Chuck

[sweetviolenturge]

http://www.darkhorizons.com/first-trail ... -in-chuck/

This film looks like a winner. And boxing fans could definitely use one after last year's somewhat disappointing duo of HANDS OF STONE & BLEED FOR THIS. Neither of which was terrible, but nor were they anything exceptional.
The Chuck Wepner story, however, has all the makings of a terrific film & Liev Schreiber looks like he was born to play the role of "The Bayonne Bleeder". And, unlike last years biopics, Chuck appears to tell Wepner's story warts & all which will be refreshing after the rather sanitized stories of Duran & Pazienza.
Also, I like what we see of the boxing scenes in this trailer. They look about as realistic as any fight scenes can be in the movies with none of the ridiculously over the top stuff that we saw in SOUTHPAW in 2015.
I don't know about anyone else, but I plan on being there on opening day to see CHUCK.

[RScarf1]

I liked Hands of Stone. I have not seen Bleed For This yet. After seeing the trailer, Chuck seems like a movie mostly about after he fought Ali. I think it would have been better to show how he got to that point as a boxer rather than focusing on his life after the Rocky movie. It looks like it will be a good movie, but I think it could be better if it was more about his boxing career leading up to the Ali fight.

[sweetviolenturge]

Well, they do show him knocking someone out, so that could be representative of what he did to earn the Ali fight ( his KO11 over Terry Hinke for the "American Heavyweight Championship" ) or it could be an illustration of the series of ham & eggers that Chuck knocked out in order to stay relevant & cash in on his effort vs Ali. I guess we'll just have to see the movie to see which it is. Either way, it should be interesting.

[sweetviolenturge]

I just checked the IMDB page for CHUCK & among the characters in the film there's one named Charlie Polite who was a journeyman heavyweight that Wepner knocked out just before the Hinke fight, so there are at least a couple of his pre-Ali fights in the film. So, I think it's safe to say that the film's focus is on the period just before & during the Ali fight ( an actor by the name of Pooch Hall plays him ) & the years following it.

[candyslim]

Wasn't Chuck reputed to be the inspiration for Rocky Balboa? I remember him from the 70s, he was a NJ liquor store salesman IIRC and I don't recall him winning any significant fights or being rated much above 30 or so. Purely from memory I seem to remember him beating Randy Newman (I might have got that wrong) I think that was about as good as it got.

I think that was the point, to give a title shot to some game but unremarkable journeyman who was never going to earn a title shot on merit. In Ali's time that was supposedly a novelty (it wasn't though, even then), it was never intended to form the basis of a career. Are you listening Deontay?

[RScarf1]

According to BoxRec, Wepner won eight consecutive fights before the Ali fight. One of those wins was against Ernie Terrell. That looks like the biggest name of those opponents from that winning streak. Terrell was the WBA heavyweight champion before losing the title to Ali. I think the movie should show the actors portraying Terrell vs. Wepner, but maybe it won't.

I met Chuck Wepner, by the way. He lived in my aunt's apartment building in Bayonne, New Jersey. I was born in Bayonne.

When I was a valet parker in Florida, a customer asked me where I was from. I said I am from Bayonne. He asked me what is Bayonne most known for. I said Chuck Wepner. He said "The Bayonne Bleeder." He said he would bleed before a punch was thrown. Of course, he was joking. I see that they changed the name of the movie from "The Bleeder" to "Chuck."

[sweetviolenturge]

Yeah, rather than only being rated in the top 30, Wepner was actually a legit top ten contender ranked by both the WBA & WBC as well as by THE RING magazine from about 1973 until his ko by 6 loss to Duane Bobick in 1976.
Chuck won two of his three bouts vs Randy Neumann as well as having solid wins over fringe contenders & pretty decent journeymen of the time like Pedro Agosto, Manuel Ramos, Roberto Davila, Mike Boswell & Charlie Polite.

[sweetviolenturge]

Then there was his aforementioned bout with the 37-3-2 "Aurora Lumberjack" Terry Hinke for the American Heavyweight Championship. Which was apparently a final eliminator of sorts with the winner to receive a title opportunity vs Ali. It would seem to me that Don King was determined to have a colorful challenger for Ali no matter who came out on top between the "Bayonne Bleeder" & "the "Fighting Lumberjack".
And it must have been a hell of a rugged brawl as Wepner had lost a whopping four points over the course of the first ten rounds for assorted fouls before rebounding to knock down Hinke three times in round 11 to claim the title & the opportunity to face Ali in Cleveland early the following year.

[candyslim]

Wow! Small world huh? I didn't recall he'd beaten the octopus but I imagine Ernie was a long way past his sixties heyday by that point. I remember reading that his sister Jean was a member of "The Supremes" but the name doesn't appear if you google them, I tried once.

Talking of meeting ex-fighters I was sat in a small churchyard in Shaftesbury Avenue in London's West End sometime in the early eighties eating my lunch while reading my copy of Boxing News. A rather scruffy looking guy clocked my BN and came up to me. I tried to ignore him as I was eating hot food, but he wasn't to be put off. "I used to box" he said casually in a gruff unmistakably Scouse accent. That's a Liverpool accent to you RS1. "Oh yeah, any good?" I replied in a tone that was intended to convey that I didn't to want be rude but it wasn't great timing. "Good enough to beat Rubin Carter" came the response, although on reflection I think he called him hurricane.

"You're Harry ... " momentarily struggling to recall his surname ... " 'Arry Scott" he finished for me. I forget what I said as I tried to engage with him, my McDonalds burger now totally forgotten, but he was already turning away, no doubt well satisfied having transformed a disinterested and mildly evasive young guy in a business suit, into a galvanized fully attentive worshipper. He wandered off in the direction of the exit showing no desire to continue the discourse once he'd got the acknowledgement and respect that was his due. Job done.

[sweetviolenturge]

I met Chuck Wepner in Canastota, NY at the annual IBHOF induction weekend back in 1992 & he was just as much of a larger than life character & as profane & foul mouthed as you likely imagine him be. And then, some. LOL.
And, much bigger than I'd imagined him. Many times heavyweights either diminish in size as they retire & they lose muscle mass or they run to fat, but neither was the case with Wepner. He was just a big solid man. More imposing than even George Foreman or Gerry Cooney were when I met them.
As I stood there talking with Wepner & his wife in the barroom of Graziano's restaurant ( where the fighters & fans gather on both Friday & Saturday nights ) I could see Floyd Patterson across the way speaking with Jose Torres & it was actually a bit difficult to believe that he & Wepner were once in the same weight class. I had been a middleweight when I fought & Patterson seemed to be about my size while I was absolutely dwarfed by Wepner.
In fact, George Chuvalo was in the room as well & I remember thinking that if for whatever reason Wepner & Chuvalo decided to try to kill one another that it would take literally the entire room to separate them. LOL.

Then, several years later, in 2001 Ernie Terrell was a guest at the HoF weekend & he was such a quiet, dignified old gentleman, his voice barely above a whisper as he spoke. Such a stark difference between him & the man who beat him. Had I not known it, I'd have never guessed that they had both plied their trade in the same profession.
Also in 2001, there sharing a table with Terrell was an aged Ron Lyle. It was difficult to fathom that he had actually made a small three fight comeback in the mid-90s in which he KO'd each of his opponents.
Not too much longer after I discovered that both men had passed.

[candyslim]

Yeah, rather than only being rated in the top 30, Wepner was actually a legit top ten contender ranked by both the WBA & WBC as well as by THE RING magazine from about 1973 until his ko by 6 loss to Duane Bobick in 1976.
Chuck won two of his three bouts vs Randy Neumann as well as having solid wins over fringe contenders & pretty decent journeymen of the time like Pedro Agosto, Manuel Ramos, Roberto Davila, Mike Boswell & Charlie Polite.

Thanks for that SVU I stand corrected ... or sit corrected if you will.

Sometimes I think I should fact-check my remarks before I post, it's easy enough considering we are already on BoxRec but I feel what it gains in accuracy, it loses in - I don't know what to call it - "authenticity" maybe for the sake of avoiding a far more disparaging description

Besides there are enough posters on here who know what they're talking about. I see myself as providing an alternative.

[RScarf1]

I also recall when Wepner shook my hand, he has a very strong handshake, like it was hurting my hand. I used to be an amateur stand-up comedian and I did my Mike Tyson impression for him. He opened his mouth in surprise because my impression is very close to Tyson's actual voice. I read the above comments. Great story about meeting the boxer while eating.

[Lackeos]

Chuck Norris vs Chuck Palahniuk in a karate fiction tournament. Who is the best Chuck in this showdown known only by the vaguely titled "Chuck"?

[candyslim]

Fictional karate championship ??? ... that, you can Chuck in the bin (trash)

Hey you two. I never got to meet Chuck Wepner, George Chuvalo, Floyd Patterson, Ernie Terrell, or Ron Lyle and you've got me feeling distinctly underprivileged. Ron Lyle, what a war he had with Foreman! As I recall he learned to box in prison (Colorado State Pen, IIRC) and was late to turn pro. I remember once reading that he got in a brawl with another inmate who showed up with a knife, as a result of which Ron "died" several times on the operating table ... They bred 'em tough back then.

Stand-up eh, RS1? I imagine in its way that takes as much courage as climbing through the ropes.

[RScarf1]

Fictional karate championship ??? ... that, you can Chuck in the bin (trash)

Hey you two. I never got to meet Chuck Wepner, George Chuvalo, Floyd Patterson, Ernie Terrell, or Ron Lyle and you've got me feeling distinctly underprivileged. Ron Lyle, what a war he had with Foreman! As I recall he learned to box in prison (Colorado State Pen, IIRC) and was late to turn pro. I remember once reading that he got in a brawl with another inmate who showed up with a knife, as a result of which Ron "died" several times on the operating table ... They bred 'em tough back then.

Stand-up eh, RS1? I imagine in its way that takes as much courage as climbing through the ropes.

As an amateur comedian, I only got three to five minutes on stage. I did not get much stage fright because my celebrity impressions were good and that is what my routine mostly was. I performed in comedy clubs in South Florida for open mic nights. I incorporate that sense of humor in my boxing writing when I write articles.

[candyslim]

I once turned up at Boxing News office naively announcing that I wanted to write for them. Graham Houston patiently explained that's not how it work,s first you need to become a reporter on a local newspaper, graduate to a national, then to their sports desk and eventually to specialize in boxing. I said I only wanted to write about boxing and they very kindly decided to humour me by sending me to mainly amateur shows and paying me a nominal sum for any reports they used.

Once I got to report from the National Sporting Club based at The Cafe Royal in Regent Street. Top of the bill was British Heavyweight contender Eddie "The Swindon Steamroller" Neilson against the capable Philadelphian journeyman, Obie English. I'm trying to watch the fight and make notes at the same time in the confines of a very crowded press balcony. There was one row of seats and a little space to stand behind them. I was becoming painfully aware of a very animated character excitedly shouting advice/abuse at Neilson and unintentionally thumping me and/ or the back of my chair at regular intervals while yelling loudly (curiously enough given my Harry Scott anecdote above, again in a, this time higher pitched Scouse accent) things like "C'mon Neilson ya bloody load of rubbish, get stuck in"

Having endured a worse battering then English was getting, and getting increasingly pissed off with the shrill yelling a yard from my ear, I finally lost it with the guy and turned around with a snarl and my hand raised in a fist. I immediately froze as I recognized my antagonist as Billy Aird - at the time the UK's number three Heavyweight behind Joe Bugner and Danny McAlinden. He seemed to register my existence for the first time and was very apologetic, bless him. I muttered something like "no problem Bill, don't worry about it" while resolving next time to be more careful who I threaten with physical violence.

As a post-script it wasn't until I discovered BoxRec last year some forty years later that I notice that it wasn't Obie's first visit to England but he was over here the first time the previous year when he beat another English Heavyweight, name of ... Billy Aird.

[RScarf1]

In America, boxing is hardly ever written about in the local newspapers. When I went to an event in Fort Myers, Florida, I was the only writer there, but I wrote for a website. The writers from the Fort Myers and Naples newspapers did not attend the event. I drove 2 hours to be there. The Miami Herald newspaper has a boxing writer, but he writes an article only once per week and it covers the events that were on television such as on HBO and Showtime and if an event was local and it will also list what fights are on television in the near future. Since there are hardly any boxing writers for the newspapers, it is very competitive to get those jobs. Writers usually have to write about other sports and are not solely boxing writers. If they are just boxing writers, then they are not writing full-time for the newspaper because one article per week is not full-time. I applied to be a copy editor at the Miami Herald, but they would not hire me because I did not have a journalism or English degree in college. Even though they let me take their copy editing test and I believe that I did very well on it, they would not let me see the results of the test. They said I had no experience and no degree in that field, so they would not hire me. However, I was able to get a freelance job writing for them and wrote a couple of articles, one of them was about boxing. I gave them the articles to show what I wrote and they still would not hire me as a staff writer or copy editor. A few years later, a boxing website was looking for a writer and editor, so I worked for them for free for about a year and a half. Thanks to the Internet, print media can no longer exclude people from writing about boxing and you don't have the page and word restrictions that are in print media. If you want to get paid for boxing writing, you usually have to work for print media. That is why more people are doing boxing videos such as workouts and interviews because they can make money from that unlike writing for boxing websites which rarely pay for articles.

[candyslim]

Yeah I'm just enjoying being able to talk (write) boxing with like minded individuals on this forum, many of whom know the subject way better than I do. It's at once humbling and refreshing because that is a rare experience in everyday life: Most people here know about Joshua, Ali, Bruno if they are of an age, maybe Tyson, Foreman a sprinkling of others. Ask them about Alexander Povetkin or Bermaine Stiverne and they'll look at you blankly but they'll cheerfully share the benefit of their wisdom regarding AJ v Klitschko

[RScarf1]

Povetkin is discussed a lot on this forum. Not as much for Stiverne.

[Badhusker]

Big fan of Chuck - but, should be in boxers of the past section.

[RScarf1]

The movie about Chuck is new. That is why it is in Current Scene.

[candyslim]

Povetkin is discussed a lot on this forum. Not as much for Stiverne.

Not much to say about Stiverne to be fair. Hasn't been exactly prolific or even relevant has he ?. It's a travesty he's been gifted a title shot if you ask me.

[Hannah Faulkner]

Trailer seems promising with some pre Ali fights

[sweetviolenturge]

Povetkin is discussed a lot on this forum. Not as much for Stiverne.

Not much to say about Stiverne to be fair. Hasn't been exactly prolific or even relevant has he ?. It's a travesty he's been gifted a title shot if you ask me.

It is, indeed, a bit of a disgrace that Stiverne is apparently one of those perennial #1 or #2 WBC contenders simply because he held the title for a minute or two. I mean, it's ridiculous that he has retained such a lofty ranking based on one single win since being shut out by Wilder. That being a rather unimpressive decision win over journeyman Derric Rossy who had him on the canvas during the course of the bout.
All I can figure is that Don King must still have some sway with the Sulaiman family after all these years. The more that things change, the more they stay the same, am I right? LOL.

[sweetviolenturge]

Trailer seems promising with some pre Ali fights

Yeah, I think it's going to be a hell of an interesting film just based on what I know of Chuck & the little info that I've been able to gather from the trailer & the film's IMDB page.
I mean, how cool is it that an 18-38-3 journeyman like Charlie Polite gets to be immortalized ( however briefly ) in a Hollywood film?