The Sweet Science - A. J. Liebling [94]
Next, Jimmy Soo, whom the Philadelphians had come to root for, went on with a lad named Jimmy Wilde, billed as “a rough, tough lightweight from the Bronx.” I learned from my program that Soo, an “undefeated lightweight of Chinese-Irish descent, is colorful, flashy, and talented.” He proved to be all that—at least, far too talented for Wilde—but the rough, tough lightweight persisted. The bout was scheduled for eight rounds but was stopped after the sixth, because it was by then ten o’clock and the main bout had to go on for television. Wilde and I were both relieved.
Finally, the main fight went on. Joe Gannon came into the ring—white-skinned, spindly, and determined, knobby of knee and elbow, bristly-jowled, and wearing the expression of a ventriloquist’s dummy who knows a secret and won’t tell. One of the seconds in his corner was Marciano’s friend Al Columbo. Gannon had worked as a Marciano sparring partner. Weill himself wasn’t there, though; and neither was Goldman. Patterson came in next, looking about as he had in Helsinki—dark, dandified, and grave. His handlers wore jerseys with “Floyd Patterson” embroidered on their backs—he had made it; he was an institution. Patterson had not filled out noticeably, and this must be a disappointment to his backers; when you have a seventeen-year-old fighter who is six feet tall, it is only human to hope that he will grow into a real heavyweight. His weight was announced as a hundred and seventy and a half, but he had boxed at the old hundred and sixty-five only a month or two earlier, and he would have had slight trouble making it again. Gannon weighed a hundred and seventy-four and a half, but his arms were thin compared to Patterson’s. He walked out bravely at the bell, as if resolved to make an arrest.
At first, I didn’t realize what a close fight it was. All I saw was Patterson moving in and Gannon sticking out his left, as if to halt traffic, and then stepping away rapidly—but all too often not rapidly enough. Patterson wasn’t exactly killing him, but he was landing three punches for one, throwing them in quick, sharp sequences and driving Gannon in front of him. It was a voice from directly behind my right ear that apprised me of what was actually happening. “Come on, Joe!” the voice howled. “You got him wobbling!”
“I wonder if he can reckernize our voice?” a voice behind my left ear said, and then, before I could roll my head, came, “In da breadbasket, Joe! He don’t like dem deah!”
Gannon’s mouth was at that moment open, as he stared, glassy-eyed, over Patterson’s back while the Negro pounded his belly. “You got him holding now, Joe!” the right-ear voice bellowed.
When the round ended, the left-ear voice said, “He’s doing good.”
From then on I attended two fights—the one I saw and the one I heard. With my eyes I apprehended poor Gannon—astonishingly brave and astonishingly persistent—sticking and hopping, holding in close for dear life, and taking a beating without ever changing that Boston-terrier expression. Patterson, more patient than in his amateur days, stalked him and outboxed him, nailing him with flurries of blows but never getting him with the one big punch. Sometimes I thought that a spark of his amateur recklessness would help, since Gannon was no hitter. Once Gannon staggered away and Patterson did jump after him. “You got him hopping now, Joe!” my right-ear voice yelled. And as the grim assault continued, the two enthusiasts convinced each other that their friend was far ahead on points.
“He looks good,” left-ear