Hello ESB Classic. As most should know, I'm a big Marciano fan. I speak highly of him in terms of a heavyweight and usually defend him in H2H matchups. So, I thought for a change of pace I would take time to detract for him a bit. If you're big on Marciano you should know that Marciano had a tendency to get wild and throw looping shots. Sometimes when an opponent was hurt he would get in a frenzy throwing anything and everything. This often hurt him from finishing fighters faster or better. No doubt these shots from all angles and from all over were hard to defend against. However, I do think a smart fighter could counter punch against this. The question though is that Marciano most likely would be more careful or less winging in a normal situation where the opponent was more helpless. So we do have to look within the context of these fights. It's also important to note that there is a slight change from Marciano of pre-title up to Walcott to his post title defenses. It's said his trainer Goldman didn't want any late behind the card scorings so Rocky picked up the pace and fought as more of a pressure swarmer which obviously limited his power a bit. It's important to note he was still frightfully painful to get hit by. Very crushing and numbing. Rocky's many 1 punch KO's and having ruined many fighters career is a simple tall tale sign. However, back to address the title subject. Marciano was wild, and a bit inaccurate at times. When opponents where hurt he was rather careless and just bombed away. Dempsey was far more precise and far quick and in there to finish fighters. The paradox of Marciano's finishing abilities is the 2nd Charles fight. Marciano gets a huge nash through his nose due to an elbow in round 6. After round 7 Marciano is basically told he has 1 round left. He finishes Charles with bombing punches. A big right hand dropped Charles and 5-6 punches finished him. If you've seen Charles one then you can see Rocky having so many moments on that he fails to capitlize on. A good example of this is Marciano v Charles I. Watch round 10. Marciano staggers and hurts Charles badly with just a glancing blow to the head. Marciano wails all over the place for the rest of the round. Charles survives, and he shouldn't. Rocky should have finished him because he was nearly helpless. Rocky would be willing to take shots just to bomb away and he throw some really crude and wild shots. If he was just a bit more patient and calculated he would've finished him. Think the Marciano vs Matthews fight to see a more tactical rather than swarming bombing side of Rocky. In that same round, the announcer talks about an instant where Rocky "misses 5-6 straight shots." And he just throws and missed and throws and misses, sometimes with such little purpose. His accuracy wasn't there when he was just constantly bombing. It was numbing, and tough to take that bonecrushing jolts of power. But if he was smarter he could have finished fighters better. This "frenzied" Marciano he was a bit overzealous is a reference to the title defenses version. As Marciano was always rugged, just not ever this careless. If Marciano is overrated somewhat it's his punching accuracy and tendency to wing thousands of punches to little avail. He missed a huge oppourtinity to capitlize on. He hurts Charles so many times in that first fight. Round 10 is a big one in which he definitely should have finished him. Sorry for the essay ramble. Anyone agree? It's important to note that Charles was heroic for surviving and not going down. He could have went down and nobody would have criticized him. He hung in there and took an absolute battering. Charles was a terrific fighter and still a good game fighter for these fights. So it's not much a note to take away from Rocky that a man went the distance. No easy task, however, Marciano in this instance could have perhaps closed the show.
If out of the 11 ranked contenders there's only one who went the championship round distance, who you have to keep talking about, then i think that says enough about his finishing ability. Until you find me another champion who knocked out EVERY ranked opponent he faced, his finishing ability is far from overrated.
Actually i kind of agree. The thing was with Rocky that his stamina was great and his punches had a accumalitive effect, just wearing opponents down. He also did a lot of damage inside and is a underated body puncher. His body shots remind me of Mike Mccalum as they are wide straight rights, rather than the typical left hook.
Or, you could say it took Marciano on average a little over 9 rounds to finish his title bout opponents, and that includes a first round KO over Walcott. Some guys like Moore or Cockell should have been out of there much sooner. Marciano closed the show, but I think the question here is, should he have closed the show earlier? When it comes to finishing opponents, four things matter. 1 ) Power 2 ) Accuracy 3 ) Stamina 4 ) Killer instinct. I think Rocky was poor on accuracy, but he had the other attributes in the spades.
Here we go again. No one gets more play here than Rocky but what the hell ... Marciano was one of the great pound for pound punchers. Marciano loaded up on every shot, unlike other power punchers like a Louis who had a different skill set. Marciano did not have one punch KO power every time out but beat down men with an accumulation over time as do almost all big punchers. Marciano made the most of what he had and is an all time great. That's the book on Rocky ...
Wtf is wrong with you? This is a thread dedicated on a Marciano flaw. Yet you can't get your weirdly misplaced hate on the love he gets when he isn't even getting love at the moment. Yes and no. Marciano was a great finisher especially when he needed to be. If you look at the pre-title fights the way he just ended fights you can make a heck of a claim to it. And once Marciano had an opponent down he was nearly down or just trying to survive. The thing here, though, is that in his post title defenses he was a slightly altered brand of a fighter. Home run hitting at everything and just bombing all over. No doubt he should've had Charles in the 10th in the 1st fight. A freaking glancing blow had him wobbling. Marciano was bombing at him and whiffing the air way too much. He could be the best finisher if he had to and he could be a man who should've closed the show better. This lies the paradox of Marciano as a finsher. Some put him in the Dempsey class but I think this is one area where Dempsey is clearly superior in. And that's because Dempsey has speed, accuracy, and placement on his side. Pretty much covers it. You can look at some fights, but the one that sticks out is Charles v Marciano. And not because it was the only man to go the distance with Rocky during his title reign but because he had an opportunity I feel he should have capitalized on. Moore was really gone in the 6th. He kept getting saved by the bell and got up. Cockell was dead game just in survival mode and that was Rocky's worst performance. And it's said that Rocky "kept LaStarza up to punish him." Either way he finished him when he had/wanted to I guess.
Pretty much my book, also. Sometimes it's not enough worship to consider a fighter an alltime great. And yes, the Rocky threads are getting a little redundant and tedious.
