Was Rocky Marciano lucky in the contenders that he drew?

Marciano fought in an era where he had to give up 35 pounds to a lean and muscular Joe Louis to get within sniffing range of a World Title. Sure Louis was 37 but there is nothing lucky about that.

 

Not really. Moore by 1955 definitely wasn’t the same fighter he was in 1951-1953, but he was still good enough to compete with and beat the other top heavyweights excluding Marciano himself. After getting knocked down if Marciano had failed to make the necessary adjustments to neutralize Moore’s counters and neutralize Moore’s defense he could’ve easily lost against Moore, who knew every trick in the book. Even Ali in the early 60’s when Moore was finished as a top fighter mentioned how hard it was to land clean on Moore without getting countered.

Moore in 1955 would beat a lot of modern heavyweight champions because he’d be able to exploit all of the mistakes they make and a lot of heavyweights these days don’t prepare as throughly as Marciano did in his day.

The same Bob Baker that Archie stopped in the mid 50’s was able to beat George Chuvalo and give Eddie Machen all he could handle when he was much older and years past his prime. This was also the case with Bert Whitehurst, who Archie was able to stop in the late 50’s years after his fight with Marciano, but Liston couldn’t.

Walcott is also another guy that was old and had seen better days, but like Moore was very experienced and could still beat many of the top young fighters and exploit their mistakes. Several younger fighters took Walcott’s age for granted and got knocked out for their trouble.

Marciano after getting dropped made adjustments and didn’t let Walcott catch him open like that again the rest of the fight and managed to take control of the pace of the fight. He also managed to get Walcott retreating against the ropes and beat Walcott to the punch with his right hand. If Marciano wasn’t so good at pacing himself he also could’ve easily lost the first fight against Walcott.

Shkor and his handlers assumed that Walcott was too old and that he’d be easy, but instead Shkor got knocked into tomorrow. One of my substitute teachers from back in my high school days was at the fight and said Shkor was completely comatose. This same Shkor went on to give Marciano one the toughest fights of his career. Even Ezzard Charles took Walcott’s age for granted and foolishly fought him a third time and got knocked out.

 

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Marciano fought who ever was put in front of him. I don't think he ever feared an opponent .or that it would ever cross his mind to avoid a challenger.He was a great champion,and a great fighter!

 

I Have read that his management didn't want him fighting Maxim coz it was a bad style.

But tbh I can't see any way for Maxim to win

 

I don’t think his management wanted him to fights louis at the time either Goldman thought he would be to clever for him at the time. Maxim thing is interesting never heard it.

 

Moore is in my opinion the most under rated HW to ever live. Obviously more known for his lower weight accomplishments. His wins over prime HW fighters ranked 12 in Boxing by the numbers (I know not an end all be all book but an interesting one).

 

I don't think so, I think it was probably around the time Marciano was coming up. That's when the fight would've made the most sense

 

Ted Lowry himself after fighting Marciano said that he advised Weill not to match Marciano against Maxim, since Maxim was extremely durable and would most likely neutralize Marciano’s crouch like he did and make Rocky look bad.

From the short clip that I watched many years ago Lowry neutralized Marciano’s crouch by beating Marciano to the punch with his right every time Marciano tried to go into his crouch and then he’d turn him. It would’ve been amazing if footage of the whole fight existed.

 

You saw some footage of the Lowry fight? I never even knew it existed until this post.

 

Here is a spreadsheet I did outlining the top 10 HWs of each decade very roughly according to BoxRec ratings. Of course, I editorialized where I thought necessary, like with the 2010s which are especially volatile. The second page shows the fighters organized by the year they debuted as a professional. It justifies where I put guys in most cases. Of course, hard division between decades is inexact.

That spreadsheet does suggest that Marciano capitalized on the fading 1940s HWs and that his contemporaries were a pretty weak crop. Maybe because WWII killed a bunch of guys his age. Fun to see which young guy got the credit for wiping out the old guard. Tyson's big wins mostly land in the 80s, but his contemporaries were largely 1990s HWs who beat him eventually. Ali defeated most 60s and 70s guys.

Feel free to suggest changes to the spreadsheet btw. It was just something I whipped up in an hour or two for fun.

 

Janitor, a very intriguing exercise. One which I looked at by using the year-end ratings of Ring, which is all I had at my disposal. I actually went one better by comparing Rocky's resume with the very year-end ratings of his own reign first, rather than the position his opponents were in at the time of their fight. Here is what I had:

!952 - Rocky had won the title in September and by year end his #1 and 2 respectively was JJ Walcott and Rex Layne. A no-brainer here, Rocky was about to defend against Walcott in a rematch the following May and he had already knocked out Layne the previous year. Rocky took care of what was needed.

1953 - #1 was Nino Valdes and #2 was Ezzard Charles. Rocky took care of business the following year with Charles, but he should have taken on Nino, who was his outstanding challenger. I feel he would have beaten Nino and put this to rest once and for all about the big heavyweight missing from his record.

1954 - #1 was still Valdes and #2 was Cokell. Rocky took care of Cokell the following May, but it should have been Nino.

1955 - #1 was Archie Moore and #2 was Bob Baker. Rocky took care of Archie the previous September, but Baker should feel aggrieved, because he deserved that shot way more than Cokell. I also feel Rocky would have beaten Baker, but Baker deserved Rocky's time nonetheless.

Now we move to another era and I decided to simply go with prime Marciano against the next era after Rocky's retirement. '56, '57 and '58.

1956 - #1 was Hurricane Jackson and #2 was Archie Moore. Jackson was made for a prime Marciano, Rocky in about 5. As for Moore, a prime Marciano takes care of him again.

1957 - These are the matchups I would be most worried about for prime Rock. #1 Eddie Machen and #2 Zora Folley. Two styles that have me shaking my head with worry. Rather than say, "Oh, Folley's chin wouldn't hold up against Rocky!", stop and think. Has anyone noticed that the Rocky style was Folley's bread and butter? He handled Oscar Bonavena, George Chuvalo, Bob Cleroux (twice) and Alex Miteff all over 10 rounds by boxing, jabbing, countering and utilizing the ring against his crowding, body-punching, clubbing-style of a puncher. All who had really good jaws. Sound familiar? As for Eddie Machen, again, that style of his. Eddie could box, punch, counter and -despite the Johannson fight - had a good set of whiskers. Tough fights. Rocky would have to grind these out. It would be tough but I think he could do it. I wouldn't be betting the house though.

1958 - #1 was Ingemar Johannson and #2 was the guy who just wouldn't go away, Nino Valdes. Prime Rocky takes out Ingo and again would beat Nino. Man, Nino couldn't get a break. First Rocky and now Floyd wouldn't touch him.

Anyways, that was my take on your exercise, Janitor. Must admit it was fun thinking on the styles.

 

If the rule is to dispense with the champions and focus only on who the champions fought in championship fights, I honestly don’t think Rocky would have much to worry about in the entire 1980s.

If you were to be selective enough, he can win 6 title defences in any decade, just as all decent champions would. At the end of the day, it is only champions themselves that will offer any real problem. Certainly not the non champions.

 

Two of those p4p greats were better at light heavy.