Rocky Graziano vs Jake Lamotta 1946

Guys have been getting out of fights one way or another forever. Why would you have to break a hand on a tree to do it? It is an absurd story. And then Graziano fights the much better Robinson. Off record, both Robinson and Zale were far more dangerous punchers than LaMotta, so why be afraid of Jake? He might win a decision or perhaps even stop Rocky, but so what?

 

Jake would walk through Graziano.

 

Zale was past his best and it was for his title.Against Robinson, Graziano had nothing to lose, he was an ex champ.

 

What did he have to lose against LaMotta? Graziano was an ex-champ then also. The scheduled fight with LaMotta was in 1950 for Jake's title with Graziano withdrawing because of an injured hand. Mitri was subbed.

The claim here is that Graziano deliberately broke his hand on a tree. Pretty far-fetched, as there are a lot of better ways to get out of a fight, and why sign for the fight in the first place if you are that afraid. Supposedly Rocky panics because he learns Jake is training. Why would anyone expect a champ not to train for a title defense, as he has to make weight.

If you want to say LaMotta is better than Graziano, go ahead, but calling him a coward on the basis of such an unlikely story with no evidence given at all? Not my cup of tea.

 

"I trust him 100 percent."

Good for you, but I don't trust anyone 100 percent.

The best policy is to verify, so what is the evidence?

This is especially true when the story is about something which supposedly happened almost 70 years ago and which I don't remember seeing anywhere else in all that time. The vast majority of folks who were adults, and probably even children, are dead, plus this story makes little sense on the face of it as Zale and Robinson were more dangerous punchers.

"Graziano was on record saying LaMotta was his policeman"

Whom did he police? I recall you mentioned Williams who had been beaten earlier by Lytell and Cerdan, and Lytell, who was actually rated ahead of LaMotta in 1947 and 1948, so policeman LaMotta wasn't doing much of a job. The truth is Robinson was the policeman until he won the title himself. beating Abrams, Belloise, and Villemain.

 

Well, the "static" part is pretty easy to explain. Jake gives the reason later by noting that Rocky got a 30/30 split. It seems that playing it coy worked. Rocky had pretty smart financial advisers, starting with his wife.

Hard to buy that Rocky wouldn't know that Jake would train. And if he wanted to pull out of the fight, there must have been better ways than slugging a tree.

But let's not miss one major point here. Was Rocky rated at all in 1949 or 1950? He doesn't appear in my copies of The Ring's annual ratings. At least Rocky was rated when Zale fought him. So Jake was bypassing all the rated fighters, including guys like Villemain who had actually beaten him (twice honestly) to try to match the unrated Graziano.

One other thing--I don't consider LaMotta a reliable source. Just my reaction off all I know about him.

 

Lamotta said he got grief because Graziano was only ranked number 9.I don't know about the veracity of his comments I just thought it might be interesting to post it.

 

Okay. I didn't know Rocky was even rated 9th, but those monthly ratings vary.

Yes, thanks for posting it. I am not saying that LaMotta is saying anything which isn't true in a way, but he is putting his own spin on it.

And it is hard to see that guys like Villemain and Sands weren't better contenders in 1950 than Graziano. Jake had already taken off a year w/o defending while losing to Villemain.

 

"citing his sources"

Means nothing unless the sources themselves are good,

and no source at all has yet been cited.

I can cite all kinds of sources who have claimed to have seen a bigfoot. Isn't necessarily convincing evidence that there is a such a thing as a bigfoot.

 

Who is defending Graziano on any ground except of his being such a coward that he breaks his hand on a tree to avoid LaMotta. Why not just grab the money and take an early round dive? It has been done by others.

I am skeptical of the slugging a tree story in the absence of very good evidence. Live with it.