Old Archie Moore Was Older and Wiser Than He Looked
By Robert Brizel, Head Real Combat Media Boxing Correspondent
Through the looking glass of boxing time, “The Old Mongoose”, Archie Moore, was older and wiser than he looked. He actually held a share of the world heavyweight title later in his career, though this overlooked fact is seldom recognized or realized. He beat Joey Maxim three times, and held the World Light Heavyweight title from 1952 to 1962. Alas, old Archie failed to win the heavyweight title from Rocky Marciano or Floyd Patterson. Maxim beat Patterson somehow, while Archie did not. A strange but true fact in the different matchups yields different results in the boxing category.
His decades career stretched from 1936 to 1963. In many respects, Moore was in a worse situation than Joe Louis. Contractually Louis had to give away future earnings to James Braddock for that title fight, as Moore did with Maxim. It was an era where the black man had two strikes against him. After Jack Johnson had ridiculed white American by winning the World Heavyweight title, Jack Dempsey did not accept the later life Jack Johnson bout offer and stuck to white opponents after defeating Jess Willard, who had beaten Johnson.
The light heavyweight title did not hold the same luster and magic the world heavyweight title did. Oddly enough, Rocky Marciano would be considered a cruiserweight under 200 pounds, and Joe Louis would be considered a WBC Bridgerweight under 220 pounds, not even a smaller heavyweight by today’s still evolving weight class standards. Moore’s 219 known professional bouts (and there had to have been more than that, in the shoddy records-keeping era preceding The Ring Record Book) are still astounding. His 186-23-10 record is one of hardcore experience. Moore fought his career from 145 to 206 pounds (final bout in 1963 with Mike DiBiase).
Hard to believe it, but Moore actually weighed the same as Rocky Marciano, 188 pounds, when he fought Rocky in Yankee Stadium in 1955. Moore appeared to be attempting to transition to heavyweight in the final years of his career, and felt he could beat Rocky if given a rematch opportunity where he could more adequately transition to the higher weight class. Moore had the guts, but not the power, to compete at heavyweight. Moore never fought Sugar Ray Robinson, Sonny Liston, Ezzard Charles, Jersey Joe Walcott, Henry Cooper, Cleveland Williams, Joe Louis, Bob Foster or Ingemar Johansson in their prime. These bouts would not have been favorable for Moore, who could have faced these challenges but would have been unable to dissect these heavier hitters.
Archie was a magnificent trainer. He had the era of hitting the road for many hard luck back woods bouts with shoulder sack and stick in hand. Moore simply arrived at the title later in life, probably much older than his stated age (like Sonny Liston) and ran into the roadblock of having to secure a title shot with financial conditions much later than he should have. That a black or minority could get a title shot at all is astounding, given the racial nature of the United States even after World War II leading into the Civil Rights movement led by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Old Archie was older and wiser than he looked. He had reached the sports on black and white television era just as television entertainment involving sports was about to blossom. Moore’s biggest obstacles was not getting fights, but ascending to the title when individuals of color faced both discrimination and adversity in the boxing ring and other professional sports. The theme of Archie’s life is he lived long enough to get titular opportunities. Looking at his record, it is just a shame Moore had to wait until the twilight of his life to get world title opportunities. The key understanding is Moore had to be good enough and live long enough to realize these opportunities having fought his way through some of the most turbulent times for black fighters of his era.
Moore’s hatred, ironically enough, was not racial or ethnic. Moore’s dislike was for referee Harry Kessler, who he felt helped Rocky Marciano up in the second round after Moore had knocked him down. The scene where Kessler helped Marciano was edited out of fight films. Moore needed decades to forgive Kessler, who also refereed Muhammad Ali versus Cleveland Williams in 1966, and Muhammad Ali versus Ernie Terrell in 1967 world title bouts. Kessler died in 1986 at age 85, and it would be later than that when Moore finally found it in his heart to forgive Kessler, who had already passed. Moore died in 1998, having been in the corner of George Foreman versus Muhammad Ali in Kinshasa, Zaire in October 1974 in “The Rumble in the Jungle”, and having witnessed it all. “That isn’t boxing!” proclaimed Jack Dempsey after Ali knocked out Foreman after using the rope-a-dope on the ropes for most of the bout. Moore, who knew Ali’s multifaceted bag of tricks, already had lived every dimension of the sweet science and knew better by that point.
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