THERE IS A PROBLEM WITH THE CINDERELLA MANS RECORD!

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 25 Aug 2005, 10:11

I fell in love with james j braddock 7 years ago, and i know everythign there is to know abnout him n ive seen just about every film there is on him... and i know for a fact that he started his record with 25 wins- 0 losses- and a few no decisions/draws. now im pretty sure that on boxing rec. they dont count exhibitions as a part of there record correct?...well the record quarry here shows that he lost to paul cavalier...when in fact this was an exhibition!!!!!!..his first lost was to joe monte.. it would be greatly appreciated if this could be fixed

barry · Post by **barry** » 25 Aug 2005, 23:29

Braddocks early career was not researched the very best that it could be by a big percentage of people that have written about him, in fact not many has went back an searched through all the old New Jersey newspaper reports. One person that has went through many of those newspapers is Henry Hascup, who the Cavalier result came from. Hascup has been involved in New Jersey boxing at one of the highest levels for many years and I know of the research that he has done, some of which are newspaper results that appeared in Paterson New Jersey newspapers, so I would put money down that the Cavalier bout is correct because it more than likely came from an actual newspaper acount. Henry Hascup has just joined boxrec as an editor, so I'll see if he can't shine some like on Braddock...I'm sure Mike DeLisa could also shed light. I'll pm both and see if they will respond about it because they both are far more knowledgable on the topic than me.

barry · Post by **barry** » 25 Aug 2005, 23:42

Actually, the reason that you had never seen the lost before was because it is an ND bout, which mostly has never been researched as I said, except probably by the couple fellows that I mentioned and a few more I'm sure, but very few. As far as ND results goes, Braddock also lost the ND decision to Herman Heller on Sep. 21, 1927 as well, or at least that is what the 1986-87 Ring Record book lists, but you are right in the first official loss of Braddocks career, which was against Joe Monte in 1928.

hhascup · Post by **hhascup** » 26 Aug 2005, 10:15

Braddock fought Cavaliere in Arcola Park on May 27, 1927. Also on that card:

Buck Kelly over Tommy Nelson KO- 2
Scotty Ferro over Young Terris KO- 2
Glen Gillen over Ace Buckley W-?
Paul Cavaliere over James J. Braddock W-10
Young Spider Buckley over Phil Angelo W- 6
Irish Dick Curtin over Battling Odin W- 8

They were all no-decision bouts. The only sports writer that thought Braddock won was Lud Shabazian, who wrote for the Hudson Dispatch for almost 70 years.

I visited Lud at his home several times before he passed away and he said that he thought Braddock won but admitted he might have been a little bias because Braddock was a very god friend of his.

I also went to several other papers around the State of New Jersey and they all had Cavaliere winning by either 7-3 or 8-2.

Also, Braddock weighed only 162 pounds to Cavaliere's 176.

I was a very good friend of Cavaliere and I gave the talk at his wake. I also talked to Braddock several times before he passed away in 1974. Cavaliere use to talk about that bout a lot with me, so I know it wasn't an Exhibition. If you still think it is, go to any New Jersey Newspaper and look up May 28, 1927, and they will have the results.

Finally we had a New Jersey Boxing Hall of Fame meeting last night (I have been the President of the Hall for the last 20 years) and Jim Hague, the author of the book "Braddock. The Rise of the Cinderella Man," which is an excellent book but does have a few mistakes in it, was our guess speaker.

I would recommend this book to any boxing buff.

Thanks, Henry Hascup

PS- You can call me anytime!

1-973-471-2458

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:17

omg i have read hte book twice ive read evrything about him and it all suggest that his fight against cavalier was an exhibition. i would liek to see that changed..i think the ND matches shouldnt be on their records because it could damage it.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:19

henry could u tell me about braddock at all? he is my hero ive been in love with him for about 7 years now. what was he like? did he tell you anything interesting?

barry · Post by **barry** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:21

It wasn't an exhibition. All New Jersey bouts during that time were ND bouts, at least I'm pretty sure that official results were not given until boxing was legalized in the state, or official decisions were legalized...again...Henry could shed more light on that. An ND match was the norm in many states from 1900 thru 1930, they were official matches...nothing exhibition about them and to take them out would just make the record incomplete. Some people disagree about listing newspaper decisions, while others like to see newspaper decisions listed...I prefer that they are listed because it certainly gives a better representation as to a fighters career. The ND bout was a result of gambling in the sport and by not having an official decision announced...commissioners thought that it would curb gambling, but it didn't as people just started following the newspaper decisions.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:32

oh okay i get wat ur saying...it wasnt leagal for them to rule a winner unless by way of KO to demote gambling... so the newspapers made the decisions and this was one of those ND and the newspapers made the decisions... harry was correct jim hagues book did have a certain mistake it classified the bout as an exhibition.

barry · Post by **barry** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:43

I really dislike the ND era, but it is a part of the sports history. The unfortunate part about it was that many times the various newspapers would not agree on an outcome. Some may have had an agenda for a certain fighter, or a writer may have just not like a certain fighter and whatever the writer wrote in his column is what a lot of people went by, but I have always tried to to go through several ringside accounts of ND bouts through as many local newspapers that a town had, which some only had one, or two, whereas New York, Philadelphia and other places had several daily newspapers. The Sam Langford-Stanley Ketchel is a good example...the bout was a six-round ND (No Decision) bout in Philly. After the bout some newspapers thought that Langford had the better of the bout, while others thought that Ketchel was better and still others thought that it was a draw, so when papers are in disagreement over a bout I usually list the result down as a draw, but it's good to keep a record of the results, or at least it is for me. But it's pretty obvious when the papers are in agreement about a bout, then it's a pretty good bet that the outcome was pretty clean-cut.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:53

i see what your saying about newspapers having certain agendas for fighters...braddock was a very popular young man in jersey and had alot of hope and seemed to attract a large following so maybe some of the closer ones went his way.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 02:53

hmm whats was the ketchel-langford bout scored as?

barry · Post by **barry** » 27 Aug 2005, 03:22

I don't think there were any scores, although I have several accounts of the fight from various newspapers. Sometimes the writer may have listed one round for one fighter, one for the other and the other four rounds even.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 27 Aug 2005, 19:47

do u think ur friend could drop in anytime soon? id LOVE to ask him a fquestions abou the cinderella man.

hhascup · Post by **hhascup** » 27 Aug 2005, 20:14

Any bout that was fought in New Jersey would be a No-Decision bout up until 1928. The 1st decision bout in New Jersey was on March 2, 1928, when Al Bryant won a 10 rounder over Battling Odin Dudrich in Newark.

I knew Odin for many years and visited him in the hospital in Passaic, New Jersey and day before he passed away.

Braddock was a GREAT guy. I also talked to his son who passed away a couple years ago and he has a grandson who lives in Saddle Brook, New Jersey.

If you took out the No-Decision bouts, most of the old timers would have very few bouts at all. The only thing I see wrong with this is that if one boxer is from New York and the other boxer was from New Jersey, the papers in New York would favor the boxer from New York and the papers from New Jersey would favor their boxer. I have run into a lot of that in my research.

I talked to Bert Sugar about this and he doesn't like changing the No-Decision bouts. He said to me that we should just leave it the way it is.

I think it's Great that we have so many boxing buffs that will spend the time to do the research.

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 01 Sep 2005, 10:08

have u ever seen braddock fight in person harry?

hhascup · Post by **hhascup** » 01 Sep 2005, 10:59

No, I'm not that old!

Rory McCloskey · Post by **Rory McCloskey** » 02 Sep 2005, 16:39

my bad

joe jennette · Post by **joe jennette** » 25 May 2009, 08:29

i created a myspace to james j. braddock he was trained by joe jennette my hero.
http://www.myspace.com/jamesjbraddock