I ask the same question to every Carnera lover .... why was he a .500 fighter at a still young age after the mob dropped him following the Louis loss ? The answer is because he was a .500 fighter in reality.
I don't know if there's any truth to the accusations of Primo Carnera being a product of a fixed career, but I will say that I was never really impressed by his style on film. He was very slow, crude, had poor defense or average defense at best, and didn't hit particularly hard for a man of his enormous size.. Boxrec can't tell us the whole story of course, and I don't like to judge a man's career on the basis of numbers on a sheet, as I feel this is very shallow. However, the record shows that he did lose to some mediocre fighters and in rather bad fashion. As for the validity of some of his matches, who knows. Perhaps certain individuals were just trying to sell a book or make big money on the silver screen....It is rather bizarre however that the claim has stood for over 70 years and has never been discredited fully. Do I think ALL his fights were fixed?...No.. Do I think that ALL his fights were on the level?....Maybe.. Do I think that he may have had some each?....Quite possibly... In either case, I don't rank him very high. He certainly was not an all time great in my book, and while I don't want to sound like I'm being too hard on the guy, it does take a reasonably significant legacy to breach the boundaries of greatness. I might be inclined to ranking Carnera somewhere along the same lines as a guy like Ken Norton or Ingemar Johansen, but probably no further....
Most likely, Shavers would knock out Carnera within four rounds. I say this because of Shavers's devastating power, and because Primo wasn't terribly hard to hit. Anyone who is that wide open to Shavers's punches is in big trouble. On the other hand, if Carnera could somehow withstand an early round beating and hang in there just sufficiently that the fight goes beyond five rounds, it could get very interesting. In this scenario Shavers's stamina would deplete dramatically with each passing round, and conceivably Primo could pull the fight out with a gutsy, later round rally. Overall, though, in my book it's a 75% chance of a Shavers victory against 25% percent for Primo.
You are thick aren't you? Me, Old Fogey, Loewe and MANY others have explained time and time again, yet like a broken record you keep repeating this. Guess you can't learn an old dog new tricks.
Ever wonder why comebacking Foreman never knocked an other decent fighter with that "right hand" that stopped Moorer cold? Does that mean it's a fix too?
So you are comparing Carnera's power to Foreman's ? And a twenty 26 year old to a forty six year old ? Not to mention Moorer's weak chin. Loewe (yawn) ...
Primo made it to champion and proved great heart vs the best Louis and a top form Max Baer...Still Primo made Champion and although could get hurt early vs Shavers...Primo had better stamina and I could see a tired Shavers that lost to Stander,Stallings,Cobb,Mercado,Quarry,Lyle losing to Primo
lost in all this heated convo is all the rounds primo won vs max baer during those 10 rounds. I counted 6 on my card.
Do you think the fact that Foreman was a comebacking man in his mid forties who had been retired for ten years ,whereas Carnera was basically finished as a top liner at 28 has some bearing on it? Don't mess with me Edam :good
I was talking about the COMEBACKING Foreman, and unless you can dig up an unknown fight where he knocked out a highly ranked fighter other than Moorer, the analogy is perfectly true. This is boxing, where unpredictable things happen. Carnera has a good record against top boxers and they were no more illegitimate than other fights around that period. Boxing in general was very icky around that time; for a period of time, no title fights were allowed around the 30's when Schmeling won the championship on a DQ. Why do you think Louis got the decision in the Wiater and Walcott fights? Connections are important. Maybe some of Carnera's early fights were fixed, maybe they weren't. Who cares about his record against tomato cans? I've seen several reports of Foreman's tomato can fights being fixed as well (not to mention that "exhibition"), and just yesterday a similar claim on a Rahman fight. Bottomline is that when it mattered, Carnera, Foreman, Rahman, Louis and all others delivered and beat top ranked contenders legitemately. It's been reported several times that Haynes ****ed up Carnera's health royally and pretty much retired him. You can create your own ghosts and say that the mob magically dropped him (why didn't they fix the Baer fight?), but fact is that around that time, many many other boxers declined vastly going into their 30's from one day to the next. Dempsey had a great fight with Firpo, and then got completely outclassed by Tunney and struggled badly with Sharkey. That's as much circumstancial evidence as you'll have on Carnera's career, in fact even more, because he didn't have his health impaired by Haynes in between, but hey, Dempsey's an American hero and Carnera has been screwed over by several authors with unsubstantiated but popular claims. Oh yeah, and there's a picture of him with mob guys! God damn... ground breaking evidence. By the way, did you know Liston's entire career was fixed, until they ran into Clay who wouldn't take a dive and hence his sudden decline after his career biggest wins?
Carnera was finished at 28 because he was dropped at 28. Left on his own without fixed fights and carefully handpicked opponents, Primo was simply not a world class fighter. He had developed enough skill to maximize his physical advantages and beame an o.k. fighter. In addition, he always had a huge heart and came into the ring in good physical condition. However, he was very limited. He was 4 - 5 following Louis with three KO losses ... he was only twenty eight ... to say he beats a prime Shavers, who was a murderous puncher with solid technical skills, who defeated Williams, Norton, Young, Ellis and almost KO'ed both Ali and Holmes ... If you believe in Primo I can see rationalization for a Carnera victory. While I respect Carnera's heart I do not believe in him as a fighter and see this as a Shaver's KO victory ...
I don´t understand the point here from some that he was finished with 28. He had at this point over 70 fights in just a few years, and that against very good opposition, that can wear you out. You can say that about many fighters (how long was Tyson´s prime for example?)