Tony Zale vs Rocky Graziano

---

Graziano was a slight betting favorite. Graziano was down for a five-count in the first round, but he came back and dropped Zale at the end of the second round for a three-count. Graziano continued to pound away savagely, and after five rounds, Zale looked like a beaten fighter. But then came the unexpected in the sixth round. Showing the heart of a champion, Zale, who injured his right hand in the second round, gathered the strength to fire a terrific right to Graziano's solar plexus and followed it up with a left hook to the chin. Graziano went down and didn't rise until just after referee Ruby Goldstein completed the count of ten. Zale had to be propped up and led around the ring carefully as he waved to the crowd after the knockout. The Associated Press wrote that Zale "looked like a man who had been in hand-to-hand combat with a buzzsaw, and somehow, much to his own astonishment, had come out ahead." There was a crowd of 39,827 and the gross gate was $342,497. Named The Ring "Fight of the Year". The Ring ranked the fight fifth on their 1996 list The 100 Greatest Title Fights of All-Time .