Schmeling was clearly robbed in this fight. I watched it last night and just couldn't understand how Sharkey got the decision. Schmeling boxed his ears off. This content is protected It's here in black and white (no pun intended)
The press of the day was overwhelmingly on Schmeling's side. What if Schmeling had got the nod? He obviously had a lot more left in him than Sharkey. That could have resulted in a very different timeline!
Maybe because Schmeling was german and at the time the U.S. had strained relations with Germany and a German HW champ wasn't wanted?
No in my opinion. Schmeling was hugely popular in America at this time, and was drawing much bigger crowds, than Sharkey or Risko. I think that a much smaller conspiracy is more likely. The referee was Gunboat Smith.
I`ll have to view it again but I thought that Sharkey won the fight. He was a very talented heavyweight and IMO should have been the best of that pre Joe Louis era.
He might have had connections to Sharkey. On the other hand he hated Harry Greb, but still sometimes gave him the nod in close fights.
Thanks for this thread IMoJL....I've always been attracted to controversial 15 rounders (I know,..I'm )...but this one has "controversial" written all over it....a bit like Johnson-Pastrano, and to an extent, like Griffith-Tiger l.
