BoxRec

Marciano vs. Tyson?
Dempsey vs. Marciano?

Who could hit the hardest?
How can you measure your psi punch?

I am a fan of Rocky Marciano, I like him better than Ali and most of the heavyweight champions. Joe Louis was the greatest. He had 25 title defenses.

Does anyone think that maybe Rocky Marciano had some of his fights fixed by the mob though?


He did die in a plane crash and had connections.

coreygardner wrote:
Marciano vs. Tyson?

Does anyone think that maybe Rocky Marciano had some of his fights fixed by the mob though?

He did die in a plane crash and had connections.

Tyson early, too big, too fast and too powerful in my opinion. Marciano only knew one way to fight and that was to stand toe to toe and slug it out, recipe for disaster against a prime Tyson.

One book released a few years ago, about Marciano opponent Harry Haft, contains a section where Harry claims "mob type" characters entered his dressing room before the fight and told him to lose. Whether its true or not is open to debate, possibly made up to sell the book, others may think there's an element of truth, who knows !!

I don't think his fights were jobs, but I think Mike would stop him inside of five rounds.

coreygardner wrote:Marciano vs. Tyson?

I'd heavily favour Marciano in this bout.

Rocky hit harder, was more durable, was braver and had the heart of a lion... The same cannot be said for Tyson. Iron Mike was a bit of a bully, and he struggled when he couldn't intimidate his opponent (like he couldn't with Holyfield)... Tyson never had the warrior's heart the way that Marciano & Frazier did.

And I would also add here, that despite pop myths - Marciano was marginally taller than Tyson, they were of similar physical statures.

It has been mentioned earlier in this topic that The Rock was one demensional, but so was Mike Tyson... And the same will be said for Jack Dempsey and Joe Frazier for that matter....

coreygardner wrote:Who could hit the hardest?

Marciano for me.

coreygardner wrote:How can you measure your psi punch?

Scientifically it can be done, but you would need a punch bag which would need to be hooked up with pressure sensors and all other sorts of technical equipment. But, as I say, it is possible.

coreygardner wrote:Does anyone think that maybe Rocky Marciano had some of his fights fixed by the mob though?

No, absolutely not. This suggestion has been raised countless times over the past decades... And the concrete truth is this... NONE of Rocky's opponents have ever hinted that they took a dive for money... Not even one.

To be honest, the above statement is only suggested by his critics as a ploy to discredit Marciano's achievements, because they can't find fault in his untarnished record.

Despite that, I once read that Archie Moore told a story of a mobster who came to him weeks before the Marciano fight and offered him money to lose. And Moore said that he declined.

To be franky, I don't believe that. Archie was a well-known liar. He used to tell people that the referee robbed him of a win over Marciano. He used to tell people that after he floored Marciano, hurt him bad and the ref spent a minute wiping Marciano's gloves to give him the precious time for Rocky to regather himself.

Moore was bitter about the Marciano defeat. Before the fight, it is well documented that Moore announced to the boxing public that he would knock Rocky out on numerous occasions. And after the fight, Moore was bitter about losing that fight...

coreygardner wrote:He did die in a plane crash and had connections.

Let's put this in to perspective here, practically EVERY Italian American in the United States must have had links to the mob in one fashion or another....

Crease wrote:

coreygardner wrote:Does anyone think that maybe Rocky Marciano had some of his fights fixed by the mob though?

No, absolutely not. This suggestion has been raised countless times over the past decades... And the concrete truth is this... NONE of Rocky's opponents have ever hinted that they took a dive for money... Not even one.

Not exactly true, Harry Haft claimed he was told to take a dive. Rocky was closely linked to the mob, his manager Al Weill was well connected and the plane Marciano died in contained Frankie Farrell who was the son of Italian mobster Louis Fratto. Whether any of these claims are true is another matter, we are unlikely to ever know but fixed fights were not uncommon in those days.

Controversial wrote:Not exactly true, Harry Haft claimed he was told to take a dive.

I was not aware of that. Can you please provide documentation to support this allegation?
And even so, despite the fact that fight-fixing was a major issue in the sport back in those days (1949 that fight took place) that does not prove that happened.

Controversial wrote:Rocky was closely linked to the mob, his manager Al Weill was well connected and the plane Marciano died in contained Frankie Farrell who was the son of Italian mobster Louis Fratto.

Rocky was not "close to the mob", as I said before, practically every Italian American had a close relative / distant relative / friend / neighbour who was either in the mafia or knew someone who was connected to the mafia... That does NOT prove anything.

And the examples which you have highlighted are circumstantial (at best)

Controversial wrote:Whether any of these claims are true is another matter, we are unlikely to ever know but fixed fights were not uncommon in those days.

Which, of course, does not PROVE that the mob had anything to do with ANY Marciano fight. It seems to be that too much is drawn to the fact that Rocky was an Italian American who lived on the East Coast of America.

Mike is too fast, and too ferocious for Marciano. Marciano has all the heart in the world obviously and would get up probably every time he went down, but Mike would be all over him, busted him up and rocking him repeatedly with vicious shots. He'd stop Rocky fairly early. Just too much for him

Crease wrote:
Rocky hit harder, was more durable, was braver and had the heart of a lion... The same cannot be said for Tyson. Iron Mike was a bit of a bully, and he struggled when he couldn't intimidate his opponent (like he couldn't with Holyfield)... Tyson never had the warrior's heart the way that Marciano & Frazier did.

coreygardner wrote:Who could hit the hardest?

Marciano for me.

Out of interest why do you think Marciano hit harder than Tyson? I agree Marciano had the edge on stamina, will to win, determination and general toughness but his style was more to wear fighters down with barrages of punches than pure ko's. Tyson was the much heavier and faster fighter and sparked guys left right and centre, much bigger guys as well, 17/18 stone fighters. Marciano never had big one punch ko's over world class fighters, Walcott aside. Can you honestly see Tyson hitting Moore or Cockell with the number of punches Marciano hit them with?

Crease wrote:

Controversial wrote:Not exactly true, Harry Haft claimed he was told to take a dive.

I was not aware of that. Can you please provide documentation to support this allegation?

Only the book about Hafts life, as I say it may not be true but would you be surprised it it was, I wouldn't.

I feel if iron mike didn't put rocky away early (and there's a good chance he could) he'd be in for a long night