Rocky Grazino's Record ...

he, this thread is getting away from us. No one I believe is saying Rocky Graziano was an alltime great MW. But he was by all odds, the most exciting
crowd pleaser during those rich talented days of his prime. Not for nothing did Vice President Harry Truman in 1945 attend the Rocky Graziano ko of Billy Arnold at MSG, as I also did. Take a tied up fighting Pit Bulldog, and release him from his lease, and that was the style of the grenade throwing
Rocky Graziano...

 

as a big naz fan i understand exactly what burt is saying. greatness is a subjective term, and while neither rocky or the prince was an atg fighter they can be called great for what they were, upper level boxers and entertainers in the ring.

 

That's fair enough.
I don't think anyone's disagreeing with you.
Graziano's whole reputation is as a hard-hitting underdog, an exciting brawler, who unexpectedly won the championship. :good

 

What's this "Zale was shot in the Graziano trilogy" nonsense? :huh

Zale started to hit a stride in the early 40's and rode that form all the way into his competitive (Ring mag FOTY) swansong with Cerdan in '48. To be frank, he was actually pretty **** in the 1930's. He lost to most everyone decent he faced - and even some not so decent. It was only in 1940, aged 26, starting with Al Hostak x2, that he started to put together some meaningful victories. So by the age of 32-34 he was magically transformed into a "shot" fighter heading into the Graziano trilogy despite riding a streak of twelve consecutive knockouts since his loss to ATG light heavyweight Billy Conn? :huh

...and then managed to put up a hell of a battle with Cerdan after the Graziano rubber match? :huh


Graziano didn't have a world-beater's record entering the Zale trilogy but to call it padded or act like he wasn't a clearly established middleweight contender by then is a bit odd.


For an entire decade, from '42 until '52 when he challenged SRR himself, Graziano beat every man he shared the ring with but for three (Charles Ferguson, Lou Miller, Danny Kapilow, and Steve Riggio - three decision losses and two draws).

Drew with Godfrey Howell and knocked him out in the rematch.

Drew with Frankie Terry in their rematch but had previously knocked him out.

Drew with Tony Janiro but took a UD in the rematch and knocked him out in the rubber match.

Drew with Charley McPherson in their rematch but took a UD in their first encounter as well as the rubber match.

Lost to Joe Agosta on points but knocked him out in their rematch.

Lost to Harold Green twice (nearly scoring a late knockout the first time, and losing a narrow MD in the rematch) but knocked him out in the rubber match.


...and obviously 1-2 with Zale.


Granted, none of the names on his record in that span were the stuff of legend but in 1945 - the year before their first match - Graziano had a far better year (6-0, all knockouts, beating, notably, Billy Arnold, Bummy Davis, Cochrane twice, and, finally, at last, Green) than Zale had ever had in his career excepting maybe 1940 (6-1 with 4 knockouts, beating Hostak twice and Fred Apostoli- but also losing)

 

I think Zale was past his best, due to his war hiatus.
But, YES, I think people have grossly overestimated his prime, in regards to his "past it" status aginst Graziano and Cerdan.

It's true, Zale had a very spotty record right up until the late'30s, and many of the 'name' fighters he beat around 1940 could be argued to be on the decline anyway.

I mean, would the prime Zale who struggled with Steve Mamakos (1941) have an EASY time with Graziano ? Would he beat Cerdan ?

 

:deal

 

IB. your dead wrong to imply that the Tony Zale of 1946 who lost FOUR prime years in the Navy, WITHOUT a BOUT, and at the old age of Thirty Five years old was as good as he was in his best years before he entered the Navy...Yes he lost bouts coming up when he held a job in a steel mill and was a part time fighter.
But when he hooked up with Sam Pian and Art Winch, both who guided Barney Ross, Zale found his stride and become one of the
toughest middleweights of the modern era, thought so by more knowledgable experts than you or I. This Tony Zale Kod Steve Mamakos twice, Al Hostak as hard a puncher as any MW in history, beat a PRIME Fred Apostoli who would give Marvin Hagler hell, flattened in one round Bulldog Harris, decisioned a PRIME Georgie Abrams in 1941,and lost one decision to a tremendous underated Billy Soose who as a college boxer, was so great that they banned Soose from College boxing...Tony Zale when he hit his stride was a great and tough middleweight and
when he lost 4 years of his prime and came back at the age of
33, he was far from the great searing body puncher of his prime.
Let's set the record straight and give this 'Man of Steel" his due..
Not one MW that followed the prime Tony Zale would come out of a bout with him unscathed...

 

:huh


Burt, not once did you see me imply that Zale himself wasn't great (quite the opposite, in fact, I'm stressing that he was a valuable h2h commodity even by the Graziano trilogy, and that Graziano shouldn't be dismissed on the basis of some presumption that Zale was utterly decrepit), or that he was the same after the layoff than before.

My point is that he was still formidable in the mid-late 40's. Not as formidable as when he was a strapping prime body-snatcher in his twenties without 4 years of rust, no, obviously not. But formidable enough to give both Graziano (who, as outlined in my post above, had already established himself as being a legitimate contender and not just some mug) and Cerdan a handful and go 2-2 against them, with both losses close enough to be named Fight of the Year.

Zale didn't sputter out in his final years in the ring. There was never any such thing as "shot to bits Zale" that actually competed. He was still a top middleweight, if not quite the MW force he was before the war. :good

 

IB, we are on the same page, that Tony Zale, before the war was a great rugged punching MW, amongst a great division of Middleweights. But 4 years away from boxing serving in the Navy
and resuming his career at the age of 33 in 1946, took away the best of Zale whilst still being more than good enough to beat a Rocky Graziano...Growing up in the early 1940s, Zale was considered by Ring Magazine to be a helluva body puncher second to none...ciao...