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greatest European Heavyweight? Isn't that a bit like asking who was the greatest Swiss mariner or who was the greatest Antarctic TV star of the 18th century? There's one kind of Euro-heavy: horizontal!

crooked nose wrote:greatest European Heavyweight? Isn't that a bit like asking who was the greatest Swiss mariner or who was the greatest Antarctic TV star of the 18th century? There's one kind of Euro-heavy: horizontal!

nonsense......but some of schmeling's american opponents were horizontal (three of them are hall of famers)

Monte
Corri
Risko
Stribling
Walker
Hamas
Louis
Thomas
Dudas

even an Axel Schulz and wasn't horizontal against american opposition....and Karl Mildenberger made a big fight against Ali. Carnera knocked out Sharkey...Johansson knocked out Patterson......
;)))

the american heavyweights (like Dempsey, Louis, Marciano, Ali) were better than all europeans, no doubt.....but your post here is respectless....

No dis intended - just some sad fact. The heavyweight division was not traditionally filled with strong Europeans. They'd make a big name at home but flop against a big American heavy. For every Schmeling (and seriously he gets my nod as best ever Euro-heavy), there's a "Faintin' Phil" Scott.
From this side, it just seems there's always been a lot of sentimentality in Europe about heavyweights. Always romanticized as gallant losers. I never could understand why Frank Bruno was so idolized when so obviously lacking, and Lennox Lewis, far superior, never received the same treatment.
But, the worm is turning - the Klitschko's are coming, and I think they are only the first of a parade of champions from far-flung parts of the world.

I still say that if it wasn't for the Joe Louis upset, Schmeling wouldn't have the same reputation that he has today. That is not to take anything away from Schmeling because he did pull off the upset!...and that fight raises Schmeling's all time rating...

hi
a geography lesson
Ireland is in europe and this brings tom sharkey, peter maher and jim coffey into the equation.
between them they held wins over Fitz, Ruhlin, Choynski, mc coy, Godfrey, goddard, slavin, Gunboat Smith, jim flynn and many others. only frank moran of the Americans made any of them horizontal at their peak.
matt

stujones wrote:Out of those four I would say Max Schmeling by a long way. Johnsson for me was a very overated fighter (with a great punch) I think the 2nd and rubber match up with Patterson were more of a reflection of his ability than the first match.

Schemeling was an authentic world champion who faught and beat some of the best names in boxing history. He'll probably be most remembered for his 2nd fight with Louis, but lets not forget the 1st one.

The other two are not in the league of Johansson and especially Schmeling, infact Henry Cooper should be ranked ahead of them both.

"Out of those four I would say Max Schmeling by a long way. Johnsson for me was a very overated fighter (with a great punch) I think the 2nd and rubber match up with Patterson were more of a reflection of his ability than the first match."
Why would you say that? Johansson STILL nearly KO'd Patterson in the 1st round of their 3rd fight anyway, so it still wouldn't reflect badly on him.

I think Johansson was probably the best European champ. Schmeling's win over Louis was HUGE, but so was Buster Douglas' win over Tyson, and that doesn't make him one of the greatest. Schmeling never had a very good win besides the 1st Louis fight. He won the title by DQ in a fight he was losing, then lost the title to the fighter he won(albeit in a controversial decision) it from after making only 1 defense, and indeed Sharkey was not as good as Patterson either. Johansson's only pro losses were the rematches with Patterson. He beat every man he ever faced. Schmeling lost by KO to Gypsy Daniels(who was that?) while he was in his prime, and overall he just was not consistently able to perform. At the time of the Louis loss, he was clearly past his prime, and I won't try to discredit him based on that. But all around, I think Schmeling is somewhat overrated by a lot for his one huge win. The Louis win does bring him WAY up in the all-time rankings, but I think overall Johansson was a better fighter than Schmeling.

silkov wrote:Another one worth mentioning is Don Cockell... who was an excellent boxer... really a light-heavy but he was forced to move up to heavy due to a gland problem. But he managed to notch up some really good wins as a heavy and was brave and very fast despite bulk... he was subjected to a bad beating by Marciano who fouled Cockell outrageously and should have been disqualified... and I say this despite being a big Marciano fan... the fouls Marciano inflicted on Cockell definately affected his fight plan... and ruined him basically.

Marciano obviously SHOULDN'T have been DQ'd against Cockell. There were some pretty flagrant fouls in that fight, but seriously, the ref never even warned Rocky. Obviously Marciano would have been much more careful about fouling if he didn't have a ref in there who was letting the fight go without calling the fouls. If the ref had started calling them, Rocky would have stopped before it reached the point of a DQ. So in other words, the fouls would have been deserving of a DQ, except that Marciano was never warned and it would therefore be completely unfair to DQ him.

hard to folow your logic here, rocky joe. you're saying marciano shouldn't have been disqualified for committing about a one foul ratio to every five punches because the referee didn't warn him about them? shouldn't the point be that the referee should have warned him, which would have at least caused him to lose a round or two because of the fouls. as for marciano finishing cockell earlier if he had fought cleaner...that's saying the fouls...after the bell punches..punches when cockell was down..head butting and elbows had no detrimental affect on cockell. the next assumption would have to be then that the fair punches would have had less effect, because cockell would have defended better against them.

plus..assuming that marciano would have been just as effective had he fought clean....well..that's in the category of those so-called imaginary dream matches....just as we never saw louis fight dempsey, we never saw marciano fight clean, so it's just conjecture.

Jaclem wrote:hard to folow your logic here, rocky joe. you're saying marciano shouldn't have been disqualified for committing about a one foul ratio to every five punches because the referee didn't warn him about them? shouldn't the point be that the referee should have warned him, which would have at least caused him to lose a round or two because of the fouls. as for marciano finishing cockell earlier if he had fought cleaner...that's saying the fouls...after the bell punches..punches when cockell was down..head butting and elbows had no detrimental affect on cockell. the next assumption would have to be then that the fair punches would have had less effect, because cockell would have defended better against them.

plus..assuming that marciano would have been just as effective had he fought clean....well..that's in the category of those so-called imaginary dream matches....just as we never saw louis fight dempsey, we never saw marciano fight clean, so it's just conjecture.

'hard to folow your logic here, rocky joe. you're saying marciano shouldn't have been disqualified for committing about a one foul ratio to every five punches because the referee didn't warn him about them? shouldn't the point be that the referee should have warned him, which would have at least caused him to lose a round or two because of the fouls."
I was saying that the ref SHOULD have warned Marciano, but since he didn't, it's unfair to just say Marciano should have been DQ'd.

"as for marciano finishing cockell earlier if he had fought cleaner...that's saying the fouls...after the bell punches..punches when cockell was down..head butting and elbows had no detrimental affect on cockell. the next assumption would have to be then that the fair punches would have had less effect, because cockell would have defended better against them."
I never said Marciano would have finished Cockell earlier had he not fouled... where did you get that?

"plus..assuming that marciano would have been just as effective had he fought clean....well..that's in the category of those so-called imaginary dream matches....just as we never saw louis fight dempsey, we never saw marciano fight clean, so it's just conjecture."
What do you mean? Marciano fought clean in a lot of his fights. I didn't see him foul much at all in his fights with Rex Layne or Joe Louis, both of which I have on tape. In fights where he got really wild just wailing on his opponents, like the Cockell and Moore fights, admittedly he clearly had the tendency towards fouling. But I don't really see how that matters. Do you think it was the fouls that beat Cockell? Rocky did foul him several times, hitting him on the back of the head, hitting him after the bell, and even hitting him once when he was down. But really, on a normal fighting basis, Marciano obviously dominated Cockell, any fouls aside. Marciano's most blatant fouls came in the last 2 rounds of the fight, mainly because Cockell came into the fight with incredible determination, and Marciano had a startling struggle just to put him down. Rocky was obviously giving Cockell a beating, fair and square, but had a lot of trouble putting him down, which was when he got REALLY wild, and then the fouls really started. The point is that it's obvious Marciano was the better fighter by far than Cockell, and there was really nothing Cockell could do to change that. I don't consider Cockell close to being the best European fighter ever, although he's probably in the top 10-15.

Oh, and I didn't see any headbutts on the part of Marciano, and very little elbowing, in that fight. It was mostly hitting violations like hitting in illegal areas or at incorrect times.

marciano would have beaten cockell without any fouls because marciano was by far the superior fighter. it just might have taken him longer as the chubby britisher didn't have much talent but he was one brave and dertermined guy, as you stated.

sorry..i misinterpreted your comments about how the fight would have gone if marciano had been warned about fouling, or whatever it is i did misintrepret...i didn't scroll back to your post before writing this...but i did recall just after i wrote mine i might have been guilty of careless writing on this one point. actually, i think it was the referee who was at fault in that fight. if you see no head butts our elbows in that fight...well..neither did the referee.

agreed..he didn't foul louis. he didn't have too..besides if he had at that point in the bomber's career the townspeople would have stormed the ring after marciano, much as they did at the end of each of the old frankenstein movies.

i think marciano is one of those love him or hate him fighters. hate is too strong for my feelings about him ....but i did hate to see him pummel and roughouse his way to the top over the bodies of far superior fighters who were well past their prime. i've always given him credit for tons of courage,condition, heart and physical strength....but i also think he was one of the least talented fighters to hold the heavyweight title.

aha...just checked back to your original post. my mistake was in a too hasty reading of your ...."marciano would have stopped it.." which i misunderstood to mean stop the fight..as in stopping cockell ..instead of the correct reading in which you were saying "stopped it.."meaning stopped the fouling.

congrats rockyjoe...one of my guiding rules in life is "never apologize..never explain"...and here you have me skirting the edge of doing both, which causes me more pain than cockell felt in the fight.

Jaclem wrote:marciano would have beaten cockell without any fouls because marciano was by far the superior fighter. it just might have taken him longer as the chubby britisher didn't have much talent but he was one brave and dertermined guy, as you stated.

sorry..i misinterpreted your comments about how the fight would have gone if marciano had been warned about fouling, or whatever it is i did misintrepret...i didn't scroll back to your post before writing this...but i did recall just after i wrote mine i might have been guilty of careless writing on this one point. actually, i think it was the referee who was at fault in that fight. if you see no head butts our elbows in that fight...well..neither did the referee.

agreed..he didn't foul louis. he didn't have too..besides if he had at that point in the bomber's career the townspeople would have stormed the ring after marciano, much as they did at the end of each of the old frankenstein movies.

i think marciano is one of those love him or hate him fighters. hate is too strong for my feelings about him ....but i did hate to see him pummel and roughouse his way to the top over the bodies of far superior fighters who were well past their prime. i've always given him credit for tons of courage,condition, heart and physical strength....but i also think he was one of the least talented fighters to hold the heavyweight title.

I don't think any fighter was "far superior" to Marciano. The only fighter he fought who was superior to him was Louis, who was admittedly well past his prime, although still a dangerous opponent.

Yes, my point about the Marciano-Cockell fight was that the ref was really the one at fault. Marciano fouled very flagrantly at least 3 times in those last two rounds, but not a word out of the ref. My point was that Marciano should not have been DQ'd, because the ref let him get away with the fouls in the first place. The ref SHOULD have warned him, and had he done so, obviously Marciano would have been careful about not getting DQ'd and so the rest of the flagrant fouls would not have happened and he would have beaten Cockell more cleanly. It might have taken him a round or two longer, but my point is Cockell obviously didn't even have a real chance at winning, and so he doesn't really deserve to be considered one of the very best European heavyweights ever. Like I said, probably top 10-15, but not really in consideration for the best like that earlier post suggested.