Rocky Marciano vs. Jimmy Ellis (both prime)

Ellis had the skill, but lacked the will to stay focused on a game plan sometimes. Especially against men he had no business mixing it up with.

Shavers told Ellis' camp "Tell your light heavyweight boxer that Earnie Shavers is coming for him", an obvious taunt highlighting the fact Ellis wasn't a natural heavyweight to instill fear. Instead of being cautious and trying to box Shavers, Ellis ego prevented him from doing this and he was aggressive from round 1...and was KO'd. That was the Acorn's clever plan all along since he knew he probably couldn't outbox Ellis.

So you're 100% spot on that a combination of Ellis' bad habits and Rocky's relentless pressure would lead to Ellis' demise. I would predict Rocky has trouble early, but eventually kicks things up a notch around round 4 and eventually wears Ellis down by rounds 8-10.

As a side note, Ellis would probably be Rocky's 5th best win overall. He was a good fighter with many good attributes and skills, but a little undersized and lacked the raw power to keep Rocky from bulldozing him once he's hurt.

 

While he had skills, I think in his mindset and in his heart Jimmy Ellis was more fighter than pure boxer. That served him well at times but worked against him at others.

I like that about him — he could have probably been proto-Jimmy Young had he wanted to be, but he had too much warrior in him to go that route. (And I like Jimmy Young, but Ellis was a ‘to thine own self be true’ kind of fighter.)

 

Quarry and Holyfield too. They could've been marvelous boxers/defensive fighters if they had a more cautious mindset.

 

Ellis was a terrific , vastly underrated fighter ... it would be a ar w Rocky but that's why ultimately Jimmy, over 5, would lose ... he was too brave ..

 

To be entirely fair to Ellis... He DID have Shavers hurt bad in the first, and Earnie had to hit him while holding the back of his head to take him out.

Also gonna go out on a limb here and say that Rocky probably gets dropped at least once before he knocks Ellis out. Jimmy had some pretty admirable punching power, and Marciano will be right there to feel it.

 

Yes, all that is true. Shavers did use crude tactics to nail Ellis. But that might not have happened if he didn't try to slug it out with Shavers.