Show 40 TN N VIEW of a number of some what sombre events that have taken place lately it Is now a simple matter to announce joe louis next defense of his heavy we weight ight championship in the new program louis will meet joe baksi ouie ollie ezzard charles violent ray and jersey joe wal cott under the fol lowing conditions he is to knock out each one in a sin gle round tor for A which the price of admission will be 2 A As s usual being a joe lows q u ick thinker it re mamed for louis loul s to call the turn on a Sep september lember fight in these words I 1 don t believe anybody would pay 15 cents to see me against either baksi bakst or the price for ezzard charles or violent ray might be lifted to 50 cents AH all of this Is fun for everyone except joe louis here is one of the great heavyweight champions of all time a 10 year ho holder ider of the ring s big crown a fighter who can t defy the challenging years much longer with no one to fight no one knows this better than joe louis with a purse ranging from to 1000 1 waiting it if only one fair challenger had emerged from the morass while he wag was in the army for four years if it you picked out the five leading challengers today I 1 believe e louis given 20 rounds could stop them all in a single september evening pro vided no motorcycles were allowed in the ring s oddest turn the tecona second louis conn fight looked to be a natural it turned out to be the greatest of all heavy weight flops the mauriello affair wasn gasn t even a work out and yet today mauriello Mau nello is a better fighter than most of those suggested tor for a september massacre it Is only natural that joe louis would like one more fight before bowing out but it so happens that in the last five years no heavy weight has come along who could even tie he 11 his shoes there were ea earlier r lier predictions that with thou sands perhaps millions of soldiers taking boxing lessons in the army and navy at least one or two could be developed the first shock I 1 got came from jaw jack dempsey who worked 10 hours a day with 10 men for many months the best fellow I 1 ve seen he told me can t even chin himself twice here s a target or a goal the heavyweight championship worth one million on dollars the defending champion has been knocking around round for over 10 years and yet with sport s richest prize at stake there chasn t been even a good sec ond rater developed in the last five years baksi bakst mauriello Maurie walcott ray woodcock two middleweights of the past mickey walker or harry greb could take them all apart without any extra effort just why this happens to be we wouldn t know golf has hogan nelson and a f flock 1 ock of others tennis has kramer and riggs racing has assault armed and stymie baseball is packed with high class talent di maggio feller blackwell shea mize cooper williams on and on the middleweights are packed with good fighters ray robinson is an able welterweight but outside of louis the best you can say for the other heavyweights is that they can o 0 breathe and eat especially eat attendance surprises the number of human feet that find their way through various turn stiles is always the main tip on pub lie lic interest it is also one of the main arguments among camp fol lowers each rabid fanatic is a hot rooter for his own game there was an early report that the t baseball racing and boxing three of the major sports would take a dip this season the pessimists we were re only partly right in the check up to date the answer is that baseball is still the national game with lengths to spare racing has taken its enly only imbor tant dip in new york it is setting new records in california it is 0 K in new jersey where monmouth has more than made good in public comfort boxing is well down for the simple reason there are not enough good fighters left to fill out a card or half a card louis the heavy weight champion has no opponent in sight only the middleweights have any combined class with zale graziano cerdan and la motta the lightweights are a drab lot as tar far as any public appeal is con berned the major surprise has hit base ball few figured that 1947 would approach the more than 18 million who visited big league parks in 1946 but despite the worst spring in history plus a wet cold june there is a good chance this 18 mil lion mark will be broken |