany. After the fight, Maske announced his retirement.

Maske was one of the few people in the world that knew he that he was still capable of avenging the only loss in his career.

Although both men were 43-years-old, Hill had fought 11 times during the ten-year retirement of Maske. There were several defeats in those 11 bouts, but they came at the hands of some of the best fighters during that time period, like Jean-Marc Mormeck, Roy Jones. Jr. and Dariusz Michalczewski. Hill was a heavy favorite to win the fight and even he was confident that the fight would be in the bag.

"I can only lose this fight through sabotage," Hill said.''


FTR, I'm not a fan of his style personally and I'm more of Rocchigiani man myself, who was actually a very good fighter and I along with many others had a clear winner in the first Maske fight and Rocky's only other 2 losses during his prime were against Dariusz M and Chris Eubank (a close decision in Germany again), the former being very controversial and the later razor close IMO. Both Rocky and Maske>>Bootleg D and obviously the same goes for Dariusz and Eubank.