What's your pick on this one 'Rocky Graziano vs. Jake LaMotta'

LaMotta in the ring
Graziano in the street

 

Jake , Graziano wanted no part of Lamotta.

 

Hi Guys.
They were scheduled to fight on June 28th 1950, but a week or so before the fight, Rocky " claimed " a thumb injury, apparently there was a lot of scepticism about the veracity of the claim, some say the fight wasn't well received, and ticket sales were not as anticipated, others that Graziano wasn't confident he would win over LaMotta, for what it's worth, I would favour Jake to come out on top.
stay safe guys, chat soon.

 

The general consensus is that LaMotta was bigger and better.

I get the impression that both of them were pretty dangerous and vicious in the street.

 

LaMotta all day long. Wrong style for Graziano. And, too good of a chin to get stopped by an occasional haymaker.

 

I think it was Angelo Dundee who was asked about this match and he said,,"You kiddin? LaMotta woulda killed him."

 

While I agree that I’d pick LaMotta, Rocky doesn’t strike me as a guy who would avoid anyone. He fought plenty of good fighters, including in and around this time.

Jake was middleweight champ. I’m not clear if what you’re citing would have been for LaMotta’s title, but I can’t see Graziano turning it down (outside of having a legit injury) whether it be a title shot or not — of course the stakes of winning the championship would have made it a worthwhile fight for Rocky, and even winning a non-title go would probably create demand for a rematch.

Graziano fought five times through mid-May of 1950 and sat out until October, having four more fights before year’s end. He was off in between. That lends credence to the injury claim to me, as he was very active except for that gap.

 

LaMotta takes the win in this one, and considering McCall's matchup in the other recent fantasy fight thread, we can consider bulls to be pretty lucky today.

 

LaMotta easily--an overall superior fighter on every level. KO or stoppage in roughly 8-10 rounds.

 

He didnt fight plenty of good middles.
Burley
Abrams
Belloise
Hostak
Edgar
Chase
Towne
Lytell
Villemain
Delannoit
Dauthille
Wade
Williams
Cocoa Kid
Basora
Raadik
Are just some he somehow missed.
Rocky was a crowd pleaser that drew big crowds,which was fortunate for him because on the way out Zale chose him as part of his pension plan.This enabled Rocky to leap frog over more deserving challengers,like Lamotta no1 and Burley no 2.

 

Hi Buddy.
Loath as I am to agree with Mcvey, he has a point, also I pulled a contemporary newspaper of the day, that cited most of my post
that said, stay safe saint, chat soon.

 

Where did you come up with this list?

Because you do realize that Jake didn’t fight most of the guys on it, right? (Too busy fighting welterweights while he was coming in over the middleweight limit, I guess.)

Graziano fought many fights against good middleweights: Janiro, Fusari, Cochrane, Servo, Bummy Davis, Arnold was 26-1-1 and a 6-1 favorite over Rocky, etc.

As for jumping over contenders, you realize not every challenger is ranked No. 1, right? That’s how it works and how it has always worked. He got his shot and he won it and that led to a three-fight series. Frankly, Jake should have been kicked out of the sport for throwing a fight for the mob but instead he was rewarded for it. Funny how the world works.

I don’t think he was scared of LaMotta and I don’t think he would have turned down a title fight. He was out for 5+ months for some reason around this time and injury explains it more than fear of LaMotta … he could have fought someone else and he was busy the entire rest of the year (before and after).

If he wasn’t too scared to fight Ray Robinson, who proved his superiority over LaMotta quite emphatically in their series, then he wasn’t shaking in his boots to fight Jake.

(And I’ve already said I’d pick Jake to beat him, that’s not the point.)

 

LaMotta all the way. Better all around boxer, better defense.

 

I think LaMotta would enjoy every advantage with Rocky only having a punch in his corner.
I believe if you want to beat Jake you stay out of his way, fight long and pick your shots wisely he was a very good at lulling guys into throwing more punches.
I think if Rocky was doing well early he’d get too comfortable hitting Jake it was in his nature to fight and I think once he started thinking he was winning he’d get excitable and the bulls horns would be waiting.
I think after some hard counters he’d fight on but go out as a matter of fatigue, Rocky wouldn’t and couldn’t outfight or outthink Jake he was a Sherman tank he’d just keep coming, not leaving him any time for a plan dragging RG into constant losing shoot outs.