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Show IPIAKING Released by Weitern Newspaper Union. HOW many people can name the champions of three of the eight boxing divisions recognized by the National Boxing association? It probably wouldn't be an exaggeration exag-geration to say that a maximum of one in ten persons could name more than one champion Joe Louis, heavyweight titlist for the duration. More than 4,000 professional boxers box-ers are In the services, suggesting that there was more real fighting out of the ring than In it during 1943. The Boxing Writers association associa-tion (emphasized this fact in award ing its boxcr-of-the-year prize, the Eddie Noil Memorial trophy, to all the fist fighters in the services en masse. Four champions were In the service serv-ice throughout the year Joe Louis, Ym . S Xi JOE LOUIS I heavyweight; Gu3 Lesnevich, light heavy; Tony Zale, middleweight; and Red Cochrane, welterweight. A fifth, Willie Pep, went in after defending de-fending his featherweight title successfully. suc-cessfully. Boxing Not Dormant Despite the lack of manpower, boxing wasn't dormant during the year. With most of the titles frozen for the duration, there still was championship activity in two divisions divi-sions lightweight and bantamweightafter bantam-weightafter Pep joined the navy. Beau Jack, recognized as lightweight light-weight kingpin by New York and New Jersey at the beginning of the year, lost the crown in May to Bob Montgomery of Philadelphia. At that time Pennsylvania granted similar sim-ilar recognition to its home talent. Jack regained the title from Montgomery Mont-gomery in November. As yet Pennsylvania Penn-sylvania has not withdrawn recognition recogni-tion despite the unquestioned heartbreak. heart-break. The lightweight title, however, was disputed by Sammy Angott, who had given it up In 1942 but came back in March and later was recognized recog-nized aa champion by the National Boxing association after beating Luther Lu-ther White in Los Angeles. Diminutive Manuel Ortiz, California-born Mexican, was the busiest champion of the year, defending his bantamweight crown eight times, chiefly in his home state. The flyweight fly-weight title, only one not held by an American, was defended successfully success-fully by Jackie Patterson in England. Eng-land. Upsets were far from infrequent during the past year as the form players will testify. Willie Pep's 62-bout winning streak was halted abruptly by Angott in a non-title bout. Ray Robinson, welterweight chief, won 41 straight and then was floored and outpointed by Jake La-Motta La-Motta in Detroit He reversed this setback before going into the army. Surprise Factor The LaMotta incident shared the surprise factor with Heavyweight Lee Savold's defeat by Eddie Blunt, reversed in two weeks with a one-round one-round knockout. Then, too, there was Bobby Ruffin's victory over Jack before the Beau regained his title. Jimmy Bivins, Cleveland Negro, was one of the toughest heavyweights heavy-weights in action, beating everything every-thing in sight. Yet be was considered consid-ered lucky to win a hotly disputed decision over Lee Murray of South Norwalk, Conn. Murray was one of the year's best newcomers. Hammerin' Henry Armstrong, former for-mer three-way champion, completed complet-ed a successful financial comeback program, and had the good grace to retire after a rather deplorable showing against Ray Robinson. But even now there's a rumor that Henry Hen-ry will try it again. There have been far too many short-sighted "Comebacks" in past years. Most has-beens should be content to remain in that state for their own good, if not for the public's. pub-lic's. Heavy Profits That there was a lot of fight left in the industry was proved by the fact that more fight clubs operated at a profit than ever before. Boxing thrived financially in many large and small cities throughout the country. Of 29 shows promoted by Mike Jacobs in Madison Square Garden, 13 drew $45,000 and up, 6 drew $70,000. The top gate was $104,976 for Jack vs. Armstrong. The Garden shows averaged $12,000 better bet-ter than in 1942 |