Joey Giardello vs. Rubin ‘Hurricane’ Carter and the Fight That Never Was

Published

5 years ago

October 23, 2019

Joey-Giardello-vs-Rubin-Hurricane-Carter-and-The-Fight-That-Never-Was

Today (Wednesday, Oct. 23) marks the 55^th anniversary of the aborted fight at the Las Vegas Convention Center between Joey Giardello and challenger Rubin “Hurricane” Carter for the middleweight championship of the world.

How’s that again?

Most folks with an interest in boxing history are aware that Joey Giardello once fought “Hurricane” Carter. Many know that the fight was held in Philadelphia. And the most fervent boxing aficionados can probably pinpoint the month and year, December of 1964, Dec. 14 to be exact. But few people know that this fight had been orphaned, leaving the principals stranded in Las Vegas, as it were, scrambling for a new date and venue.

It’s odd that there’s been virtually no mention of this fact in stories about the Giardello-Carter fight because had the fight had gone off as scheduled, the post-fight life of Hurricane Carter may have taken a different path. Considering what lay ahead for him, it’s hard to think of another aborted fight that commands such a compelling “what if?”.

The Las Vegas fight was promoted by an organization called the Silver State Boxing Club. The face of the club was matchmaker Mel “Red” Greb. A Caesars Palace craps dealer, Greb had learned the business of boxing in his native Newark beginning as a teenage “go-fer” for Willie Gilzenburg who had the boxing and wrestling concession at Newark’s premier indoor sports venue, Laurel Gardens.

For a world title fight, the Silver State Club needed a partner to share the expenses and risk. They partnered with Telescript, a fledgling company that had acquired the rights to exhibit the fight at closed-circuit outlets. But Telescript, to Greb’s great dismay, was all smoke and mirrors. The company was contractually obligated to kick in a portion of the required $55,000 bond, but the helmsmen kept stalling and eventually Greb had no recourse but to bail out. On Monday, Oct. 19, four days before the big event, a crestfallen Greb told the media that the show was canceled. The gate receipts alone wouldn’t be sufficient to cover his nut.

In those days in Las Vegas, it was normative for the principals in a nationally important fight to show up three weeks before the event. The showroom or ballroom at the casino where they stayed was converted into a gym for afternoon workouts. The workouts were open to the public and the fighters were expected to fraternize with high rollers.

Joey Giardello, being the A-side guy (and the white guy) got to stay on the Strip. He and his entourage stayed at the Thunderbird. They sent Hurricane Carter downtown to the far less toney El Cortez.

According to stories in both local papers, Carter looked sensational in his workouts. He ran off several sparring partners.

One could attribute this to pre-fight hype, but hype that is especially thick is invariably layered on an underdog and Hurricane Carter was the favorite. The local bookies had it 7/5 that The Hurricane would snatch away Giardello’s title and the price was expected to drift higher.

A Snapshot of Rubin “Hurricane” Carter

In 1964, Hurricane Carter was 27 years old. To say that he had a troubled past would be an understatement. He had been convicted three times for muggings and had already spent 10 years of his life behind prison walls.

Carter was good copy for sportswriters because he was extremely well-spoken. “I regret that I was a contumacious child,” he told New York Post reporter Milton Gross. He had charisma that accrued from his menacing appearance. He was one of the first prominent athletes to shave his head bald, cultivated a Fu Manchu moustache and a thick beard, and perfected Sonny Liston’s malevolent glare.

Carter turned heads with first-round knockouts of Cuban contender Florentino Fernandez and world welterweight champion Emile Griffith in a non-title fight. Aside from those spectacular triumphs, his best win was a split decision over George Benton, a tough fighter from Philadelphia who would go on to become a prominent trainer. Benton owned a win over Giardello.

But Carter’s 20-4 pro record was unexceptional for a man accorded a title shot and three of those losses had come against marginally skilled opponents. Giardello’s boosters disparaged Carter as a frontrunner, a boxer who loses his courage when he fails to take his man out quick.

A Snapshot of Joey Giardello

Giardello was born in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn and raised in South Philly. His birth name was Carmine Orlando Tilelli. The name “Giardello” came from a phony ID, an ID loaned to him by an older boy, the cousin of a friend. It was Joey’s passport out of his hoodlum-infested neighborhood, allowing him to join the Army at age 15. The pseudonym stuck.

Prior to joining the Army, Giardello had served four-and-a-half months in a juvenile reformatory. He was the alleged ringleader of a gang of teenagers that busted up a gas station.

Giardello’s 10-round fight with Detroit’s Henry Hank in 1962 was named The Ring magazine’s Fight of the Year. But his performance in this fight was out of character as Giardello wasn’t a hell-for-leather fighter. To the contrary, he was something of a cutie; a crafty technician.

His career was a lesson in perseverance. He had 105 fights under his belt when he got his first title shot. It came against Gene Fullmer in Bozeman, Montana, a regional site advantage for Fullmer who lived on the outskirts of Salt Lake City. In a lusty match, Fullmer retained his title with a 15-round draw.

Three years later, after upsetting a faded Sugar Ray Robinson, Giardello was granted another title shot, this coming against Dick Tiger in Atlantic City. They had split two previous meetings, but Tiger, born in Nigeria, was installed a 7/2 favorite.

Counter-punching effectively, Giardello won the title, prevailing by an 8-5-2 margin on the scorecard of referee Paul Cavalier, the sole arbiter. There were only two internationally relevant world sanctioning organizations, the WBA and WBC, and both now recognized Joey Giardello as their champion.

When the Giardello-Carter fight finally came to fruition at the Philadelphia Convention Center, the deck was stacked against The Hurricane. The Pennsylvania Commission, yielding to a protest from Giardello’s camp, forced Carter to shave off his beard so that he could not use it as an abrasive in the clinches. And although Carter hailed from Paterson, New Jersey, not far from Philadelphia, he would be in hostile territory. The crowd was overwhelmingly pro-Giardello.

In the 1999 movie “The Hurricane,” filmed in black-and-white to capture the flavor of the era, Carter pounds Giardello from pillar to post only to be robbed of the decision by racially biased judges who deliberate 35 minutes before reaching their decision.

Carter is portrayed by Denzel Washington. He’s brilliant, but the movie is garbage. Fourteen of 17 ringside reporters scored the fight for Giardello who did especially well in the late rounds. (Giardello sued director Norman Jewison for libel and received an undisclosed sum in a case settled out of court.)

Hurricane Carter had 15 more fights, winning eight, before he was locked away in Rahway State Prison for his involvement – perhaps we should say alleged involvement — in a particularly heinous crime, a triple homicide at a Paterson bar and grill. He spent 19 years at Rahway, all the while maintaining his innocence, and became a cause-celebre, inspiring three books (the movie was based on his autobiography “The 16^th Round”) and a Bob Dylan song. He died in 2014 in Toronto where he was being treated for prostate cancer.

Joey Giardello lost his title in his next title defense, losing a 15-round decision to four-time rival Dick Tiger, and retired in 1967 with a record of 98-26-8. In retirement, he held several private- and public-sector jobs and became known for his charity work, particularly for children with learning disabilities. (Joey’s son Carman, the youngest of his four children, was born with Down Syndrome.) He died in 2008, three years before a statue of him by the noted sculptor Carl LeVotch was unveiled in his old Philadelphia neighborhood.

Nobody seems to be on the fence when it comes to Hurricane Carter’s guilt or innocence. He was twice found guilty in jury trials, but both verdicts were overturned on the grounds of prosecutorial misconduct. “Twice Wrongly Convicted of Murder” appeared in the headline of his obituary in the New York Times, but there are some folks who will always believe that justice would have been better served if his captors had thrown away the key. Regardless, the “what if?” question will never disappear.

What if Carter’s fight with Giardello had been staged in Las Vegas as originally planned? Keep in mind that Carter would have been favored. How would his life have changed going forward if the fight hadn’t imploded, the casualty of a bad marriage between a local promoter and a feckless TV partner?

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Avila Perspective, Chap. 70: Golden Boy vs Top Rank, US vs UK and More

Avila Perspective, Chap. 303: Spotlights on Lightweights and More

Published

20 hours ago

November 1, 2024

David A. Avila

Avila-Perspective-Chap-303-Spotlights-on-Lightweights-and-More

Those lightweights.

Whether junior lights, super lights or lightweights, it’s the 130-140 divisions where most of boxing’s young stars are found now or in the past.

Think Oscar De La Hoya, Sugar Shane Mosley and Floyd Mayweather.

Floyd Schofield (17-0, 12 KOs) a Texas product, hungers to be a star and takes on Mexico’s Rene Tellez Giron (20-3, 13 KOs) in a 12-round lightweight bout on Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada.

DAZN will stream the Golden Boy Promotion card that includes a female undisputed flyweight championship match pitting Argentina’s Gabriela Alaniz and Gabriela Fundora.

Like a young lion looking to flex, Schofield (pictured on the left) is eager to meet all the other young lions and prove they’re not equal.

“I’ve been in the room with Shakur, Tank. I want to give everyone a good fight. I feel like my preparation is getting better, I work hard, I’ve dedicated my whole life to this sport,” said Schofield naming fellow lightweights Shakur Stevenson and Gervonta “Tank” Davis.

Now he meets Mexico’s Tellez who has never been stopped.

“I’m willing to do whatever it takes,” said Tellez.

Even in Las Vegas.

Verona, New York

Meanwhile, in upstate New York, a WBC junior lightweight title rematch finds Robson Conceicao (19-2-1, 9 KOs) looking to prove superior to former titlist O’Shaquie Foster (22-3, 12 KOs) on Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Turning Stone Resort and Casino in Verona, N.Y. ESPN+ will stream the Top Rank fight card.

Last July, Conceicao and Foster clashed and after 12 rounds the title changed hands from Foster to the Brazilian by split decision.

“I feel that a champion is a fighter who goes out there and doesn’t run around, who looks for the fight, who tries to win, and doesn’t just throw one or two punches and then moves away,” said Conceicao.

Foster disagrees.

“I hope he knows the name of the game is to hit and not get hit. That’s the name of the game,” said Foster.

Also on the same card is lightweight contender Raymond Muratalla (21-0, 16 KOs) who fights Mexico’s Jesus Perez Campos (25-5, 18 KOs).

Perez recently defeated former world champion Jojo Diaz last February in California.

“We’re made for challenges. I like challenges,” said Perez.

Muratalla likes challenges too.

“I think these fights are the types of fights I need to show my skills and to prove I deserve those title fights,” said Fontana’s Muratalla.

Female Undisputed Flyweight Championship

WBA, WBC and WBO flyweight titlist Gabriela “La Chucky” Alaniz (15-1, 6 KOs meets IBF titlist Gabriela Fundora (14-0, 6 KOs) on Saturday Nov. 2, at the Virgin Hotels Las Vegas in Las Vegas, Nevada. DAZN will stream the clash for the undisputed flyweight championship.

Argentina’s Alaniz clashed twice against former WBA, WBC champ Marlen Esparza with their first encounter ending in a dubious win for the Texas fighter. In fact, three of Esparza’s last title fights were scored controversially.

But against Alaniz, though they fought on equal terms, Esparza was given a 99-91 score by one of the judges though the world saw a much closer contest. So, they fought again, but the rematch took place in California. Two judges deemed Alaniz the winner and one Esparza for a split-decision win.

“I’m really happy to be here representing Argentina. We are ready to fight. Nothing about this fight has to do with Marlen. So, I hope she (Fundora) is ready. I am ready to prepare myself for the great fight of my life,” said Alaniz.

In the case of Fundora, the extremely tall American fighter at 5’9” in height defeated decent competition including Maria Santizo. She was awarded a match with IBF flyweight titlist Arely Mucino who opted for the tall youngster over the dangerous Kenia Enriquez of Mexico.

Bad choice for Mucino.

Fundora pummeled the champion incessantly for five rounds at the Inglewood Forum a year ago. Twice she battered her down and the fight was mercifully stopped. Fundora’s arm was raised as the new champion.

Since that win Fundora has defeated Christina Cruz and Chile’s Daniela Asenjo in defense of the IBF title. In an interesting side bit: Asenjo was ranked as a flyweight contender though she had not fought in that weight class for seven years.

Still, Fundora used her reach and power to easily handle the rugged fighter from Chile.

Immediately after the fight she clamored for a chance to become undisputed.

“It doesn’t get better than this, especially being in Las Vegas. This is the greatest opportunity that we can have,” said Fundora.

It should be exciting.

Fights to Watch

Sat. ESPN+ 2:50 p.m. Robson Conceicao (19-2-1) vs O’Shaquie Foster (22-3).

Sat. DAZN 5 p.m. Floyd Schofield (17-0) vs Rene Tellez Giron (20-3); Gabriela Alaniz (15-1) vs Gabriela Fundora (14-0).

Photo credit: Cris Esqueda / Golden Boy

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Bakhram Murtalaziev was the Fighter of the Month in October

Published

2 days ago

October 31, 2024

Arne K. Lang

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As we close the book on October, let’s look back at the month’s stellar performances. Kenshiro Teraji added another exclamation point to his brilliant career with an 11^th-round stoppage of Cristofer Rosales. England’s Jack Catterall, considered no more than a decent domestic-level talent for most of his career, showed that he had been underrated with a comprehensive 12-round decision over declining Regis Prograis. But the top performance, by a landslide, was delivered by Bakhram Murtalaziev who annihilated Tim Tszyu on Oct. 19 in Orlando, Florida.

Murtalaziev was undefeated (22-0, 16 KOs) and the reigning IBF junior middleweight champion, but he was the underdog and the “B” side. As champions go, and there are roughly five dozen across the 17 weight divisions, the California-based Russian ranked among the least well-known. He had won his title in Berlin with an 11^th-round stoppage of an unexceptional 38-year-old German-Ecuadorian campaigner, Jack Culcay, and he would be making his first defense.

Managed by Egis Klimas who also handles Oleksandr Usyk and Vasiliy Lomachenko, among others, Bakhram Murtalaziev came from a good barn in the vernacular of a horseplayer, but on paper that alone was insufficient to get him over the hump against Tim Tszyu who a few short months earlier was widely considered the best 154-pound boxer in the world.

That was before he met up with Sebastian Fundora who blemished his record, but that setback could have been written off as a fluke.

As we recall, Tszyu was scheduled to fight Keith Thurman in the initial PBC offering on Amazon Prime Video, but Thurman suffered a biceps injury in training and Fundora was bumped up from the undercard to fill the breach. With only 12 days’ notice, Tim Tszyu went from fighting a five-foot-seven fighter who fights out of an orthodox stance to fighting a southpaw who stood almost a full foot taller. The “Towering Inferno” has his limitations, but poses a special problem to anyone, let alone an opponent with little time to formulate a good game plan.

Tszyu was hampered in the Fundora fight by a gash on his hairline that hampered his vision. The injury happened in the second round when he ducked under Fundora and walked into an elbow. The gash bled copiously throughout the fight and yet the best that Fundora could do was win a split (albeit fair) decision.

To say that Tszyu failed to rebound from the Fundora misadventure would be putting it mildly. Murtalaziev steamrolled him, knocking him to the canvas four times in all before Tszyu’s corner tossed in the towel at the 1:55 mark of the third stanza. It was painful to watch. Referee Chris Young was faulted for allowing the match to continue as long as it did. Compounding Tszyu’s misery, his celebrated father, a first ballot Hall of Famer, was ringside. Kostya Tszyu hadn’t seen his oldest son fight in the flesh since Tim’s pro debut in 2016.

Although the dichotomy is imperfect, Tim Tszyu, who turns 30 on Saturday, is more of a puncher than a boxer. That may work against him so far as clawing his way back to a position of prominence. The noted boxing coach Stephen “Breadman” Edwards, a keen student of the history of boxing in the modern era, expressed this sentiment in a Q and A story for Boxing Scene. “Destructive fighters usually don’t come back to full capacity after bad KO losses,” he said, citing John Mugabi, Mike Tyson, George Foreman, Sonny Liston, and Naseem Hamed to illustrate his point. Moreover, added Edwards, “No one will ever be afraid of him again.”

But there were two stories that emerged from the Murtalaziev-Tszyu fight. Tim Tszyu crashed, but Bakhram Murtalaziev emerged from obscurity, announcing his presence (pardon the cliché) as a force to be reckoned with. As for his next assignment, the best guess is that it will come against Sebastian Fundora or Errol Spence Jr. who are expected to meet early next year. And based on Murtalaziev’s stunning performance in Orlando, it will be impossible to bet against him.

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Foreman-Moorer: 30 Years Later

Published

3 days ago

October 30, 2024

The Sweet Science

Foreman-Moorer: 30 Years Later

By TSS SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT JAMIE REBNER — In sports, middle-aged athletes are not supposed to beat opponents who are half their age and in their athletic primes. Only the greatest ones can use guile, technique, and experience to compensate for the dulling of speed, reflexes, and athleticism that have unavoidably eroded with time.

That is why George Foreman’s feat of reclaiming the heavyweight title at 45 is so impressive. It was thirty years ago this coming Tuesday, Nov 5, 1994, that Foreman scored a monumental upset in knocking out Michael Moorer to win back the title he had lost twenty years prior against Muhammad Ali in The Rumble in the Jungle. In doing so, Big George became the oldest heavyweight champion, breaking the record previously held by Jersey Joe Walcott, who had won the title at 38.

When Foreman beat Moorer, he was in the twilight of his second career, a comeback that began in 1987. George had retired in 1977 after losing to Jimmy Young and experiencing a spiritual awakening in his locker room. That led him to become a minister and devote himself to his family and congregation. During his retirement, he opened a youth center in Houston, which required much financial support, prompting him to return to the ring.

After winning 24 straight fights from 1987-1990, Foreman lost his first title shot by decision to Evander Holyfield in 1991. He rebounded from that loss with three more wins before getting a crack at the WBO title against Tommy Morrison in 1993. But his performance against Morrison was disappointing and he lost another decision. After that, Foreman was out of the ring for 17 months before he was gifted another title shot against Moorer.

Foreman got that gift because Moorer, due to his sullen demeanor and curtness with the media, was not a draw with the fans. He was also an unproven champion, having beaten Holyfield for two belts only seven months prior. So. Moorer needed a name opponent who could bring in the crowds for his first title defense. And the other top heavyweights like Oliver McCall (WBC champ), Lennox Lewis, and Riddick Bowe didn’t have close to Foreman’s drawing power. So. deserving or not, Foreman was chosen as the challenger to make a fight that would be worth the public’s attention and pockets.

Even Foreman was surprised by getting selected to fight Moorer. “I never in my wildest imagination thought I’d get a title shot again,” he told Associated Press sports columnist Tim Dahlberg. Still, George was determined to make his third time a charm.

But as motivated as George was, there was an irrefutable gap in speed between himself and the much younger champion. From the opening bell, Moorer used his superior quickness and reflexes to make Foreman look stiff and slow. And although George landed punches early on, he fired them one at a time while Moorer countered with multiple shots. But despite Moorer’s advantage in connects, his trainer Teddy Atlas advised him from the get-go not to stand in front of Foreman and make himself a stationary target for a right-hand bomb.

But Moorer failed to heed that advice as he continued to outwork Foreman in the middle rounds. Although he was winning, Moorer’s overconfidence kept him at close quarters, and he continued to circle unwisely to his left and into Foreman’s dangerous right hand. And despite absorbing many quality shots, Foreman never appeared hurt or discouraged thanks to his granite chin and unyielding resolve. He was determined to win and he was willing to walk through as many flush shots as he needed to do so.

With Moorer content to stay in range, Foreman gladly returned his firepower and he landed some telling right crosses, uppercuts, and plenty of thudding body blows during the battle. And while Moorer continued to pile up points and rounds, as long as George was marching forward and throwing shots, he had a puncher’s chance.

And with a minute to go in round ten, that punch came. After missing a three-punch combination, Foreman scored with a one-two, with the right hand landing on the forehead. He immediately repeated that combination but this time aimed the right hand lower on Moorer’s jaw. That slight adjustment caused his bulldozer right to collide perfectly with Moorer’s chin, sending the champion crashing to the canvas and sprawled onto his back. The champion couldn’t beat the count, and just like that, the fight was over, Moorer’s short-lived title run ending before it ever truly began.

With a single, shattering blow, Foreman etched his name into boxing history. Wearing the same trunks from Zaire 20 years before, he was now heavyweight champion of the world once again. It was a shocking result that defied conventional wisdom since seldom do 45-year-old boxers score knockouts over champions in their athletic primes. But Foreman reminded us that he was anything but your typical quadragenarian. He was special, and he had two distinct heavyweight championship reigns to prove it.

—

About the author:

Jamie Rebner lives in Toronto, Canada. He has been a freelance boxing writer since 2016 and his writing has appeared in The Fight City, Boxing News Online, The Ring, and Ringside Seat magazine. His Substack blog is Fight Fundamental, and he is currently writing a book about George Foreman’s comeback. He is also a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Follow him on Twitter @J_NReb.

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