Was Marciano the Perfect Fighter?

[The Old LefHook]

Rock may have been the closest to perfect we have seen, but he did have a flaw or two. Can you find his real flaws, not just the weathered tropes of exhausted boxing writers?

Which astute fellow can actually describe Rock's few flaws realistically? Who can devise a realistic fight plan for anyone whosoever to whip the mighty blockbuster? And what might such a battle plan look like mapped out on paper?

Hint: Any good plan will attempt to exploit actual flaws generously.

[The Old LefHook]

I did not think there was anyone on here astute enough to catch and define Rocky's few actual faults as a boxer. Maybe some time I will clue you boys in, and maybe I won't.

[Rusty Tromboni]

As if you weren't already an epic-enough troll.

[BKM-]

Rock may have been the closest to perfect we have seen, but he did have a flaw or two. Can you find his real flaws, not just the weathered tropes of exhausted boxing writers?

Which astute fellow can actually describe Rock's few flaws realistically? Who can devise a realistic fight plan for anyone whosoever to whip the mighty blockbuster? And what might such a battle plan look like mapped out on paper?

Hint: Any good plan will attempt to exploit actual flaws generously.

A plan that doesn't fall apart when you get punched in the face.

[ShoulderRoll]

Perfect? Hell no.

Marciano couldn't carry Jack Dempsey's jockstrap.

[billeau2]

Rock may have been the closest to perfect we have seen, but he did have a flaw or two. Can you find his real flaws, not just the weathered tropes of exhausted boxing writers?

Which astute fellow can actually describe Rock's few flaws realistically? Who can devise a realistic fight plan for anyone whosoever to whip the mighty blockbuster? And what might such a battle plan look like mapped out on paper?

Hint: Any good plan will attempt to exploit actual flaws generously.

Trick question. The thing that made him so good was that he took his flaws and made them assets. You get a guy with two left feet? You make his movement relaxed, and dependent on momentum. Then you give him a supercharged, high rev motor that keeps on ticking... Humm? but what do we do about power? Well the caveman can't even throw a proper punch, what a problem...er what a gift! You teach him to leap a bit and throw from the shoulder (like throwing a baseball), so now you have him utilizing gravity, punching more along the lines of how nature intended us to inflict blunt force trauma...

Its prepostorous! It would not make sense unless it did. Your taking a short, slow man and teaching him to punch in a loop on top of everything else. Another asset. Why does this work? well...it turns out that to beat most fighters there is a skill that is universal...this skill will take the steam out of Deontay Wilder's punches, make the boxer with the jab fail, etc... Musashi said it better than I could. "once your man is on the run, you keep him on the run."

You can't hit things very well when you have to get out of the way of something coming into you. When Marciano fought he violated all the rules: There was no fleet footed jaber, moving in educated steps, Nor any puncher cutting the ring down waiting to catch you... Instead in front of you was a smallish man (for a heavyweight) crouching down, this man had his head low and his hands high, he came right at you below your line of sight, and as you went to adjust to hit him... up his head comes along with punches flailing from the sky... Your whole perception is ajar, how can a croucning man hit you from the sky?

Ever wonder why if you really think about it Marciano was not much of a body puncher? False horizontals. Marciano looked like he would be frazier, he set up like he was a hooker... But his power came from hitting down on his man... hitting down on his man's arms, his chest and his head when he could.

So there you have it. One should have beat Marciano easily. Simply jabbing the oaf, setting up outside of him and attacking at a distance... One interesting aside: The older style of boxing would have possibly had a better answer for fighting the rock: By setting up off the back foot and catching him with the lead...But its not that simple because Marciano held to his crouch up until...you guessed it, he had his man moving backwards where punches, if landed had no real momentum. meanwhile he came forwards blazing. Hitting down on anything in his way as his man moved backwards.

He was not invincible I think Tunney beats Marciano. Gene had education in both systems of fighting.

[billeau2]

I did not think there was anyone on here astute enough to catch and define Rocky's few actual faults as a boxer. Maybe some time I will clue you boys in, and maybe I won't.

Well all these iconoclasts, like Rusty... They want to tell us how some fighters were neglected, yet ask them a real question and watch them fall... Its a good question and very few are willing to look at a fight with marciano as an opponent saw it.

I gave you an answer and in that answer I wanted to imagine how an adversary, a boxing man, trying to set up a situation where he could react and catch a fighter like Marciano, would experience the Rock. Your trying to hit someone who is barreling towards you, in a perpetual crouch (Rock learned to do this being a catcher) and...when this person arrives he is firing punches down on you suddenly from a different horizontal position entirely.

[GhostofDempsey]

Marciano did more with less, and was a tremendous athlete with a lot of heart, stamina, durability and respectable power for a man his size.

Things he did wrong: rarely threw the jab and when he did, he would paw with it and come back dropping his left low. He was flat-footed, which seemed to serve him well, it provided a low center of gravity and allowed him to get more leverage on his punches, but he was not quick on his feet. He didn't really cut off the ring, he followed his opponent in whatever direction they moved. He often lunged with his punches, which were telegraphed with looping right and left haymakers. He kept or frequently dropped his left which would leave him open to right hands. He took too many punches in order to get in close and land his own. Fortunately for him he won the inside battles, but took a lot of punishment in the process.

[The Old LefHook]

I noticed that the Rock's feet are often too close together. A man intent on moving forward through all that firepower could have kept him off balance most of the time. But no one ever tried that. They all wanted to box him and stay away from his power.

[Marchegiano]

I noticed that the Rock's feet are often too close together. A man intent on moving forward through all that firepower could have kept him off balance most of the time. But no one ever tried that. They all wanted to box him and stay away from his power.

If I have you correctly I swear if you take the time to check I've pointed that out a few times on this forum.

I use Don ****ell as an example because ****ell tried to push Marciano around, and, ****ell is the one man Rock was meant to destroy and he didn't. He had a good fight with Donny and he wasn't meant to.

Archie, Charles, Walcott, they were meant to whoop Rocky, teach him boxing, so on. They did better than ****ell, but, they were always meant to, they were meant to do better than they did and Don wasn't.


That alone set me to understand. Why did Don overachieve while Charles under performed. The answer, I think, is Charles did his best work when he tried to bully and suffered his worst damages when he tried to box. ****ell never tried to box.

Ali, say Ali fights like Ali, then he loses, but, if Ali were to fight Marciano like Marciano fights then Ali wins.


Only way to rock The Rock is to out rock Rock. You can't 'box' him, you'd better batter him, bully him, crowd him, make it dirty, make it mean, and be on him from bell to bell....Just like he will you. It's the only way. Being stronger, hitting harder, having more gas...What does Rocky do when you take his style away and make it your own? I think he might lose that one.