Who Was First to Break Dominance: Schmeling, Marciano, Johansson, Other?

I went through the yearly Ring Magazine rankings from the 1920's to 2000's to see what I would find on this subject--here are my results. I split them between white Americans, black Americans, white non-Americans, and black non-Americans. The numbers of each who appeared at least once in the yearly rankings:

1920's (only 6 years)
white Americans-----11
black Americans-----2
white non-Americans-12
black non-Americans-0

1930's
white Americans-----35
black Americans-----7
white non-Americans-11
black non-Americans-1

1940's
white Americans-----24
black Americans-----15
white non-Americans-3
black non-Americans-1

1950's
white Americans-----13
black Americans-----23
white non-Americans-11
black non-Americans-2

1960's
white Americans-----3
black Americans-----21
white non-Americans-14
black non-Americans-0

1970's
white Americans-----6
black Americans-----22
white non-Americans-12
black non-Americans-1

1980's
white Americans-----3
black Americans-----23
white non-Americans-4
black non-Americans-4

1990's
white Americans-----2
black Americans-----21
white non-Americans-6
black non-Americans-9

2000's
white Americans-----2
black Americans-----15
white non-Americans-14
black non-Americans-6

I these stats do give a useful overview of boxing history, and the rise and fall of different ethnic groups over the years.

The 1920's and 1930's show only 9 black fighters, reflecting the color line. Things start changing in the late 1930's with Joe Louis, and by the 1940's the total goes up to 15. It is interesting that the number of black Americans making the ratings each decade is always between 21 and 23 all the way from the 1950's to the 1990's. Remarkably consistent. The white non-Americans were also very consistent from the 1920's through the 1970s with the easily explainable exception of the war-torn 1940's. They are always between 11 and 14. After the fall off in the 1980's and 1990's, the influx of Eastern Europeans puts then back at the same level.

My take on all of this would be that the black Americans were the solid core from the late 1930's to the turn of the 21st century. White Americans began gradually at first and then rapidly abandoning boxing after WWII. Western Europeans except for the Brits, after the 1970's.

Anyway, I hope this chart intrigues folks.

 

You Archivist you!lol

 

I wonder how this maps on to the other weight classes.

And why haven't the eastern Europeans been more successful in lower weight classes in recent years?

 

Gerrie Coetzee had ten minutes after beating Does but then got crushed by Page ...

 

No champion should ever be criticised for facing his #1 challenger.

 

In hindsight, although we didn't see it at the time!

 

Too tedious to do all weight classes over the years, but I did do the 1950's for some classes--

Heavyweights
white Americans-----13
black Americans-----23
black non-Americans-2
white non-Americans-11

1950's middleweights
white Americans-----13
black Americans-----22
black non-Americans-2
white non-Americans-12

About as close to a dead tie as one could expect

one other factor.
white contenders entering rankings

heavyweights
1950 to 54-----9
1955 to 59-----4

middleweights
1950 to 54-----10
1955 to 59-----3

Almost a mirror effect. White American impact drops off badly after the early 1950's.

Another stat--White American heavyweights rated in the top five (champion and top four contenders)

1950's-----8 (Lee Savold, Joey Maxim, Rocky Marciano, Roland LaStarza, Rex Layne, Dan Bucceroni, Willie Pastrano, Roy Harris)

1960's-----1 (Jerry Quarry)
1970's-----2 (Quarry & Duane Bobich)
1980's-----1 (Gerry Cooney)
1990's-----0
2000's-----1 (John Ruiz)

So the 1950's produced twice as many top white American heavyweights as the next 50 years combined.

 

Lastarza’s number one rating was a joke. It was manufactured by his manager screaming “lastarza was robbed”. Lastarza split 1-1 with Dan Bucceroni then split with obscure Rocky Jones. I have evidence Jones was ordered by the mob to “cool it” after round 2 when Jones was on his way to kicking lastarzas ass again. Lastarza turned down numerous fights with top contenders to keep his paper ranking. He had one nice win over Layne, in a fight I thought Layne won, and it should be noted Layne was very erratic at that point in his career.

But I agree with janitor a champion should always fight number one contender so I don’t criticize Marciano for rematching lastarza

 

Mcvey

Lastarza was ranked number 1 by RING and NBA when the fight took place, but it was an absolute joke..completely manufactured

Cockell getting a title shot while the number 1 mandatory was side stepped and forced to fight an eliminator is also very shady

 

No critism of the champion was implied or intended. Here is my post.
"Marciano had two what I would call soft defences ,Lastarza and ****ell, his others were against top contenders, he ducked nobody.His manager was more circumspect,which was his job."

 

I think over the last 3 decades we have see the Eastern Europeons with vast amateur experience turning pro & most of them but not exclusive to the higher weight classes especially the above 230lb class of heavyweight I think the Klitschko's have to be considered as well as some of Vlad's opponents such as Povetkin,Ibragimov,Chagaev, and Vitali possibly Adamek and others who may have been somewhat successful in earlier era's 70's 80's,60's 50's etc.

 

It obviously wasn’t Dempsey Lol

 

Here's what I have from the NBA prior to Marciano-LaStarza II -

NBA Quarterly Rankings (via AP)
(As of July 14, 1953)

Champion: Rocky Marciano

Logical Contender:
Ezzard Charles

Outstanding Boxers:
Roland LaStarza
Dan Bucceroni
Bob Satterfield