Rocky Marciano seems to be...

Bowe made 2 defences, against crap opposition.

Holyfield only managed 3 consecutive defences.

Lennox Lewis made 6 consecutive at the most, if you count his win over Briggs as the "linear title", otherwise it's 3 or 4.

Tyson managed 6 if you count his unification with Tony Tucker as the real title, or 2 if you count his win over Spinks as the championship.

 

I don't personally have a problem with him, but I often think that a bit too much is made of his unbeaten record. When debating the old school versus the new, its common for a contemporary advocate to point out that the old school fighters had more blemishes on their records than many of the more modern champions. Old school fans will rebuddle by saying that the less pretty records were attributed to the lack of amateur experience as well as the prescense of better competition, hence records mean nothing. Where the contradiction comes into play, is when someone tries to rate a fighter over Marciano, the same fans will point out that he had a perfect unbeaten record. Marciano debates often generate arguments where double standards are concerned.

 

The more I think about Marciano, the more I want to put him as my #1 heavyweight ATG.

You can't ask more of any guy, honestly. He was small by the day's standards, tiny by today's, and yet he still beat everyone ever put in front of him, mostly via brutal knockout. His training ethic is legendary and his will to win is nearly without parallel.

49-0 speaks for itself. Everyone else lost - except for Marciano. His comp as champ is highly underrated, too - and so is the manner he disposed of them.

As of right now, I have him at #3.

 

I think very good fighters with spotty records often have had issues with matchmaking and management. But that doesn't apply only to an "old school" era.

Also, I believe the old-timers had lots more amateur, or unrecorded pro, or un-regulated amateur contests than is often assumed. So that's not a good explanation.

 

I loved the guy,he was never a big head,and seemed quite shy at times,a good honest family man,who imo would give fits to any heavy weight that ever laced up the gloves and got in a ring,by the way heres that funny coming to america clip someone was looking for

[YT]-CEayuIgB8k[/YT]

 

Great observation, I always thought the same thing.:good

 

Marciano and the 72 Dolphins are nothing a like, Hell even today's New England got a few close calls to that unbeating record.

Yes the Rock had a close call here or there?? But than again who doenst. Ali had close calls vs Fraizer III, Cooper, and Dong Jones.
Louis had it against Conn.
Dempsey vs Firpo.
Robinson vs Turpin II and of couse Lamotta.
Marciano is just as great as any other legend of the ring. I dont see why people are even debating about this. Yes the 72 Dolphins PERHAPS could win the Superbowl to day. There only close call would be New England of couse.

 

It's not just the close calls, it's the inferior competition. The teams in the Dolphins division were **** poor, none of them were close in making the playoffs. And when they would have lost to the Steelers in the playoffs if Bradshaw was more mature. They got lucky.:good

 

And Marciano had pretty great wins, Walcott, Charles and Moore were great fighters. They would have been champs or contenders in about any era.

 

Marciano is the ultimate story of triumph, a charmed boxing life. If anything, I think he's underrated, except for the supernuthuggers.

The guy had like 15 amatuer fights & turned pro @ 23 1/2 years old. How many guys have had successful careers with this sort of beginning? Add to that, he was relatively short, had short arms, and appeared clumsy, and some claim he was not very fast. How many guys with this description have great careers. Yet he won it all, defended the title 6 times, KO'd all his defenses except Charles I, convincingly won the rematches with Walcott and Charles, defeated Archie Moore who was still a champion some 7 years later, retired undefeated when there wasn't any competition, and perhaps most impressive of all, he stayed retired!

As far as skills go, his defense was very underrated, just too unorthodox to appreciate, and it set up an offense that was delivered at all angles with serious power.

P4P he's the only guy I would not favor Ali to beat. I'd have to flip a coin.

 

Marciano's opposition was excellent really.

 

"I refer to Rocky Marciano as the NFL version of the 1972 Miami Dolphins, who also went undefeated. Miami won by narrow margin in some games, and ended up undefeated, but very few believe they would rank in the top 5 best teams talent wise."

Seriously, who are these very few. The Sporting News in 2002 picked the Dolphins as the best team ever, and they were loaded with talent. They may have been more talented teams, but I doubt if there were any teams as deep and as balanced with as few glaring weaknesses.
Running Backs--The Dolphins may have had the best corps in the history of the sport. Here are the top five all-time yards per carry leaders in the history of the NFL:
1. Jim Brown--------5.20
2. Mercury Morris---5.14 (halfback on the 1972 Dolphins)
3. Gale Sayers------5.00
4. Barry Sanders----4.99
For a talentless guy, Morris is keeping fairly fast company here. Morris averaged 5.3 yards per carry in 1972. The fullback, Larry Csonka, in the era of two back running games, averaged 5.2 yards per carry. Csonka was possibly the best bet in the history of the NFL to get you one or two yards when you really needed them. The third back, Jim Kiick, was a solid performer in short yardage situations and excellent at catching the ball coming out of the backfield.
Recievers--This is a list of the top yards per catch leaders among recievers in the Hall-of-Fame:
1. Paul Warfield------20.06 (wideout on the 1972 Dolphins)
2. Bob Hayes--------19.98
3. Lance Alworth-----18.93
4. Don Maynard------18.70
Warfield was simply the best reciever of his time. Nor was he all the Dolphins had--here is the yards per catch of the Dophin recievers in 1972:
wideouts
Paul Warfield---------20.9 Yards per catch
Howard Twilley-------18.2 ypc
Marlin Briscoe--------17.4 ypc
Otto Stowe----------21.2 ypc
tight ends
Jim Mandich---------15.3 ypc
Marv Fleming--------12.0 ypc
This was certainly a very talented and explosive group. Briscoe, by the way, was, I think, the first black quarterback in the NFL-certainly one of the first. Fleming had started on three championship teams in Green Bay.
Quarterbacks--Bob Griese was an accurate passer and the type of quarterback who rarely made mistakes. One can argue he was not as good as some other championship quarterbacks, but what separates Miami is the quality of their backup. Earl Morrall was a former NFL and Super Bowl MVP-Griese was hurt in the 6th game in 1972 and Morrall led the Dolphins to 9 straight victories. He led the league with 9.07 yards per pass, generally considered the best measurement of quarterback effectiveness. No top team in the history of the NFL had two better quarterbacks.
Offensive line--led by Hall of Famer Larry Little, the Dolphin line was considered by far the best of the era.
Defense--The Dolphins 'no name" defense led the league both in least yardage allowed and fewest points allowed. They were tougher to score on then the Steelers' steel curtain in both 1972 and 1973.
Kicking--There were no better placekicker or punter in the league than Garo Yepremian and Larry Seiple.

Bottom line--The Dolphins are the only team in NFL history to lead the league in most offensive yards and fewest defensive yards, as well as both scoring offense and scoring defense, and they repeated as champions. Warfield, Csonka and Kiick jumping leagues ruined their chances of ever regaining their championship after the most narrow of defeats in 1974. A superficial arguement belittling the Dolphins does not lend much credence to similar superficial arguments belittling Marciano.

 

When was Bradshaw supposed to get mature? The fact is the Dolphins in 1972 and 1973 defeated every Super Bowl team from 1969 through 1977. It is hard to argue they didn't meet the best. Also, they had to go to Pittsburg in 1972. They won with a backup quarterback and they won on the road and they came back and beat Pittsburg the next year also.
And, by the way, even if you think Pittsburg became better at some point--so what. A lot of people rate the 1970's Steelers the best team of all time.
Also, unlike many top teams, the Dolphins defeated their chief rivals. They beat Pittsburg at Pittsburg and Washington in the Super Bowl. The 1962 Packers were blown out at Detroit and never played them again. In 1967, the 9-4-1 Packers lost to the Colts who in turn lost only one game all year but were eliminated by the Rams who the next week had to go to Green Bay where they came up flat. The 1979 Steelers were crushed by San Diego but never had to go to San Diego to reverse the result as San Diego blew a close one in an early playoff to the Oilers. The 1985 Bears were blown away by the Dolphins but the Dolphins were eliminated in the semis by a New England team that was a setup for the Bears.
Sure the Dolphins had some luck and there were close games, but they had to be very, very, very good to go undefeated.

 

Don't tell me. Its not my explanation, but it certainly seems to be the token excuse everytime a debate comes up about an old school fighter's record.

 

Yeah, I know it's not your explanation.
I agree with you that it's not a good one.

Management is often a reason for spotty records though, also we should really consider what a fighter did when they were enjoying their best run, it's where they arrived at that matters more than where they came from.

I understand that a fighter with a good amateur reputation will be more likely to enjoy a well-managed career, and can often live as a full-time pro from day one, and matched carefully.
The management side of boxing has evolved tremendously. But still, there are good fighters these days who have come through with spotty records.

Then again, some fighters just need to grow and improve. Buster Douglas was destined to be better than quitting against Mike "The Giant" White, but for whatever reason that result did occur. Buster Douglas did something about the situation, and eventually became a very good boxer who beat Mike Tyson.

Henry Armstrong was knocked out in 3 in his first pro fight, accotding to the record books.
Same with Benny Leonard.

Armstrong was 1-3 after four fights.
All great fighters go through a learning process, all of them make massive improvements. Whether they were KO'd or embarrassed in the gym, in the amateurs, or as a pro, it happens to them all at one point.

So pristine records shouldnt mean that much, because they always tell as part of the story parts of that learning/improvement phase.

At his best Rocky Marciano beat the best guys in the world, and didn't lose to them. That's what matters, really. If he'd lost 3 of his first four fights - like Armstrong - we'd still recognize his greatness. But if he had gone 49-0 against utter palookas and tomato cans we wouldn't even be discussing him.

That's my take.