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On Second Thought Picks Marciano To Beat Charles By BARNEY NAGLER NEW YORK, N. Y., June 12. In this week of heavyweight championship contretemps, the boxing world little notes nor long remembers any other event, even. Joey Giar-dellos close but deserved victory over honest Bobby Jones in the Garden Friday night. Giardello won this one, razor thin though his margin was, and thats that. Honesty is a nice little virtue, to be placed alongside patriotism and pastrami as good things to have around the house, but it will never replace a left hook to the jaw! Thats why Giardello won. Come Thursday night, at the Yankee Stadium, however, Rocky Marciano and Ezzard Charles will have to take a lot more into the ring to come away with the victory. They are down for 15 rounds, all tough and a yard wide, and the feeling here is that the bout will go the distance, come what may, and that Marciano will be hard-pressed to hold the championship. He will be operating: before 50,000 customers, not too large a crowd for the big park but large enough to account for some 5500,000, and those who give their business to Jim Norris will be rewarded by a rousing battle. Some will say that Charles too often has failed to repay the customers for their patronage, but this time he will be forced to do just that because Marciano will make him fight or run for his life. Hell not run. Charles never has. Even against J. J. Walcott, in his first bid to retrieve the championship, Charles didnt run. He didnt work too hard, but he didnt run, and Walcott, who had official help galore in the ring at Municipal Stadium, was pleased enough to just stand there and look. Thats about as much as he had to put out to keep the title and thats just what he did. Charles won the fight, hut didnt deserve to get it because he hadnt be haved like a matt determined to atone for the unhappiness in Pittsburgh the year before. This is another year, another city, another chance and another fight. Charles will be pressed to exert all the pressure at his command, in the 15th year of his career as a pro and in the 34th year of his age. He is imaginative and competent. He needs a few breaks and he will do what hasnt been done before: Win back the most valuable of ring titles. It is easy, after exposure to the fight dodge, to become cynical. Boxing is a soft touch for skepticism. Write that Charles will be going in there for pay-night, perhaps his last one, and there will be few to dispute the premise except Charles, his wife, his friends and agents. However, there is no disposition to stigmatize his effort in, this way. He is the one fighter who,1 going in against Marciano, had all the equipment . to take the marbles. Roland LaStarza had poise but no punch. Lee Savold had skill but little else. Joe Louis was poor old Joe. Walcott almost achieved the distinction of whip -lashing Marciano, but his legs denied him the big chance and he was caught up with and knocked down and put. LaStarza, again, had something, but not enough, and while he won a six-round decision, the fight last September was over the championship route. Marciano took out his man in 11. Only Charles comes to the battle with his armory brimming. Except for one punch the left hook with which Walcott knocked him out in Pittsburgh to win the title in 1951 Charles has proved he isnt easy prey. If this punch hadnt whistled on a July night, none today could say Charles wasnt the toughest man in the ring to hurt. None can say that Charles, in condition, cant punch. And there is none around to question his quality as a boxer. Why then, on this week-end before the battle, isnt Charles the forthright selection here? For one, it is difficult to pick against the champion. There is no statute against such a selection, but the shackles of the mind prevent it, especially since this department went out on a long branch in behalf of Roland LaStarza last year and fell right on its noggin when the limb broke. Some will ask: Having picked LaStarza against Marciano, how can you pick against Charles, who is superior to LaStarza as" an all-around fighter? The answer: Marcianos record, 40 knockouts . in 45 bouts,- and the feeling that he is all fighter even though he is a 5 rap on the trainers who would have you believe they sell a course in scientific assault. If Marciano is beaten, and the possibility is not being read out of the realm, it will result from an effort hitherto foreign to Charles. The quondam champion shackled by a quality regarded as pacific in peace-loving men and as a detraction in fist-fighters, will have to mount an assault over many rounds. He will not conquer the champion with one punch, in one moment. If he is to do it, he will have to press from the start, all the way, thoroughly. He just doesnt have it. . -
