Greatest Cinderella stories in boxing history

Wish I could use Dave Tiberi here

 

The great Luis Santana deserves a mention here. The Jersey Joe Walcott of the 1990's.

GOAT.

 

Yep. He proved it was no fluke in his first defense, replicating the result of his title winning effort vs. HOFer Terry Norris. Inspirational stuff.

In the time I've follow the sport, Rene Jacquot and Rolando Pascua are two examples that come to mind...

 

Billy Backus, Lauro Salas, Rocky Kansas, Johnny Dundee

 

Has to be Buster Douglas. With his mom dying weeks before the match. Sadly it turned midnight pretty quick.

 

Excellent choice, Douglas is a top pick for me as well.

I'll throw out a few others

Steve Little= journeymam upset Nunn for a title

victor Rabanales rugged Mexican journeyman turned champion

Glen Johnson = unbeaten against cans, then gets destroyed by Hopkins. But figured out how to be better and after going something like 6 wins and 9 losses (many unjust) he wins a world title

But one of my favorite and a real oddity, Will Grigsby. Grigsby is 1-0 in 1989 when he's put in against Olympian and future world champion and hall of fame Michael Carbajal in fight #2 of his career. He drops a four round decision. Grigaby then retires for five years, makes a comeback and about 10 years after the carbajal loss wins an IBF world title. But his story doesn't end there... 7 years later he wins another world title in 2005, 16 years after dropping a decision to carbajal and retiring

 

Hi Buddy.
Good pics, very good pics, you could also add Eugene Criqui the tough and tenacious featherweight from France, this little battler compiled a record of 68 fights before he entered the first world war, and while fighting at Verdun was shot in the face by a German sniper, as you can imagine the bullet caused extensive damage to his face, in particular his jaw, the surgeon's of the day had to piece his jaw back with the use of plastic, wire, and sheeps bone, and he had to take 2 years to fully recover, his friends and family were aghast when he told them he wanted to return to the ring, but not only did he return, in 1923 as a huge underdog he won the featherweight title knocking out the redoubtable , Johnny Kilbane in 6 rounds, he must have been some man.
PS he lost the title to non other than Johnny Dundee !!
we haven't spoke for a while Kid, and I am less the richer for that, keep up your fine postings, chat soon buddy.

 

Saoul Mamby had some good upsets vs young boxers.

 

Jersey Joe Walcott came up dry 4 times. I imagine, at the time, it looked pretty obvious he was never going to be Heavyweight Champion. Then: BANG!

Also, George Foreman the second time.

 

Oleg Maskaev deserves a mention too. After being knocked out COLD three times in just over a year - by Johnson, Whitaker and even T-Rex Sanders - he was completely written off. No one thought he could be even a fringe contender, let alone win WBC HW title. In fact - most fans thought that at 33 y.o. after 3 brutal KO's in his last 5 fights it's the end of his career. Then, 4+ years later Maskaev KO's Rahman once again and wins the title!

 

Troy Dorsey was never meant to beat Paez, he technically didn’t… he came close twice, deserved to at minimum once… he was all grit, all action but not overly good (compared to someone like Paez and the competition he was thrown to) but he punched his heart out into this conversation… at least twice…well… on my cards.

 

Backus is a good pick Basilio fought through him that night… tough, very tough.

 

I think Dwight Muhammad (Braxton) deserves a mention. Gets out of prison with not many prospects and very little boxing experience. A draw and a loss in his first 3 fights. Then wins a belt in I believe under 20 pro bouts with 0 amateur fights.
You could actually say the same thing for Hopkins here.
I'm sure theirs plenty stories from the 20's 30's and 40's

 

Mike Weaver - self admitted that he wasn't taking his career seriously in the beginning. A conversation with Ken Norton, who told him he could make some real money if he got down to some serious training, turned the career around. I saw an early fight of his with Tony Pulu and believe me, he was un-extaordinary. A few short years later i saw his fight with Bill Sharkey and was amazed that this was the same fighter. Further wins over Stan Ward, Bernardo Mercado and Pedro Lovell go him his first title shot and he really took Larry Holmes by surprise. Went on to win the WBA heavyweight title.

Rodolfo Gonzalez - started out as a flashy Mexican banger very early in his career (turned pro at 14) until abdominal pains took him to a Doctor who diagnosed him with liver cancer and actually gave him a time limit for end-of-life. Out of the ring almost 3 years before being given a clean bill of health (some say misdiagnosed, he says divine). Went on to become WBC lightweight champ.

Daniel Jacobs - also diagnosed with cancer. Was out of the ring for a year and a half (heard he had to learn to walk again) beofore returning to the ring and went on to win WBA and IBF middleweight titles.