Apparently, Marciano and Louis used to hang out sometimes.

I know it must have been hard for Rocky Marciano on the night of Oct 26 1951, when he fought and destroyed his boyhood idol, the great Joe Louis in Madison Square Garden.

 

true. Rocky didn't have a choice. He had to fight him to get a title shot. I am glad they became friends afterwards though.

 

Me too.

 

I need to check out this book. Sounds fascinating.

 

It was smart the Rock stayed retire, no way a 40 year old former champ was going to beat prime Ali.

 

The thing (embryo) that kicked off movement toward the ‘69 Computer fight was Ali being angry over his “defeat” by Jim Jeffries in Woroner’s 1967 HW Computer Tournament which Rocky ultimately “won”.

Ali literally threatened legal action over his “loss” to The Boilermaker - the eventual appeasement was the Computer Fight between Ali and Rocky.

For those who wish to relive (or hear for the first time) Jeffries’ “victory : -

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lol. Ali losing to Jefferies is a stretch. How the hell could they have come up with it when no decent footage of Big Jeff even exists?

 

I guess the “data” they fed into their computer was “fed” to them by some old school boxing historians who were more partial to Jeff.

 

This was the 60's and they did not know how great a chin Ali had at the time. I really don't think it was out of reason to think Old Jeff could have caught up and ko Ali like he did vs the likes of Corbett back in 1965. This was before the Frazier and Foreman fights.