By Keith Terceira
As a die-hard boxing fan I get a kick every time the sport of boxing is showcased in the mainstream media, one such event gave me a chuckle when I saw it because it is based partially on a real life event.
Hopefully some of you will recall a recent commercial which for the life of me I can’t recall what company it was done for, it features a boxer training for a upcoming fight. As the fighter stands center ring to receive instructions with his opponent the overhead microphone drops down and knocks out the fighter that was featured throughout the commercial.
That was the artsy version of a real life encounter with a overhead microphone, the real life version was so much more exciting and much less humorous for three belt champion Tony Canzoneri.
The date was May 8th 1936 and the stage for this drama was New York’s Madison Square Gardens in front of 17,000 screaming Irish and Italian boxing aficionados .
Let’s use the account of the late great Teddy Brenner as to what transpired just prior to the first bell.
"So this night McLarnin and Canzoneri were boxing the wind-up in the Old Garden," said Brenner, who promoted fights for Madison Square Garden. "They met in the middle of the ring for instructions, and when Tony started back to his corner he walked into the hanging microphone. It took 12 stitches to close the cut but there wasn't time then. They mopped the blood off him with a towel and shoved him out for the first round. He was groggy and he lost the round. It was the last one he lost."
“Baby Face” Jimmy McLarnin, the former welterweight world champion would come into the ring six and a half pounds heavier and a 9-3 favorite of the gambling crowd.
McLarnin took advantage of a dazed Canzoneri in the first round and for the last minute and a half it looked to be the end of Canzoneri’s streak of never being stopped. McLarnin hit him with four series of left right combinations and drove Tony to the ropes blasting him with destructive body shots that pushed Canzoneri to the corner staggered.
Jimmy hadn’t fought since the year before when he lost his title to Barney Ross and his timing suffered for the long layoff which may have lead to Canzoneri surviving the round.
As Tony was driven to the corner the bell sounded for the end of the round and Canzoneri had survived being stunned by both the mic and McLarnin.
Canzoneri’s huge champion’s heart roared to life in the minute between the first and second rounds, but the gamblers didn’t know it and changed the odds to 4-1 in favor of the Irishman. McLarnin started the second as he had ended the first landing a huge left then a few more but then Tony went to work. A left right combination followed by three left hands dazed the Celt and Canzoneri passed the cob webs he had in the first over to Jimmy. A big left forces McLarnin into a clinch then a left right combo puts him to a knee. McLarnin is down for only the third or fourth time of his great career.
From then on it was all Canzoneri , winning seven of the nine rounds after his near disastrous first round. McLarnin took only the first, fourth, and eighth rounds .
"He's a grand fighter, that Tony," said Jimmy, as the attendant massaged his badly swollen jaw. "I guess I ought to quit, at that. Fighting once a year is tough going."
"Jimmy hit me hard and hurt me a lot in the first round." Canzoneri stated after the fight . "But when I saw could take that, I knew I would win, I knew I had taken all he had.”
The vast majority of newspapers took McLarnin’s statement to heart and reported that Canzoneri had put the Irishman out of the business and forced him into retirement. The win put Tony in line to face Lou Ambers for the lightweight championship and that fight came off the same year on September 3, 1936. Canzoneri would lose a 15 round decision.
McLarnin didn’t retire, instead he came back on October 5th of 36 to face Canzoneri a second time.
The second fight was a remake of the first but the leading roles were reversed just as Canzoneri had manhandled McLarnin in the first fight the clouting Celt ran roughshod over Tony in the second, landing punches ten to one over the course of the ten round affair.
Canzoneri battled gamely but the loss to Ambers in September had taken the wind out of his sails. Cuts over both eyes , bloodied in both mouth and nose the title Baby face no longer fit the moonfaced Italian.
This time Canzoneri did go down but in the second round of the second meeting. A straight right would drop him for a three second knockdown and Tony would lose all but the fourth and tenth rounds.
"There's nothing like married life to keep a fellow attending to business," grinned McLarnin, after being besieged by admirers in the Garden dressing rooms. "I've got to hustle now and I feel like I've got a lot more fighting in my system."
“The McLarnin/Ross match is now a natural,” stated Garden promoter Jimmy Johnston afterwards “We may try to sign McLarnin to fight Lou Ambers, the new lightweight champion, in the meantime, the winner to take on Barney.”
McLarnin would face Ambers “The Herkimer Hurricane” in last fight of his career next and come away with a ten round win. Neither great would ever face Barney Ross..
Canzoneri would suffer a heart attack and pass early in life on December 9th 1959. McLarnin would go on to have a long life passing in 2004 at the age of 97 ..
Long before boxing commercials and the current crop of trilogies there was McLarnin/Ross and in the wake of Pacman-Marquez there was great duo’s like Canzoneri/McLarnin to set the stage for current fighters to be cast against. No movie or company plug can match the art that real life creates in this sport.
Keith Terceira is the UBC North American Ratings Chairman, and can be reached at Kterceira@aol.com