BoxRec

DavidPayne wrote:Against whom do we build this glowing tribute for Vitaly?

A fat Danny Williams?

A fat Kirk Johnson?

A fat, tired and old Lennox Lewis?

A fat Corrie Sanders?

He just stood out as a robust contender who was hard to punch.

Vitaly is over-rated. If he comes back beats some of the present bunch of pretenders then fair enough.

But if you examine his record - its pretty shallow.

This is true but he lost very few rounds in his career and has a very ko percentage. He ended his career in a 'what if'. His comeback will be interesting

I do fail to see how a 185lb short armed man like Marciano could handle Vitali personally though. How does he land? How does he get past the 80 reach jab? How does he not got backed up and flawed by a much stronger man?

The same way Tyson used to feast on big men with a long reach.

Marciano fought out of a low crouch, and was good at working his way inside quickly. Despite being perceived as a crude brawler, he was very adept at cutting off the ring.

Marciano's biggest problem would have been getting to Vitali's chin, as Vitali tends to fight pretty tall if you know what I mean, but I'm sure he could have reached his body.

Not that I rate Vitali all that highly, but his combination of size, relative speed for a big man, high work rate, and solid punching would make him a hard night's work for Marciano.

If Vitali didn't get Marciano out of there by the 8th, I'd favour Marciano to wear him down, he had a phenomenal workrate Marciano.

Marciano isn't old and isn't fat. He'd be there all night swinging, and Vitali's stamina didn't look all that. He'd be hard to hit square early, but Marciano im sure could punch out a 12 rd decision. 15 rds and Klit is in trouble.

Another thing about Marciano is that he was NOT the bleeder that many people try to make out. Many people just seem to say that without looking into his career a little deeper and most just seem to accept it as a fact.