Fisticuffs

Godfrey-Risko. There is always one fighter among heavyweight fighters who is called the Black Menace. It used to be Wills. Now, as everyone knows, it is George Godfrey, Alabama blackamoor. To be the black menace a fighter must be big. Godfrey weighs 245 pounds when he is thin. The Black Menace must have beaten up a lot of inferior fighters. Godfrey fought 16 times last year, scored 16 knockouts. Above all, to be the Black Menace, it must be rumored that he is: 1) so formidable that the heavyweight champion is afraid of him, and 2) crooked. Godfrey fulfills these conditions. He is very good-natured and always smiles kindly and hideously at his opponents. His larded body melts with any exertion, making him hard to hold in clinches. He has enormous strength and likes checked neckties, pork chops, going to the zoo, and resting. This week, after much palaver and two postponements because of rain, he climbed into a ring and mauled around with John Risko, baker-boy from Cleveland.

McLarnin-McGraw. James McLarnin, lightweight who has a cherub's face and wears a harp on his bathrobe, who knocked out Sid Terris with one punch but who couldn't lay a glove on Champion Samuel Mandell, feinted with his left last week in Madison Square Garden, then crossed his right to the retreating but tough chin of Phillip McGraw, lightweight from Marathon, Greece, knocking him through the ropes into the lap of one of the judges. McGraw climbed back, was knocked down three times more, after which, amid cries of "Stop it," Referee Dorman lifted Mc-Larnin's hand.

Hudkins-Walker. Ace Hudkins, pal of Charles Lindbergh, bouquet-lover, and broken nosed punch-drinker who fights flail-fisted, lunged after middleweight champion Mickey Walker in a wet ring in Chicago. Rain on the canvas was stained with the blood that flowed from the lips and noses of both men. Walker won two rounds, Hudkins five, the rest were even. When the referee, with finger pointing at Walker, yelled "The winner, and still champion. . . ." the crowd jumped up and booed for 15 minutes.