Ambers v. Canzoneri

Luigi D'Ambrosio (Lou Ambers) and Tony Canzoneri began fighting each other in 1931. They fought several rounds every day. Canzoneri, then lightweight champion, was training for an important bout and Ambers was his sparring partner. When Canzoneri finished training and his sparring partner went on to become a fighter famed in his own right, the Canzoneri v. Ambers combat, instead of ending, became intensified. When they met for the lightweight championship in 1935, Canzoneri won. When they met again last September, Ambers won. Last week, in Madison Square Garden, they fought for the championship once more. This time, the sparring partner was a 3-to-1 favorite over his onetime employer. Experts felt that, after twelve years of fighting in which he had held the featherweight championship once, the junior welterweight championship once, the lightweight championship twice, Canzoneri, at 29, was past his prime.

Mentally the advantage was Canzoneri's because he was fighting a onetime underling. Physically it was Ambers' because he knew all his opponent's tricks. Before the fight was two rounds old, it became obvious that this time Ambers' knowledge of how to catch Canzoneri's jabs on his elbows, duck his hard rights, was worth more than Canzoneri's ever-fresh certainty that Ambers did not really belong in the same ring with him. When, after 15 rounds, Canzoneri's self-assurance was the only thing he had left, three judges unanimously gave Ambers the decision. Equally unanimous, experts decided that the string of Ambers v. Canzoneri fights had ended.

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