Top 50 middleweights ever (8-10)

How's this for a line-up of champions, taken at the American Boxing Writers Dinner in New York in 1964. Most people would recognise Muhammad Ali (actually then, he was still Cassius Clay) on the right and Jack Dempsey on the left. The guy Ali has his arm around is Willie Pastrano, who soon after would become world light-heavyweight champion. The little guy is Mickey Walker and some would claim he was as good as any of them. He is certainly good enough to make it to the next part of our middleweight list.

8. Mickey Walker
Walker had such a long, successful and complex career, it is difficult to rank Walker. He won world titles at welterweight, middleweight and light-heavyweight. As a middleweight, he beat Tiger Flowers for the title in 1926, having been earlier beaten by Harry Greb. He defended it in London against Tommy Milligan and also had big wins over Mike McTigue and Jock Malone. But he also had a string of fights against men much bigger, including a draw against Jack Sharkey (in between Sharkey's fights against Schmeling and Carnera) and a win over Bearcat Wright, who might have fought for the heavyweight title in another era.

9. Gene Fullmer
Fullmer, a Mormon from Utah, often gets overlooked in the talk of great middleweights, but he held the edge in four encounters with Sugar Ray Robinson, so that should put him high on the list on its own. He originally won the title from Robinson in 1957, but held it for only four months until knocked out in a rematch. Beat Carmen Basilio for the vacant NBA title in 1959 and clung on it through six successful defences, beating Benny Paret, Spider Webb, winning and drawing against Robinson and drawing with future champ Joey Giardello.

10. Tony Zale
While researching this, I was surprised to find out that Michael Jackson came from Gary, Indiana. But for me, and most sports fans, Gary, Indiana, will always be the home of The Man of Steel, Tony Zale. While there were certainly more talented boxers than Zale, there were few harder men. Zale could take tremendous stick but somehow come back to win. He initially won the NBA middleweight title from Al Hostak and remained champion for most of the next seven years before losing it to Marcel Cerdan when he was probably well past it. He is best remembered for edging a three-fight series of thrillers with Rocky Graziano. In the film of Graziano's life, Zale was originally cast to play himself in the fight scenes opposite Paul Newman (picture). Legend has it that when working on their scene, Newman got a bit fresh and landed a full-blooded punch on Zale, who responded by flattening Newman. Zale got the knockout, but lost the pay cheque.

Comments

[Dave Yaros]

Tony Zale is indeed one of ours. Ours = folk who hail from the "Steel City" of Gary, Indiana. Tony put his time in the mills, like most of us, and decided professional boxing held more of a future. One hell of a choice to have to make, in my opinion!

Tony Zale is not the only person of fame from da'Region, as it is affectionately referred to by residents. In fact, there are quite a few famous persons, and not limited to the sports arena.

For those interested, I have a web site which features Gary, Indiana. In addition to the history of Gary, there is a section on famous Garyites. The list might surprise some. The web site is Dave's Den. The web site url is http://GDYNets.WebNG.com

All are cordially invited to come on by, check it out, and have thier conceptions of Gary, Indiana shattered.

[James Fairweather]

Hard to argue with these three, and full credit for selecting Fullmer at 9 - one of those really diamond-hard fighters who probably don't receive full credit for their exploits.

The seven remaining fighters seem reasonably clear; can't wait to see which one finishes top.