How Good Was Rocky Marciano

Hands down the single most dominant HW champion from the first century to now. Prior to Rock there was Klietomachos, Melankomas, Glaukos, and Theagenes all said to have been unbeaten and all said to have had over 100 fights, each individual has their own claim to fame, but, it's not important....they are literally ancient history. The point is, you have to go that far back to find anyone who rivals Rocky in terms of utter domination over his division. That's not because 1722-1888 saw no undefeated HW champions, there was Ben Brian and Hen Pearce who were very good, but, together, they had about twenty fights or so. Marciano has a nice full career's worth of fights, no draws, no no-contests, nothing but wins. He KO'd Ring mag's favored HW Rex Layne. He shattered the elbows of the prospect from the Bronx who gained popularity for pioneering a defense based on catching blows with the elbows and using the ropes to mitigate damage, Roland LaStarza. He stopped the 55+ win streak of the prospect of the west. Harry Kid Matthews had never lost at HW, hardly lost at all, and when he did it was when he was green, small, and fighting names with great records and far more experience. They say he never beat anyone worth a damn who was also prime, but, who was given a chance to prove they are worth a damn? Marciano cleared the deck before he stepped up to the champion level. There is no way for a prospect to shine if they're beaten by the most dominant prospect boxing has ever seen before either of them are champions. He moves on to champion levels and beats the champ the former champ (also one of the p4p greatest) the former-former champ (GOAT) the british champ the european champ the LHW champ ( KO King and a p4p great) With literally nothing left to prove Marciano retires unbeaten, unmatched, and totally dominant by every metric. What of the bums? You know how Wilder brags about knocking out bums and how if it was easy everyone would be knocking out bums but look at their records, they fought bums to UDs often? Marciano really did knock them out, and, he has one over Wilder, he knocked bums out of the sport. Retired them. The only man with more retirements on his record at HW is Fitz, but, that's thanks to Fitz's massive list of debuts he fought. Still the highest rated punch ever scientifically measured at 925ft-lbs stronger than most firearms and quite a lot of vehicles. x3 Fighter and x3 Fight of the Year award winner, 49 wins, 43 knockouts, 13 direct retirements with another 12 five fights or less after Marciano, shattered the bones of anyone who'd guard his blows, and measured the punch to prove it. Because a lot of people only like half of boxing and belittle the other half Marciano gets shat on by loads for being crude. If hit and don't be hit back boxing is all you're into he is definitely not for you. If you enjoy all of boxing Marciano is easily one of the greatest of all time. My favorite excuses to explain the once in a millenium fighter that is Marciano: Weak era - from the first century to now there's a ton of weak eras, only one Marciano though. Old fighters - He destroyed anything with any backing to it before they got to the title not after Ezzard Charles - Only in real hater land can you take a character who is about a year in age apart from a guy and has a full career's worth experience over him and call that a deficit. My favorite excuses for the present: Size - Just really a bad understanding of physics to be honest. Marciano's got small, MW, sized hands on modern HW size thighs. That's like a ball-peen hammer strapped to a rocket. It'll be doing damage and doing damage is all Marciano needs to win. Skills - Read a ****in' book. Points boxing isn't even that successful. There's no good reason to exalt it over damage boxing. Resume - How do you have a resume where you can brag about the guys he beat's accomplishments when he beat the **** out of everyone in his era? How big can anyone be, how important can they be, to the fifties, with the Rockness Monster stomping around? As far as the moderns: Lennox is the last great champion, but, what the **** does he know about fighting a MW? Marciano knows about fighting giants, Lennox knows nothing about fighting hobbits. Seems to me Lennox doesn't have an answer for the crouch. K2 Brothers can't handle the output. They're too slow and stiff, Wlad goes down too easy and Vitali gets cut up. McCall can't keep punching, early rounds he might win by KO but if the fight goes past 3 I reckon Marciano. Haye'd be a decent fight I reckon, but soon as Marciano clobbers him with a sleeping phantom overhead he's done. Tua's the best name of the list. He has the build and style to bully Marciano, proven output, proven chin, damn fine fighter to pit against Marciano. Rock struggled with ****ell because ****ell bullied Marciano. If Tua bullies I reckon he could win. Ortiz hasn't a snowball's chance in hell. He lacks the output and his training is for guys way to big to apply to Marciano. I think his are the worst chances so far. Wilder's got that one punch **** you, but, so does Rocky. If Deontay can't get him out in four it'll be Wilder on the ground. Good fight though, Wilder's got the athleticism to keep up and they both use the same gameplan. It'd be interesting to see who out studied who during the fight and landed that winning punch first. Joshua's got like no chance in hell. Just none. I'm not hating on the guy it's just a terrible match up for him. He's slow and stiff, has posture problems, and isn't the toughest to put down....that's what Marciano banks on. Throw in a stamina issue to match up against Marciano's relentless pace and jango, all you're left with are silly surface reasonings....like Josh big doe. Fury's find of in a similar situation. He's been put down by a CW who doesn't have Marciano's 925ftlbs of bone breaking power while said CW was performing a Marciano staple punch poorly. None of that bending at the waist and making faces **** will phase Rock in the least. Trying to make him miss is what gets you ****ed up, just ask Archie....a much better mover and much more dangerous puncher. What's he going to do pitty pat Rocky away? Only in weird as **** Furyland. On top of all this, the Ali superfight computer isn't the only time Marciano's been computerized against others. There is Mike Paul's ranking program and TBCB's simulator to name a couple. You'll find if you look into who dominates the all time computers that's Marciano. When you try to figure out why you'll find it's because his stats are so far beyond anyone else's. To make him more fair in video games a human needs to adjust the code because the engine is going to go ham based on his stats. He dominates the D20, TBCB hates to give him Ls, and he's top five on Paul's computerized ranking system because you need a human to say "yeah but" otherwise he's the most dominant force in modern boxing history and the computer will recognize that. If you dunno Mike Paul, um, read some books, you will. I didn't even get into the historical significance of Marciano's skill set. He uses both ancient and bare knuckle techniques adapted to modern gloved, rounds, sport boxing. See him as he crouches? Picture in his left hand a shield and in his right a sword. You can see Sparta in Marciano now yes? The historical significance of Marciano performing on the level he did during the era he did while using the tools he used is massively over looked. You can't see Klietomachos, but, you can see his form in Marciano vs Moore anytime you like. Wow, that was hands down, one of my favorite responses I’ve ever gotten on BoxingScene... Beyond that this was some of the best summarizing of Marciano’s career I’ve read. I’m not trying to flatter you, just know you made my day from a boxing perspective. I sometimes get tired of wading through all of the low I.Q. rants on this forum, but it’s posts like this one that make the effort worthwhile! I agree that Marciano is one of the ATGs. He’s always been one of several old timers I’ve enjoyed watching since my early teens, right up there with old Smokin’ Joe and a handful of other fighters. I love it when people give the old timers their due credit.

There's was never really any good competition back then so well never know

He wasn't very good. Just a big puncher. If he was around today, he would be a CW. If he fought Usyk, he'd get stopped.

He was good. He got the job done against bigger men. However the modern crop of heavyweights are just too big for him. Rocky weighed in around 185 give or take a couple of pounds.

Best of his era, and Heavyweight champion when there was only one champ per division. Calm under pressure.

I've often read that he had a legendary style for training camps, but haven't really seen any documentation of this. Can anyone corroborate this? Or did I just imagine it?

I remember watching grainy footage of Rocky Marciano on ESPN Classic as a twelve year old and being impressed by his patient, menacing style and devastation knockout punch. My question is, just how good was Rocky Marciano? Where do you rate his different skills and why? Do you consider him an ATG? Also, how do you think he would fare had he lived and fought in the current HW era? Mythical Matchups: Marciano v. L. Lewis Marciano v. V. Klitschko Marciano v. W. Klitschko Marciano v. O. McCall Marciano v. D. Haye Marciano v. Tua Marciano v. L. Ortiz Marciano v. D. Wilder Marciano v. A. Joshua Marciano v. Ty. Fury Marciano v. Ali Muhammad Ali on Rocky Marciano: "I truly think on my best day and his best day, I would've beaten him. Probably not knocked him out I think he was better than Joe Frazier, I'll put it that way, I truly think he was better than Joe Frazier and you know what Joe Frazier did to me. I think it would've been even, he may have won, it's just hard, it's just up for the imagination." Marciano v. Holmes Holmes went 48-0 and almost tied Marciano's record, and he bitterly slighted Marciano when he went to 48-1. That may have been an interesting fight.

He's not one of the best heavyweights because the bigger guys in the decades since would be too much. He's arguably one of the top guys P4P though, because even for his era, he was a small heavyweight that often had disadvantages in height, weight, and reach. Marciano was the same height as GGG. If he were fighting today, he'd be fighting against Light Heavyweights at 175. Matchups: Marciano v. Kovalev Marciano v. Ward Marciano v. Roy Jones Jr. Marciano v. Hopkins Marciano v. Canelo Marciano v. Beterbiev Marciano v. Usyk

I wouldn't give him a chance against Rocky Balboa. Balboa takes him inside 4 rounds.

He's the best of his era. He loses all those matchups.

He’s TBE 49 and 0 and he didn’t fight little J@P kick boxers

He was very well conditioned and composed..never saw him panic or get out of character...

He was the best of his era and that was enough.