Boxing/Professional Wrestling crossover

[gilgamesh]

I'm a pretty big fan of both these, and the way that the real world of Boxing sometimes bleeds over into the world of Pro Wrestling has always been interesting to me.

Back the old days when Wrestling was still presented as totally legit they were even often covered in the same magazine, and old Legendary Champions often would compete in Wrestling matches in between their Boxing matches as a way of staying in shape, and making money on the side.

Bob Fitzsimmons regularly did this sorta thing for instance, and I'm sure he wasn't the only one.

So let this thread be a spot to discuss any and all Boxing/Pro Wrestling crossovers.

Wrestlers that Boxed. Boxers that Wrestled, and anything in between that fits the topic.

[littlepug]

When you say presented as totally legit isn’t that because it was ? Wrestling back in the old days was real wasn’t it ? So any crossover today is staged but back then it was a legit fight as I understand it

[Tony1244]

Tape out there of Dempsey vs Cowboy Luttrell. Lattrell later was the co-owner of CWF Championship Wrestling from Florida.

Another fact that should be on the US citizenship test is Archie Moore's last fight was against Ted DeBiase's Father, Mike.

Joe Frazier once ref'd a title match between Ric Flair and Dusty Rhodes.

[gilgamesh]

When you say presented as totally legit isn’t that because it was ? Wrestling back in the old days was real wasn’t it ? So any crossover today is staged but back then it was a legit fight as I understand it

Yes indeed, Wrestling was legit as far as I understand it up until some time in 1920's when guys figured out it'd be to their mutual benefit to make a work of it, even then the early days of Wrestling as a work are extremely interesting to read about, but I digress.

Chuck Wepner wrestled against Andre the Giant in a match one time.

Scott LeDoux I believe refereed several matches for the AWA based out of Minnesota in the 80's.

By the way, good shout Tony about the Archie Moore/Mike Dibease thing, that was the kinda thing that made me think of this thread. Interestingly enough, that's Archie's last bout.

[gilgamesh]

A Pro Wrestling jobber (and a damn entertaining one) named Rip Rogers, had a few boxing matches

https://boxrec.com/en/proboxer/37404

He wrestles quite a bit in the early days of Smoky Mountain Wrestling, and had a lot of matches prior to that.

[Onetimeonly]

Mr asses brother(not sure if that was real) had a real bad experience boxing butterbean!

[Ambling Alp II]

Primo Carnera wrstled for many years after boxing. He took on Stangler Lewis and Lou Thesz.

Joe Louis wrestled some after boxing.
I read once that Ezzard Charles did as well; however I have never seen that anywhere else so I don't know if that is true.

Ali had several connections to wrestling.
Some of his shtick for promoting fights in advance was from Gorgeous George.
There is video out there somewhere of Ali was once put in an "Airplane Spin" by Gorilla Monsoon.
There was the infamous "fight" with Antonio Inoki.
He was a referee in Wrestlemania I.

[gilgamesh]

Mr asses brother(not sure if that was real) had a real bad experience boxing butterbean!

Ahh yes Bart Gunn (I don't believe they were actually brothers, but in the world of Kayfabe they were). He had won some thing called "The Brawl for All" which was a weird Boxing/MMA type thing WWF did briefly. As I understand it the goal here was to establish Dr. Death Steve Williams as a legit badass, and potential challenger to Stone Cold Steve Austin.

Williams had been talked up for a long time by Jim Ross as one of the baddest motherf*ckers in the world so I guess Vince got this bright idea.

Bart Gunn knocked out Williams, among other guys in the show, and because the whole thing hadn't gone according to plan for 'em they essentially made Bart Gunn pay the price, and fed him to Butterbean basically destroying his career right then and there.

A pretty unusual thing in the World of Wrestling.

As I understand it the Brawl For All matches and the Butterbean fight were legit.

Given how sh*tty some of the Wrestlers boxing technique is I can believe it

[gilgamesh]

Primo Carnera wrstled for many years after boxing. He took on Stangler Lewis and Lou Thesz.

Joe Louis wrestled some after boxing.
I read once that Ezzard Charles did as well; however I have never seen that anywhere else so I don't know if that is true.

Ali had several connections to wrestling.
Some of his shtick for promoting fights in advance was from Gorgeous George.
There is video out there somewhere of Ali was once put in an "Airplane Spin" by Gorilla Monsoon.
There was the infamous "fight" with Antonio Inoki.
He was a referee in Wrestlemania I.

He also came into an angle in Mid South Wrestling where he was on the side of The Snowman or whatever, and he punches Jake "The Snake" Roberts to help the guy win the match

[gilgamesh]

Speaking of Butterbean beating up Pro Wrestlers.

Here's a fight from Pride FC 32 where Butterbean fought Sean O'Haire. Some of you may remember him as part of a tag team with Chuck Palumbo. If you don't, well just take my word for it he was a wrestler...and he fought like one too

[gilgamesh]

Sean O'Haire would try his luck in Combat Sports one more time competing in a K-1 Kickboxing match against Gary Goodridge.

He's at least able to get some shots in first, but the result is the same.

[goose 5]

Alfredo Escalera wrestled as a pro at 210 lbs. He dropped the weight and went back to boxing as a jr. welterweight.

[gilgamesh]

Alfredo Escalera wrestled as a pro at 210 lbs. He dropped the weight and went back to boxing as a jr. welterweight.

Wow that's a hellacious drop in weight. He must've been quite fat as a wrestler because surely he couldn't have lost 50 or more pounds of muscle and stayed healthy.

[margaret thatcher]

Maybe I'm disgustingly mentally ill, but I've always thought Bean was actually not that bad (I mean, obviously he was nowhere near world class etc), he could throw some pretty explosive shots and punch in combo better than a lot of hws

[goose 5]

Paul Berlenbach made the 1920 Olympic wrestling team but didn't compete. He was a 2 time AAU wrestling champion. Won the World light heavyweight boxing title and then went into pro wrestling for a brief while.