Was Ted Lowry robbed against Marciano?

Fair enough. That said , you're still wrong on both counts.

 

Back to the thread, who knows without a film of the bout .. if Lowry won the first four and badly hurt Marciano twice it might have been a draw ... maybe Rocky wiped the floors with him the last four .. too little info ..

 

Here's what Lowry wrote in his book God's in My Corner A Portrait of an American Boxer.

Chapter VIII The Greatest Fight of All: Tiger Ted vs. Rocky Marciano

Little did I know that what would turn out to be one of my greatest fights and gain me the most recognition was my fight in Providence, Rhode Island, against Rocky Marciano, who went on to become the Heavyweight Champion of the World. I went the distance with him twice: two 10-round fights, no knockdowns; 20 rounds with supposedly the greatest fighter ever, as viewed by some.

I had heard about Rocky Marciano; he was the new kid on the block. I had the feeling they were hand-picking his fights, bringing him along. So, I was not intimidated by his record. I did not know until I was in the ring with him that he was all that they said he was: A Future Champion." Marciano's record claims that he was undefeated, that he never lost a fight in 49 fights. But I claim to have beaten him in our first fight on October 10, 1949. The local paper was there and judged the fight by rounds. The Providence Journal scored six rounds for me and four rounds for Rocky. Ask anyone who was there that night and saw the fight, and they will tell you who really won.

I will never forget that night. Outside, the air was crisp and cool. Inside, the temperature was rising. The bell rang, and Rocky and I moved toward each other. I did not face him; I gave him my side. I moved in on him and he came at me swinging, right then left. Because of the position I was in, he was unable to hit me with his right or his left. Rocky stood in a semi-crouch and just kept swinging; he kept coming at me, relentlessly throwing punches. But I wasn't there. I was able to hit him at will; he was especially open for upper cuts. He just kept ducking and stayed in a semi-crouch. I will say this for him: He had to be in top notch condition to throw that many punches and to keep coming at me.

When the round ended, we went back to our corners. Then the bell rang, and we came out for the second round. I could tell by the expression on his face that he was befuddled and surprised. He had no defense against me, and he was having trouble trying to figure out my style. I was not the type of fighter who threw a lot of punches, but everything I threw was hard. My jabs were stiff; my upper cuts were sharp.

I hit Rocky at will for the first four rounds. Although he was tough and in good condition, I had him hanging on the ropes by the fourth round. In my opinion, the bell saved him. In the fifth round, things changed. I think his comer men figured out my style somewhat because he came out fighting differently. Instead of rushing me, he moved around me and that caused me to change my style. In doing so, he was able to get to me a little bit better.

Before Rocky changed his style, I was blocking everything he threw. In the fifth round, he stopped rushing me and throwing punches everywhere. He slowed down and began to concentrate on what he was doing. He threw a right and then a left hook. I blocked his right hand and threw up my right hand by my ear to block the hook. That's when I found out that he could punch. He hit me on my arm, and I thought he almost broke it.

From that point on, I fought a defensive fight. When he threw his right hand, I would ride with the punch; that is, I would fade with the punch to avoid feeling its full effect. In other words, I would turn away, so that the full strength of the punch was not realized. Nevertheless, I know that I won the first four rounds, and I took two of the last six rounds, which gave me six rounds to his four. I will always believe that his manager in New York-AI Weill of Madison Square Garden fame-had something to do with the fight's outcome. Al was not at the fight but, because the Rock was his fighter, the judges gave the last six rounds to Rocky to gain favor with Mr. Weill.

The decision was booed, and I received a lot of pats on the back and was told by many: You were robbed! Others said, You won that fight, Ted. Some people say that fight was fixed. I have never said anything concerning this fight, but I will tell you, that if the fight was fixed, it was to make sure the Rock won no matter what.

No one can tell me differently: I know I beat Rocky Marciano in our first fight and, if he were still alive today and wanted to set the record straight, he would tell you the same. I can understand why no one wants to come forward: if Marciano had ever admitted to a loss, he would not have been able to retain the claim of never having lost a fight. But there are those who were in Providence, Rhode Island, on October 10, 1949, who know that he lost his first fight-No. 21-to me, Tiger Ted Lowry, the New England Light Heavyweight Champ.

I don't want to take anything away from Rocky. He was a good fighter, well conditioned and tough. He was a hard puncher and had a habit of hitting fighters on the arm-a maneuver that made it difficult for them to lift their arms.

I know that, when I was in the ring with Rocky Marciano, I was in the ring with a fighter-not a boxer-and he' was a good one. But perhaps to Rocky's surprise-I was a good boxer and a smart fighter too.

In 1982, Bill Gallo, of the New York Daily News, wrote a piece about me commemorating the 33rd anniversary of my first fight with Rocky Marciano. The headline read: Lowry 'Owned' a Piece of the Rock. Gallo wrote: Ted Lowry is a forgotten name in boxing and we don't even know his present whereabouts, but I suspect he's walking around proudly on some Providence street knowing that he boxed a total of 20 rounds with Marciano, and in that time, never once visited the canvas.

The Providence Journal~Bulletin picked up on the article and did a subsequent piece with the subtitle, The Night Tiger Ted Lowry (Beat?) Rocky Marciano. The New York Daily News later commented on the Journal article, calling it an excellent comprehensive piece. The story told how most ringside observers felt that Lowry won the 10 round decision, and Mike Thomas, the sports writer who covered the fight for the Journal at the time, had Lowry ahead 6- 4. In fact, the pro Marciano crowd booed the decision. According to the article, people still talk about the fight. What does Ted think of the sudden spotlight? 'People talk more about that fight today than they did when it happened. You can't buy anything with it, but it is nice to know people remember.

In the Journal-Bulletin article, reporter Angelo Cataldi described Rocky Marciano as a twenty-six-year-old Brockton bruiser with a fairy-tale future in boxing that lay before him like a yellow-brick road. In the mind of his manager, Al Weill of New York, Rocky Marciano was no more than a couple of years away from the heavyweight championship of the world." The article continues:

At the time, Weill and Sam Silverman, a Boston-based promoter who helped build Providence into one of the best fight towns in the nation, were not the closest of friends, and Silverman saw the unsuspecting Lowry as a means for revenge in a power struggle with Weill. 'I thought Lowry was gonna lick Rocky that night,' Silverman recalled many years later. 'I was disgusted with Al Weill, and wouldn't have minded getting rid of him. Weill wanted too much money. He was getting 25 percent of the gate, but the greedy guy wanted 30.

There have been other write-ups over the years as well. In 1986, Michael Marley recounted the experience for the March edition of Boxing Scene:

In the first meeting, Rocky kept hammering away with a body attack, but he could not bring the Tiger down. In his dressing room, Marciano was discouraged. It was the only time in 21 pro bouts that he had failed to register a KO.

It was good experience, trainer Allie Colombo said. You won the decision easy. You can't expect to knock everybody out. Nobody knocks everybody out. I should have had him," Rocky kept saying. Lowry is no sore loser. He admitted that he and Marciano were two fighters headed in different directions. People knew I was a good fighter, but the real good fighters didn't want to fight me. I held the New England Light Heavyweight title back then. Rocky was a little heavier than I was, but we were both about 182 then. I fought all the top notchers, guys like (Lee) Savold, Lee Oma, Jimmy Bivins and others. But nobody who held a title wanted to fight me. I was what you might call a spoiler. So, I spent most of my time fighting in small clubs.

Rocky beat me the second time around on November 13, 1950. 1 took that fight on short notice, subbing for someone else. I am not making any excuses for the loss, but I do feel that ifI had known I was going to get another shot at him and had sufficient time to train, I truly helieve the outcome might have been different. I lost that second fight fair and square. There were no knockdowns in the 20 rounds we fought, but I did have him on the ropes in one of the rounds.

The Rock was a well-conditioned fighter and a good stiff puncher, and so was I. I had quite a knockout record myself in my younger years. (Most of my fights are on record in the 1954 edition of The Ring Record Book and Boxing Encyclopedia.)

Incidentally, the second time I fought Rocky Marciano in Providence, we both ended up at the same night club-the Celebrity Club-where we were introduced to the crowd and a very special lady who sang with the band. And boy, could she sing! She was two years older than I was and not yet famous. Her name was Ella Fitzgerald. We were introduced to her, not knowing that she would one day be considered the Queen of Song.

Rocky, by the way, was very young when he died. He died on Aug. 3, 1969, on the eve of his 46th birthday, in a plane crash over Iowa.

 

Hhascup, that was a brilliant report. Thanks.

 

I remembered that my uncle (a big boxing fan) was living in Rhode Island around that time. He never had any children and I have many of his papers. Sure enough, he was there. He scored the fight 6-4-0 for Marciano. He mentioned that the fight was scored for Marciano by 3 different official scorers. There is no mention of Marciano being hurt by Lowry, though he did give Lowry the 1st 4 rounds. He did mention that Marciano looked dry coming into the ring, while Lowry looked properly prepared to start fast. He wrote that Lowry was hurt once late in round 4, and again early in round 5, and went into survival tactics thereafter. He didn't mention any booing of the decision afterwards and, all-in-all, from what he wrote, and other things I've read, I don't see any serious evidence of any controversy surrounding the unanimous decision verdict, local paper's opinion aside.

I think we're just going to have to live with the fact that Rocky was 49-0 as a pro.

 

Dont think I’ve ever seen this excerpt before. Good find.

 

Impossible to say.

Thee is no film, so the opinion of the press would have to be overwhelmingly in favor of Lowry, before I would entertain talk of robberies.

 

Good to have knowledgeable people like DJ around who actually had family there and witnessed it! Love this forum

 

DJ is a Legend!

 

I honestly don't understand why some are adamant Lowry was robbed. Absolutely none of us, can say whether Lowry was robbed or not because WE DON'T HAVE THE FILM.

At the end of the day, all we know is that this was recorded as a win for Marciano.

 

I dont believe that bs of yours

 

FYI, you are replying to a poster who is not longer with us in this world. His granddaughter still posts here, so respect is appreciated by all.

 

Interestingly I just came from a Greb thread where I pointed out he hardly gets the scrutiny we give other fighters. Which makes me wonder the obvious; how many newspaper need to report a win for Greb before it's on his record as a win?

For you personally. Not fixing to argue, just curious what folks think.

 

First of all what would we call a robbery if we did have film of the fight?

There is an element of interpretation in scoring a fight, so you and I could produce two significantly different score cards for the same fight, and they could both be valid in their own right.

Therefore I would not call a fight a robbery because I disagreed with teh score card, I would have to feel that it fell outside the range of reasonable interpretation.

When we don't have footage of a fight, or if we only have partial footage, the problem becomes much more complex.

If the majority of ringsiders agreed with teh decision, then it would be tempting to think that it fell within the range of reasonable interpretation for the time.

In order to conclude that such a fight was a robbery, the ringsiders would have to be very lopsidedly against the decision.