Jake La Motta is dead. At such a time of preposterous vanity and decadence in Boxing, La Motta’s life and career make a risible mockery of today’s divas, charlatans and narcissists. Born into brutal depression era poverty in The Bronx, The Bull was pimped by his Father into local child bouts which earned pennies for the rent and he quickly became a violent abusive thug, resqued from a life begind bars or the chair by his unparalelled bravery and tenacity in the ring. His major career-spanning rival was the greatest boxer ever Suger Ray Robinson, the superstar whose tour of France created the term ‘entourage’ in modern parlance as he paraded about in top of the line motor cars and hung out in 5 Star Hotels with a huge bunch of friends stringers and hangers on…. they fought 6 times, sometimes twice in a year and once with only 3 weeks between bouts…. Robinson won their personal duel 5-1 with some mafia help but he never managed to knock The Bull down which The Bull had done to him in his only victory, punching Robinson out of the ring through theb ropes…. he was loved by the mid-Century mass boxing audience for his astonishing courage…. most of his fights went the distance and were called closely and often corruptly for gambling purposes….. La Motta was a good stand-up comedian, film-actor and a talk show circuit favorite for decades after his retirement and confessed all his many terrible sins in his memoirs endearing him even further to his public. His era had Robinson and Marciano as well as The Bull. We have McGregor, Mayweather, Fury, Canelo, Hay and…. Rio Ferdinand….
Roddy McDevitt