"Stallone kills Liston! Stallone kills Liston!"

Today Sylvester Stallone has single-handedly proven that to become a sports hero, you don’t have to be blessed with athletic prowess, discipline, or have even played that sport professionally.  All you need is a knack for cheese truths and a dream.  KEEP PUNCHING!

The actor, who penned the script about an underdog boxer from Philadelphia named Rocky Balboa, was named — along with Iron Mike Tyson and Julio Cesar Chavez, among others — to the 12-member 2011 class for induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame and Museum.
”The two things that brought boxing back to the forefront with the public was the great success of the 1976 Olympic team, and when Sylvester Stallone gave us our heavyweight champion — Rocky Balboa,” Hall of Famer Emanuel Steward said. ”I still get goose bumps when I hear the Rocky theme.’ [MSNBC]

Naturally, the blow-hardy sportswriter battle lines are clearly drawn, between “Stallone did a lot for the sport!” and “it cheapens the Hall to induct a non-boxer!”   They’re both right, but more importantly, who cares.  As long as Tom Cruise doesn’t make the samurai hall of fame, I think we’ll be all right.  …Wait, do they have one of those?  Because that would be bad ass.

For whatever reason, boxing movies in the past have tended to focus on the gritty, hardworkin’ white fighters rather than the black guys who beat them up (Rocky, The Fighter, Raging Bull, Cinderella Man, Gladiator, etc.).  That may soon change with a planned biopic (bye oh pic) of Sugar Ray Robinson, the guy who beat Jake “Ragin’ Bull” LaMotta’s ass five out of six times. Though he never knocked him out. Say what you will about us Italians’ fighting ability, we can sure get punched in the face.

Rachael Horovitz, the producer who originally set up the Michael Lewis book Moneyball  at Columbia about overachieving Oakland A’s GM Billy Beane, has teamed with Recount screenwriter Danny Strong to option the Wil Haygood biography Sweet Thunder: The Life and Times of Sugar Ray Robinson. Haygood will write the screenplay.

Robinson is still considered pound for pound the greatest boxer ever.  Robinson challenged mob control of the fight game in the 1940s and 50s, leading to Senate corruption hearings. He opened the Harlem nightclub Sugar Ray’s in Harlem in 1946 and it became a celeb magnet, but his own foray into showbiz was less impressive. He shockingly hung up his gloves in 1952 to become an entertainer with the Count Basie Orchestra. After getting the first bad reviews of his career, Robinson un-retired three years later and won the middleweight title.[Deadline]

An even better (and true) story is that in 1947, Sugar Ray Robinson was supposed to fight Jimmy Doyle, but the night before fight, he had a dream that he killed Doyle in the ring, and he pulled out of the fight.  His priest had to convince him to go on with the fight anyway, and when he finally agreed a few days later, he knocked Doyle out in the sixth round and Doyle never woke up.  That’s one of the most badass stories I’ve ever heard, and if it happened in a movie, I probably wouldn’t believe it.  Long story short, if they cast Will Smith in this I’m going to burn down a Scientology center.

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As previously discussed, Real Steel is a futuristic film about robots that box, “but at its core a human story.” Produced by Steven Spielberg and Robert Zemeckis, from the director of Night at the Museum and Cheaper by the Dozen, it sounds like it could be either the greatest or lamest movie ever. The latest news is that Hugh Jackman is in talks to star.

Pic is a Rocky-esque tale of a fighter who has to reinvent himself when human boxing becomes obsolete, replaced by 2000 pound human-like robots. Jackman is negotiating to play the ex-fighter, who becomes a Robot Boxing promoter, but whose chances of success are hampered by his access to sub-standard robot parts. That is until he discovers a discarded robot that always seems to win. The ex-fighter has also discovered he’s the father of a 13-year old son, and they bond as the robot brawls its way toward the top. [Variety]

So basically, it’s like Rocky meets Wall-E meets Three Men and a Baby.  Why didn’t I think of that? “You don’t undastand, Chahley! I coulda been a contenda!  It coulda been somebody!  Until dem no good robots come and gimme a one-way ticket ta palookaville.”  (*jazz hands*)