Jack Kelly writer
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THE UNDEFEATED
(AmericanHeritage.com)
Fifty years ago today, on April 27, 1956, heavyweight
champion Rocky Marciano achieved something unique in
his sport and rare in any sport: He quit. Not just quit, but
walked away from boxing at the peak of his powers, never
having been beaten as a professional fighter. He had
fought 49 times and won 49 times, with 43 knockouts. He
had conquered the best fighters of his time. He was
satisfied. He remains the only pugilistic champion of any
weight class to have retired undefeated.
All athletes live accelerated lives. Lightning reflexes,
stamina, strength, and desire are gifts parceled unequally
to the young. They depreciate rapidly as years slip by. For
a while a fighter can rely on an increasing store of
experience and ring savvy. Sooner or later, a competitor
comes along whose youth and talents overcome the
veteran’s wisdom and guile.
The story of the athlete who refuses to acknowledge
the dictates of passing time is common to the point of
cliche. (The phenomenon is not exclusive to sportsmen,
the incomparable vocalist Ella Fitzgerald continued to
perform in public after her voice had failed her.) Many a
golden reputation has taken on the tarnish of a demeaning
decline. In the sport of boxing, where this type of hubris is
nearly universal, the consequences are more than
academic. Climbing between the ropes to face punches
that can maim or kill, a man needs a cold-eyed view of his
abilities.
Marciano was an improbable figure to achieve this
unequaled feat. Boxing was not his first sport. Growing up
in Brockton, Massachusetts, he had dreamed of playing
major league baseball. After a stint in the army during
World War II, he tried out unsuccessfully for the Chicago
Cubs. He turned to boxing relatively late in life -- he was
already 23 when he fought his first fight as a professional
in 1947. (Floyd Patterson, who succeeded Marciano,
turned pro when he was 17 and won the title at 21).
Marciano was small for a heavyweight, tipping the
scales at 184 pounds. Nor did Rocky demonstrate stellar
skill as a boxer. “Marciano was so awkward that we stood
there and laughed,” his trainer Charley Goldman
remembered about his first encounter with the fighter. “He
didn’t do anything right.” Throughout his career, Marciano
was noted for his wild slugging and awkward footwork.
He was also noted for his sledgehammer punches.
Ezzard Charles, the former champion with whom he fought
two classic fights in 1954, said, “Rocky numbs you all over.
Wherever he hits you, he hurts you.”
Crucial to Marciano’s success was the unheard-of
intensity of his training regime. He quite literally worked his
way to the championship. “The most superbly conditioned
fist fighter who ever lived,” one sportswriter called him. He
himself noted, “My occupation is fighting and it is an
extremely exacting profession. . . . I always thought that
fighting mainly was condition.” He trained for months
before a fight, logging hundreds of miles of roadwork,
hundreds of rounds of sparring. He never tired in the ring.
The result of all this work was a title shot against
Jersey Joe Walcott in September 1952. Observers ranked
this ferocious fight, close all the way and with dizzying
shifts in momentum, as one of greatest heavyweight
battles of all time. Losing on points going into the
thirteenth round, Marciano hit Walcott with one short, solid
punch to the chin. “To ringsiders,” a sportswriter recorded,
“the sound of it was frightening.” Walcott toppled, Marciano
was champion of the world.
At the time, there was no higher perch in the realm of
sports. Professional football and basketball had yet to
catch hold of the national imagination. Only baseball could
match boxing for mass appeal. The winner of the
heavyweight championship became an instant idol.
Marciano filled the role perfectly. He was a paragon of
Eisenhower-era values. A family man and patriotic veteran,
devoted to his parents, loyal to his friends and his home
town, clean-living and good natured, simple and humble --
his image mirrored almost every public virtue of the time.
And he was white, an important factor in a sport
increasingly dominated by African-American fighters.
He defended his title six time over three years. His
last fight was a knockout of the experienced Archie Moore
in September 1955. His solicitous mother urged him to
retire while he was ahead. He had earned a respectable
amount of money boxing. There were few credible
contenders left to fight. And perhaps most of all, Marciano
realized that a 49-0 record would be a permanent and
marketable crown to his career. He had little to gain from
risking his title again, and much to lose. He chose to quit.
For thirteen years after his retirement Rocky led a
restless, aimless life, dabbling in business and amassing
personal-appearance money, which he refused to entrust
to banks. He died in the crash of a small plane in August
1969, at age 46.
Back in 1951, when Marciano was a promising
heavyweight but not yet champion, he faced Joe Louis in
the ring. Louis had retired two years earlier. But broke and
in hock to the Internal Revenue Service, he decided to
attempt a comeback. As a teenager, Marciano had idolized
Louis, who had held the championship belt a record 12
years and had established himself among the fistic
immortals. But now Louis was 37, old in a sport requiring
extraordinary physical acuity, and Marciano was a fresh
28.
Marciano attacked the older man with youthful energy
and pure brawn. Louis tried to use his quick hands and
superior boxing skills to resist the onslaught. As the fight
progressed, the crowd at New York’s Madison Square
Garden, began to realize that Louis was too tired, too slow,
too old. Swinging wildly, Marciano was able to hit the
former champion repeatedly. In the eighth round, he
floored Louis twice, then knocked him out of the ring and
out of boxing. When Louis came to Marciano’s dressing
room to congratulate him, Rocky, perhaps catching a
glimpse of the tragedy of inexorable time, wept.
Five years later, contemplating his own retirement, he
might have remembered that night and taken heed of
sportswriter Red Smith’s comment about the fight. It was a
word of caution to all athletes tempted to cling to the
limelight. “An old man’s dream ended,” Smith wrote. “A
young man’s vision of the future opened wide. Young men
have visions, old men have dreams. But the place for old
men to dream is beside the fire.”
# # #
Jack Kelly
March 20, 2006
(AmericanHeritage.com)
Fifty years ago today, on April 27, 1956, heavyweight
champion Rocky Marciano achieved something unique in
his sport and rare in any sport: He quit. Not just quit, but
walked away from boxing at the peak of his powers, never
having been beaten as a professional fighter. He had
fought 49 times and won 49 times, with 43 knockouts. He
had conquered the best fighters of his time. He was
satisfied. He remains the only pugilistic champion of any
weight class to have retired undefeated.
All athletes live accelerated lives. Lightning reflexes,
stamina, strength, and desire are gifts parceled unequally
to the young. They depreciate rapidly as years slip by. For
a while a fighter can rely on an increasing store of
experience and ring savvy. Sooner or later, a competitor
comes along whose youth and talents overcome the
veteran’s wisdom and guile.
The story of the athlete who refuses to acknowledge
the dictates of passing time is common to the point of
cliche. (The phenomenon is not exclusive to sportsmen,
the incomparable vocalist Ella Fitzgerald continued to
perform in public after her voice had failed her.) Many a
golden reputation has taken on the tarnish of a demeaning
decline. In the sport of boxing, where this type of hubris is
nearly universal, the consequences are more than
academic. Climbing between the ropes to face punches
that can maim or kill, a man needs a cold-eyed view of his
abilities.
Marciano was an improbable figure to achieve this
unequaled feat. Boxing was not his first sport. Growing up
in Brockton, Massachusetts, he had dreamed of playing
major league baseball. After a stint in the army during
World War II, he tried out unsuccessfully for the Chicago
Cubs. He turned to boxing relatively late in life -- he was
already 23 when he fought his first fight as a professional
in 1947. (Floyd Patterson, who succeeded Marciano,
turned pro when he was 17 and won the title at 21).
Marciano was small for a heavyweight, tipping the
scales at 184 pounds. Nor did Rocky demonstrate stellar
skill as a boxer. “Marciano was so awkward that we stood
there and laughed,” his trainer Charley Goldman
remembered about his first encounter with the fighter. “He
didn’t do anything right.” Throughout his career, Marciano
was noted for his wild slugging and awkward footwork.
He was also noted for his sledgehammer punches.
Ezzard Charles, the former champion with whom he fought
two classic fights in 1954, said, “Rocky numbs you all over.
Wherever he hits you, he hurts you.”
Crucial to Marciano’s success was the unheard-of
intensity of his training regime. He quite literally worked his
way to the championship. “The most superbly conditioned
fist fighter who ever lived,” one sportswriter called him. He
himself noted, “My occupation is fighting and it is an
extremely exacting profession. . . . I always thought that
fighting mainly was condition.” He trained for months
before a fight, logging hundreds of miles of roadwork,
hundreds of rounds of sparring. He never tired in the ring.
The result of all this work was a title shot against
Jersey Joe Walcott in September 1952. Observers ranked
this ferocious fight, close all the way and with dizzying
shifts in momentum, as one of greatest heavyweight
battles of all time. Losing on points going into the
thirteenth round, Marciano hit Walcott with one short, solid
punch to the chin. “To ringsiders,” a sportswriter recorded,
“the sound of it was frightening.” Walcott toppled, Marciano
was champion of the world.
At the time, there was no higher perch in the realm of
sports. Professional football and basketball had yet to
catch hold of the national imagination. Only baseball could
match boxing for mass appeal. The winner of the
heavyweight championship became an instant idol.
Marciano filled the role perfectly. He was a paragon of
Eisenhower-era values. A family man and patriotic veteran,
devoted to his parents, loyal to his friends and his home
town, clean-living and good natured, simple and humble --
his image mirrored almost every public virtue of the time.
And he was white, an important factor in a sport
increasingly dominated by African-American fighters.
He defended his title six time over three years. His
last fight was a knockout of the experienced Archie Moore
in September 1955. His solicitous mother urged him to
retire while he was ahead. He had earned a respectable
amount of money boxing. There were few credible
contenders left to fight. And perhaps most of all, Marciano
realized that a 49-0 record would be a permanent and
marketable crown to his career. He had little to gain from
risking his title again, and much to lose. He chose to quit.
For thirteen years after his retirement Rocky led a
restless, aimless life, dabbling in business and amassing
personal-appearance money, which he refused to entrust
to banks. He died in the crash of a small plane in August
1969, at age 46.
Back in 1951, when Marciano was a promising
heavyweight but not yet champion, he faced Joe Louis in
the ring. Louis had retired two years earlier. But broke and
in hock to the Internal Revenue Service, he decided to
attempt a comeback. As a teenager, Marciano had idolized
Louis, who had held the championship belt a record 12
years and had established himself among the fistic
immortals. But now Louis was 37, old in a sport requiring
extraordinary physical acuity, and Marciano was a fresh
28.
Marciano attacked the older man with youthful energy
and pure brawn. Louis tried to use his quick hands and
superior boxing skills to resist the onslaught. As the fight
progressed, the crowd at New York’s Madison Square
Garden, began to realize that Louis was too tired, too slow,
too old. Swinging wildly, Marciano was able to hit the
former champion repeatedly. In the eighth round, he
floored Louis twice, then knocked him out of the ring and
out of boxing. When Louis came to Marciano’s dressing
room to congratulate him, Rocky, perhaps catching a
glimpse of the tragedy of inexorable time, wept.
Five years later, contemplating his own retirement, he
might have remembered that night and taken heed of
sportswriter Red Smith’s comment about the fight. It was a
word of caution to all athletes tempted to cling to the
limelight. “An old man’s dream ended,” Smith wrote. “A
young man’s vision of the future opened wide. Young men
have visions, old men have dreams. But the place for old
men to dream is beside the fire.”
# # #
Jack Kelly
March 20, 2006