Rocky Balboa?

[Jersey Devil]

Try the real Rocky, Chuck Wepner, "The Bayonne Bleeder" who went 15 rounds with Ali, but we all know how that ended.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

1. He Also Knocked Ali Down In That Fight And Earned A Piece Of Boxing Immortality

I believe he was only one of three boxers to knock "The Greatest" down...The other two were Joe Frazier and Henry Cooper...

[H2O Man]

5. Sonny Banks n/t

[DemocratSinceBirth]

7. The Fight Before Liston Which Some Thought Ali Lost

One time on ESPN I saw not that fight but some footage of an exhibition fight with Sonny Banks...

[H2O Man]

10. Cassius Clay

fought Sonny Banks on 2-10-62. They were both undefeated young contenders. They both scored knockdowns early in the fight. I am not aware of Ali ever having an exhibition with Banks.

In 1963, Clay beat Doug Jones in a close fight at MSG. Jones' style would give Ken Norton's trainer Eddie Futch ideas for getting side Ali's jab a decade later. The Jones fight was 3-13. Three months later, in London, Clay had the problem with Henry Cooper landing the big left hook. They fought again in May of 1966.

Cooper is one of Ali's today. They have traveled back and forth to hang out with one another on their respective birthdays. Henry also accompanied Ali to some medical appointments. He really cares about The Champ.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

11. You Are Correct

I mixed up Doug Jones and Sonny Banks...

[H2O Man]

14. When some fans

at the Garden "boo-ed" Clay after the decision with Jones, I remember that he tossed peanuts to them.

[Orsino]

17. Apt political analogy. n/t

[loyalsister]

2. Why not Billy Jean King?

She won

[DemocratSinceBirth]

3. The Poor Rocky Analogy Is Being Twisted Beyond Recognition

The whole Rocky saga is about a person who overcomes adversity through sheer will...

[loyalsister]

6. I understand it

I was just trying to point out that there are successful women athletes - real ones- that she could identify with.

[NDambi]

8. yeah but she was pandering specifically to Philly with the Rocky up the art museum steps thing

King doesn't fit into that pander mode...

[Mooney]

13. ... and still loses.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

18. He Beat Apollo Creed In The ReMatch

He also beat Clubber Lang, Ivan Drago, and Tommy Gunn...

He lost a decision to Mason Dixon (Antonio Tarver) when he was almost sixty years old...

Again, folks are reading too much into this analogy...

Though I imagine with Hillary's disposition she would have made a decent boxer... I'd have to see how athletic and coordinated she was...

[Mooney]

19. This is the first match, though. n/t

[MadAndy]

20. Right. In the first match garlic-nose Rocky lost to the black guy. :-)

[DemocratSinceBirth]

23. Apollo Creed Never Went There

LOL

[DemocratSinceBirth]

21. Oh-But The Saga Had Six Parts

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1tXhJniSEc

[Mooney]

24. But this is part one.

She used a shitty analogy. Basic research is a good strategy when pandering.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

25. Do You Really Think The Average Voter Is Going To Care

Do you really think the average voter is going to care that a fictional character who played an vastly overmatched underdog lost a fight only to win the rematch?

[Mooney]

26. That's a fallacious analogy.

If Hillary Clinton is a vastly overmatched underdog, it's because she blew the considerable advantages with which she entered the race. For her to try to cast herself as a vastly overmatched underdog is spin of the highest order.

A vastly overmatched underdog does not enter the primary season as the presumptive nominee. A vastly overmatched underdog does not start the primary season with a 20% lead in most states. A vastly overmatched underdog does not have a former president of the United States campaigning for her. A vastly overmatched underdog is not married to a former president of the United States.

If you want to cite a boxing film that accurately conveys what's going on here, it would have to be one where the protagonist starts the movie with all sorts of good fortune and blows it. That isn't "Rocky." That's "Raging Bull."

[DemocratSinceBirth]

28. Reprise

I don't think the average voter is going to go into that level of detail... Even Senator Clinton's most ardent enemies admit she's a scrappy fighter, like Rocky; someone who would prefer doom to defeat...

[Mooney]

29. Someone who would prefer doom to defeat?

Aren't those the same thing?

Anyway, although I agree that the average voter isn't going to go into that level of detail, I still get to point out that it's a poorly chosen analogy. There are a million boxing movies where the underdog wins in the end, but she chose "Rocky" because she was pandering to a Pennsylvania crowd. It is amusing to me that in an effort to win votes and, she hopes, the nomination, she chose a scene from a movie where the protagonist she compares herself to LOST.

She might as well say "Vote for me, because I'm going to lose at the convention."

[DemocratSinceBirth]

30. There Are A Million Boxing Movies

And coming from a family where my uncle was a professional boxer and my father was an amateur boxer I have seen most of them...

That being said, I suspect the fictional Rocky is the one movie boxing character who has the most resonance...

To mix metaphors we are beating a dead analogy...


One of my favorite boxing movies is Requiem For A Heavyweight... I like the part where a young Muhammad Ali/Cassius Clay fights Anthony Quinn's character...

I also liked "Somebody Up There Likes Me" Rocky Graziano was a boyhood friend of my now passed uncle...

[H2O Man]

4. Chuck Wepner

Chuck recently was caught "autographing" Muhammad Ali photos, which were sold to sports fans.

He filed claims again Sylvester Stallone in 2002, and settled out of court.

Chuck also fought two other heavyweight champions: young George Foreman knocked Chuck out in 3 rounds in George's 4th pro fight (8-18-69), and Charles "Sonny" Liston knocked Chuck out in 10 rounds in his last fight (6-29-70). Wepner required more than 70 stiches after the Liston fight. I remember a journalist asking Liston if Wepner was "the bravest man he ever met?" Liston, who had a dry wit that was largely unappreciated by the media, said, "No. His manager is."

My brother fought on the same card as Wepner once. I remember him from the weigh-in, and we were in the same dressing room on fight night. He was a good guy.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

9. He Comes Off As A Good Guy In The Book "Facing Ali"

In fact the only opponents who have harsh words for Ali in that book are Joe Frazier and Larry Holmes and even their harsh words are muted...


I think every incarnation of Ali beats Holmes up to the Ali who fought Frazier in Manilla..

[H2O Man]

12. Larry Holmes is unique,

in that he is the only person associated with boxing who has bitter feelings about both Ali and Foreman. He is being inducted in the Hall of Fame this year, something he deserves, but it is sad to see him still carrying the chip on his shoulder.

Smokin' Joe has been in a wheel chair recently, and has been having a difficult time. If he had fought in another era, he would likely have retired undefeated, and experts would debate if he would have beat Ali and Ali.

A great fight would have been Frazier versus Holmes. In their primes, I think Joe would have TKOed Larry in 10 rounds.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

16. Joe Is In A Wheel Chair...That's Sad...

As you know Ali is my idol...Ironically, my best friend likes Joe Frazier... He met Joe Frazier at an autograph session and told him "he got the last laugh against Ali"... To Joe's credit he admonished my friend and said please don't go there...My friend's a good guy and has told me he was embarrassed to put things that way...

Holmes doesn't come off as hating Ali...He comes off as resenting being in Ali's shadow...Why does he dislike Foreman?

Prime Foreman-Holmes is an interesting fight but Foreman beats Frazier ten times out of ten because he made a living out of destroying pressure fighters, especially ones much smaller...

You still haven't told me how you see Prime Ali-Prime Holmes or Prime Foreman-Prime Frazier or Prime Foreman-Prime Holmes going...

[H2O Man]

22. Ali

in his prime would have defeated any heavyweight in boxing history. The Ali who fough Cleveland "Big Cat" Williams was better than any other heavyweight champion. As Jimmy Jacobs pointed out, he landed 100% of the punches he threw in those three rounds. (Even Floyd Mayweather Jr., didn't have that connect rate against Arturo Gatti.)

Larry has a strange take on Ali. He is convinced that Ali wouldn't fight him earlier, because Larry thinks he was able to beat Ali for years based on his service as a sparring partner. The truth is that Ali (unlike a Marciano or Frazier) didn't often go hard on sparring partners. Larry usually says good things about Ali, but he is prone to adding little insults, too. (I do not like it when people insult Ali.)

In their late-phase careers, Larry challenged George several times. They came pretty close to fighting at one point. But George always opted not to. Larry resents him for this. The new edition of The Ring has an interview in which Larry gives his low opinion of George.

George, by the way, has the same weird dynamic when talking about Sonny Liston: he, like Larry with Ali, was a Liston sparring partner. He believed he could beat Liston at that point. Of course, Liston was old, but I still suspect he could have taken a young Foreman.

At his best, George has to rank in the top 4 or 5 of all time. Louis is obviously right up there. I think Holmes is at the next tier, below Ali and the second tier (Louis and Foreman, possibly Liston).

[RoadRage]

15. Remind me.. in Rocky 1... did he win that fight? NT

[kentuck]

27. Fictitious character, right?

???