A deeper dive on Tony Canzoneri's greatness.

Didn't expect it to be Canzoneri did you ? I think he is one of the most underrated fighters ever period, top 20 lock for me at least. Well, no point in saying anything else, so let's just do this. This will probably be my longest one yet. So prepare yourselves.

Tony Canzoneri became a pro fighter as young as 16 years old, but that didn't mean he would just sit back and fight bums for years before finally doing something noteworthy. Not even a year into his career, he beat the #10 rated Flyweight, Tommy Milton, and only 3 months later he beat the #7 rated Bantamweight, Archie Bell, proppeling Tony high in the rankings. Davey Abad beat him, thus ending Canzoneri's 31 fight winning streak, and would be rated # 8 after his victory over him. Canzoneri would then proceed to beat future Featherweight Champion and #6 rated Featherweight Andre Routis, #3 rated Bantamweight Bushy Graham, #5 rated Bantamweight Johnny Green and he would then draw with #4 rated Bantamweight Charles Bud Taylor and #13 Bantamweight Vic Berrune. Canzoneri then officially lost to Charles Bud Taylor for the vacant NBA title. He was still only 18 years old mind you.

Right after that, he beat the tough Cowboy Eddie Anderson and Pete Sarmiento, 2 former contenders, before losing by DQ to Cowboy Eddie Anderson in their rematch. Then, he would proceed to make history by beating the Featherweight Champion of the word, the fantastic Johnny Dundee, thus making him to this day the youngest American Champion in history. Then he beat the #7 rated Featherweight Ignacio Fernandez, before rematching and beating his former conqueror, Charles Bud Taylor, the #1 Bantamweight in the world. Then he would draw with Pete Nebo, who would climb up as high as #5 by the end of the year. He would then beat the other best Featherweight in the world alongside himself, the NBA champion and #2 rated Featherweight Benney Bass. This is a 19 year old we're talking about.

#9 rated Bantamweight Vic Folley would put up a good fight but would come up short. #6 rated Featherweight Harry Biltman would get the better of him though. And then Canzoneri would lose his title to his former victim Andre Routis. Instead of taking revenge and regaining his title, he decided to let it go and move up through the weights.

At Junior Lightweight, he knocked out former top Featherweight contender Chick Suggs in 6 rounds. He would then draw with the wonderful Al Singer, who only 2 months later, would proceed to beat Bud Taylor twice back to back and would become a future Lightweight Champion by beating Sammy Mandell. Now back to Canzoneri. He would then stop the #4 Featherweight Joey Sangor in 7 rounds and beat his former featherweight victim, Ignacio Fernandez in a rematch. #4 and #6 rated Junior Lightweight contenders Cecil Payne and Sammy Dorfman didn't do any better. Andre Routis put up a very good fight, but coudn't defeat Canzoneri a second time, thus Canzoneri won the trilogy against him 2-1. His second rematch with Ignacio Fernandez was a similar case, same thing with his win over fringe contender Phil McGraw.

He would then lose to the Lightweight Champion of the world Sammy Mandell. Let us not forget that he was still 20, no shame in losing to a Hall of Famer. He would then beat the #1 rated Junior Lightweight, Eddie Mack, as well as #7 rated Johnny Farr. The #5 rated Junior Welterweight Stanislaus Loyza would also get beat. These last 2 paragraphs have been describing a single year mind you.

#2 rated Lightweight and future Champion of the world Jack Kid Berg would put a good beating on Canzoneri. Canzoneri would then beat Stanislaus Loyza and Johnny Farr again in their respective remaches, as well as the #8 and #3 rated Junior Welterweights Joe Glick and Tommy Grogan. He would then proceed to beat the Junior Lightweight Champion, Berney Bass. Then he would lose to #2 rated Lightweight Billy Petrolle.

Finally, he would become the Lightweight king by knocking out Al singer, who had defeated Mandell in 1 round, also in 1 round, in what was quite a poetic upset. Poor guy, imagine winning and losing the title in just 1 round. After that, he would beat the #2 rated Junior Lightweight Johnny Farr again before losing to the fantastic Sammy Fuller in a 10 round decision. Previous victim Tommy Morgan would lose against Canzoneri again too. Then, he finally beat his former conqueror, Jack Kid Berg, in an astonishing 3rd round knock out to gain the NBA Junior Weltweight title. A rematch was scheduled, but Canzoneri first decided to defend his Lightweight title against another previous victim, Cecil Payne. After that, he would again beat Jack Kid Berg in the rematch to defend his 2 titles, as well as the #2 rated Lightweight and future Champion Kid Chocolate.

He unfortunately lost his Junior Welterweight title to Johnny Jadick in a close one. But he successfuly defeated the #7 and #6 rated Lightweights Lew Massey and Battling Gizzy before again losing to Jadick in the rematch. He would then successfully defend the title against top contender Billy Petrolle in the fight of the year. He would also beat Pete Nebo, whom he had drawn with earlier in his career, prior to losing to the #3 rated Lightweght Wesley Ramey, then he would beat Battling Shaw to become the first 2 time Junior Welterweight Champion in history. And then of course, he would lose twice back to back against the legendery all time great, Barney Ross, in 2 very close fights.

Canzoneri would then beat the #7 rated Lightweight and future Champ, Frankie Klick, as well as Kid Chocolate and Cecil Payne in rematches. #5 rated Lightweight Cleto Locatelli would fall short twice back to back, and Pete Nebo was the same. He would then beat eventual Champion and the #1 rated Baby Arizmendi before again defeating Frankie Klick in the rematch. He then lost and won against #3 rated Welterweight Harry Dublinsky, and outclassed the undefeated #4 Lightweight, Leo Rodak. Then he beat the amazing Lou Ambers to win the vacant Lightweight title. He would then proceed to defeat the #3 rated Frankie Klick twice, Bobby Pacho, the #8 rated Joe Ghounly, the #6 rated Al Roth, fringe contender Billy Hogan and Steve Halaiko, and Johnny Jadick again. Then, he would sounly outclass the legendery Jimmy McLarnin. He would then lose to Ambers and McLarnin.

He then defeated future #9 Lightweight contender Frankie Wallace before losing to Ambers again. The great Tony Canzoneri was clearly in decline. Canzoneri would not fight for another year, and when he did, it was in a losing effort against the unremarkable Eddie Zivic. He would fight 2 more rated opponents until his retirement, Bobby Pacho whom he beat, and Al Bummy Davis in his last fight, which was the only stoppage loss in his career.

Yeah, I think people are sleeping on this guy.