Carnera hits Sharkey with a phantom punch? (Great Quality)

I have this fight on film and just watched it frame by frame on a HD big screen TV.

I think it was the fist which hit Sharkey.

I think Sharkey does not start raising at all until the blow connects.

Was Sharkey actually knocked out? I think so, because I don't think he could have been that good of an actor. Not on the basis on being thrown into the ropes, but his facial expression. That blank look so quickly would be really first rate acting. I have a lot of old movies and I don't remember seeing any actor doing such an effective "I am unconscious" act back then at all.

Is Sharkey's big physical reaction impossible to explain? I don't think so. Carnera was a muscular 260 lbs. Sharkey a flabby 201. We just don't see many fights with this kind of disparity in size. Sharkey was .773 the size of Carnera. Consider that if for a man of 200 lbs, an opponent .773 his size would weigh about 154. I don't think it that unlikely that a super-welterweight would have "extreme" reactions to punches from a 200 lb man. And off the way they look, Carnera was in better shape and stronger for his size than Sharkey. So we have a strong 200 lb man against a flabby 154 lb. man. I would expect the little fellow to fly around from punches.

As for gangsters in the crowds at workouts, this doesn't mean anything unless it is unusual. A gangster might just be a guy who likes sports. If a gangster attended a baseball game, does it prove the game was fixed? At least someone should produce evidence here that the gangsters attending these boxing workouts never did anything like that except in this case before we jump to conclusions on no real evidence.

Off boxrec, the late money coming in was actually bet on Sharkey and shifted the odds in his favor, the opposite of what one would expect from a betting coup.

I am certain I am in the minority, but I see no reason not to consider this fight on the level.

 

To me, Sharkey's reaction in jerking his head back was too quick and natural to be faked. It looks like a spontaneous reaction. Sharkey wasn't a professional wrestler who was practiced in the art of hamming it up after receiving a phony forearm smash. Just my take, of course, but there it is for what it's worth.

 

Do you not think it curious that a 270lbs Carnera could not even wobble a 186lbs Loughran?
Mobsters weren't just at the training camp they owned his opponent and fixed fights for him!

 

Not really because Loughran had an iron chin.

 

Did he ? He was ko'd by Sharkey one of the lightest hitting heavyweight champions.
ps There was only 10lbs disparity between them

 

On the first part, Carnera doesn't look to me on film to have much of a left hook or right cross. He did have a jab, and he did have a right uppercut, off not only this film, but the Baer film. It is a valid question, but the answer might be that Loughran's style didn't make him as vulnerable to uppercuts as Sharkey, and he fought to avoid that punch.

I haven't seen an entire film of Carnera-Loughran, but what I have seen shows Loughran basically fighting to survive in the late rounds.

I admit I didn't know that gangsters owned Sharkey.

But the FBI investigating boxing corruption for the Kefauver Committee in 1960 believed that as many as six of Sonny Liston's fights were fixed. Is this true? I don't know.. The FBI has been known to be in error, but even if so, it certainly doesn't prove to me that Liston needed such help to become champion. I think he clearly was the best heavy between Marciano and Ali. But the folks who controlled Liston were at least as corrupt as the ones who controlled Carnera. So again a fair point, but I don't think proof that the Sharkey KO was a dive.

Just on the Sharkey KO of Loughran, it shows you can never tell. The unexpected in boxing and other sports does happen. On that KO I think it possible that Sharkey's punch did knock Loughran down (probably not all that unusual for Tommy) and he hit the back of his head on the rope when he fell which might have caused the KO. Anyway, that is the way it looks to me on the film.

 

Have you anything on the fights that are claimed to be fixed for Liston? Loughran was hampered against Carnera because the giant stamped on his feet, fractured one toe and severely bruised others.

 

It is in Sports Illustrated in 1960, and of course also probably in the Congressional Record. The FBI had bugged Blinky Palermo's phone and claimed that some Liston opponents phoned him, including on the day of fights. Sounds suspicious, IF you consider the FBI a reliable source.

The problem with the Loughran argument is that Loughran was a good and durable fighter. Is it that unusual that he could go the distance with anyone? The surprise is that Sharkey KO'd him.

And as for the unexplainable, how about Levi Forte (20-28-3 with 16 KO defeats) going the full ten rounds to an apparently close decision loss to George Foreman. No one would expect nor be able to easily explain that one.

 

I'm not particularly surprised Forte managed to last,he was a veteran of over 50 fights ,and George was a novice. Loughran was a better fighter when Sharkey ko'd him than he was against Carnera.

 

Loughran was stopped I think twice in 126 fights, and fought a ridiculous number of elite opponents.

Why would his lasting the distance against anybody require a radical explanation?

 

Loughran was a defensive wizard,you can't ko what you can't hit . When he was tagged he went down.
Stribling dropped him.
Greb had him nearly out in their second fight.
Tunney dropped him.
Lomski had him down twice for 9 counts when the bell rang.
Lomski would probably have stopped him in the next round , but he had broken his right hand,his money punch.


Iron chin my arse!
ps Loughran didn't actually meet that many punchers. Look it up!
Stopped 3 times

 

Really ? So Sharkey w 13 KO victories was a monster puncher ?

 

Seriously guys just watch the full fight.

It wasn't just one freak punch that did it.

Sharkey had slightly the better of the earlier rounds, but then Carnera took control of the fight.

Carnera was stuffing Sharkey in the round before the knockout occurred, and had him on the canvas once.

The stoppage occurs when Carnera pushes Sharkey backwards and catches him with an uppercut as he bounces off the ropes.

While this is a bit flukey, it would be almost impossible to stage, and is the type of shot that would be almost impossible to anticipate.

When you look at Sharkey's subsequent results, he was obviously ready to be taken, and it doesn't seem so much of an upset int hat context.

 

In the heavyweight division almost everybody is a dangerous puncher.

Given that Loughran had 126 fights, something like that was bound to happen at some point.