Word: jakes
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...pout-mouthed Jake La Motta is a sturdy fighter with an in & out record who currently holds the middleweight championship of the world. He won it on a fluke 15 months ago from the late Marcel Cerdan (TIME, June 27, 1949), who fought, after the first round, with the handicap of a torn shoulder muscle. In Detroit, where Jake had the luck to win his title, he defended it last week against Frenchman Laurent Dauthuille. Jake was lucky again...
...rounds La Motta worked like a man in a doze: his footwork was sluggish, his left, normally sharp and stabbing, had neither punch nor pep. Twice the referee had to step in to tell Jake to fight. In the 14th round, the Frenchman jarred him with a right cross that almost floored the 29-year-old champion for the first time in his ring career...
Going into the 15th round, Dauthuille was well ahead on points, and coasting to the title; all he had to do was keep himself covered up through that last round. Instead, on advice from his corner, he chose to come out punching for a knockout. And Jake came out of his doze...
...less than half a minute of the fight remaining, the battered, bleeding La Motta suddenly saw an opening, fired his first good salvo of the evening. A right hook caught Dauthuille flush on the jaw, gave ringside cameramen one of the finest knockout pictures of the season (see cut). Jake's sudden come-alive finish left some sportwriters unimpressed ("manufactured melodrama," one called it), but it saved Jake's title by the barest of margins: the fight had only 13 seconds to go when Dauthuille was counted...
...also saved reluctant Jake for the next challenger: deadly Welterweight Champion Sugar Ray Robinson. In their meeting, probably in February, Jake would need all his luck and then some...