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Show I SPORT LIGHT No One Can Label Rocky a Punk I , By GRANTLAND RICE rpHERE ARE SEVERAL things you can say about Rocky Grazi- ano after his Fusarl party. One is that having a 12-pound advantage, he was running behind before the tenth round. But the main point is that Grazi- ano, ring rusty, wilder than a The Calumet Clean-up It is a September custom to begin making the annual award to Calumet Calu-met in the way of racing honors. First, Calumet has the horse of the year in Coaltown maybe the horse of many years. Second, Calumet has the top three-year-old of 1949 in Ponder, the unknown two weeks before the Derby. Third, Calumet has now passed pass-ed the $950,000 total earning mark for 1949 and the year has more than three months of racing rac-ing left, including antumn and early winter. This means well over a million dollars will drop into the Calumet coffers. There is one hornet in the honey, however. Citation hasn't run since last December and is still a pretty fair chunk of cash in back of Stymie, Sty-mie, the Hirsch Jacobs' family steed. timber wolf, apparently ap-parently badly beaten, came back to win against long odds. It must be admitted ad-mitted that Charley Fusarl, Fus-arl, physically, looks less like Grantland Rice a figner than Punch and Judy. He is a pale carbon copy of complete futility. futili-ty. But he can box he can move, around he can take a punch. Fusarl is dead game but he is not a champion. Graziano threw enough punches to knock out Dempsey, Tunney, Jeffries, Johnson and Louis. But 99 per cent of them merely cut the balmy September air. Some of them missed by two feet. Some by only a foot. But, after all, Graziano hadn't had a fight, a real fight since Tony Zale nailed him back in the early summer of 1948. In the meanwhile, Rocky had suffered any number of cerebral hemorrhages or explosions explo-sions of the conning tower. Considering all this, Rocky didn't do a bad job. His victory down the stretch, as cheap as it was in spots, can't be Ig- Citation, at this time last fall, was supposed to move far beyond be-yond the million mark. But the popped osselet proved to be more damaging than an exploding ex-ploding bomb. The horse, rated beyond all rivals since Man o' War, possibly better than Man o' War, has been as idle as a "painted ship upon a painted ocean" for the last eight months. Just about this time last year, the two best two-year-olds were Young Peter and Mr. Busher. Mr. Busher was practically wrecked in a Chicago race and then Young Peter had to step aside and leave the field open to Ponder, Capot, etc. nored. It was a good fighting job. When you have been badly outpointed in seven of nine rounds with only one round to go and still move in swinging with all you have no one can label you a punk. There is much disagreement about the margin Fusari had after the 9th round. No one can question the fact that Fusari was far in front as the final round arrived. Fusari must have nailed Rocky with 150 right-hand punches. Fusari also might just as well have used a feather duster. Rocky Graziano's victory is worth at least $200,000 to the I. B. C, which Jim Norris deserves, but doesn't need. Only don't let Rocky wander in the same inclosure with Ray Robinson. Or any good middleweight. middle-weight. Rocky is still dangerous but he isn't the Rocky of old. But, as Dizzy Dean once said "Whoinel is?" I happened to be at the track the afternoon Maxie Hirsch sent a two-year-old known as Middle-ground Middle-ground against a good field. Mid-dleground Mid-dleground ran away from the same and practically disappeared. He did the same thing at Saratoga. Then it was discovered he wasn't the soundest colt in the world so he won't run again until 1950. The King Ranch horse is probably prob-ably the fastest two-year-old alive today. But that doesn't mean he will be the fastest seven or eight months from now. Serious contention conten-tion may come from Christopher T. Chenery's Hill Prince, which set a new record for six and a half furlongs in the Cowdin Stakes. This doesn't mean Middleground or Hill Prince will win the Derby or the triple crown next year. Under Un-der the direction of a trainer such as Max Hirsch it would be a wonderful won-derful thing to see Middleground in top shape to run. |