Rocky Marciano: a schiester?

[Beanflicker]

I remember watching a documentary on the Chuvalo/Ali fight, where Chuvalo talked about Marciano being brought in as a "mentor figure" for Chuvalo, and Rocky exploiting him and taking a bunch of money from him.

And just recently I borrowed Bret Hart's book from a friend to read on a roadtrip. There is a story about Bret's father, Stu, flying Marciano in as a "special guest referee" for one of his wrestling events and Rocky intentionally screwing him over. From the book...

"I'd learn years later that Marciano was a horrible cheapskate; when he'd left town he intentionally misled Stu into writing him two cheques, each for the whole fee. Even knowing how badly my dad needed the money, he cashed them both. Despite my dads attempts to get him to send the money back, he never did. About a year later, Marciano died in a plane crash. My mom didn't shed any tears."

Its kind of disappointing hearing one of the sports all-time greats and supposedly most classy champs of all time acting like this outside of the ring.

[El Kabong]

Rocky was very money conscious maybe to the point of being miserly

[Gandalf]

Who cares? Everyone looks after their own interests...you could say the same about any number of promoters or fighters.

[JazMerkin]

I think this goes well beyond simply being a bit miserly & looking after his own interests. If those either of those 2 stories are true, (ie I'd like to see some proof) then I lose any respect for Marciano, that is just being a bastard & a thief. If Floyd Mayweather or Manny Pacquiao was discovered to have done this, we'd be up in arms. Just because promoters like Don King & Bob Arum are thieving bastards doesn't make it ok for Marciano.

[Beanflicker]

I think this goes well beyond simply being a bit miserly & looking after his own interests. If those either of those 2 stories are true, (ie I'd like to see some proof) then I lose any respect for Marciano, that is just being a bastard & a thief. If Floyd Mayweather or Manny Pacquiao was discovered to have done this, we'd be up in arms. Just because promoters like Don King & Bob Arum are thieving bastards doesn't make it ok for Marciano.

I agree, this goes above and beyond just being money conscious, this is stealing.

There is no proof besides word of mouth, but watch "The Last Round: Chuvalo vs Ali", or check out the Bret Hart book. Hard to prove, as these instances happened well over 40 years ago, but I doubt these guys (Especially Chuvalo) would incriminate such a beloved guy like Marciano if it wasn't true.

To me its just kinda disappointing. All us sports fans build these guys up in our minds, and in most cases the real people are huge disappointments.

[BoomBoom]

Sheister is an offensive word used for Jewish lawyers, Im pretty sure Rocky was neither.