The Saga of Stanley Ketchel

Junior Non-Fiction Short for MSU-Bozeman. Official Selection at BendFilm Festival 2008.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• BendFilm Festival 2008
• Sydney Hoffner
• Non-Fiction
• Short
• Documentary

[sydneyhoffner]

The town in the beginning of the video is Butte, Montana, where he hopped the train to at age 12. The car dolly is actually dollying to the 'whorehouse' where he was the bouncer, as the voiceover describes.

[eslubin]

The greatest polish fighter in history

[1899sharkey]

Stan Ketchel the Michigan assassin!!! Top five middleweight of all time. Hate to disapoint Hagler fans but Stanley would of ate him up.

[MrBumboclart]

@1899sharkey What an animal he was! Inside the ring and out, especially during his hobo days as 'Steel Yard Steve' haha. In a fight with a hobo on a moving train he bit the fella's ear off, broke him arm and threw him out of the moving box-cart...all because he pulled a knife on him. Stanley hated knives. I highly recommend the book as you're a big Ketchel fan.

[1899sharkey]

@MrBumboclart - No I haven't but i'm sure its a k.o.. Nothing like a boxing book about one of the oldtimers, they dont have to be about greats either as I loved " a bloody canvas" the Mike Mctigue story that one can pick up for a couple of bucks. Ketchel was my fav middle and probably the best ever.

[MrBumboclart]

@1899sharkey I just read Ketchel's biography. Have you read it? 'The Killings of Stanley Ketchel.' Amazing read, the man was a beast.

[MrManuel822]

Middleweights of now would bitch and complain if they had to fight for 20 rounds in a raging rainstorm. They lack the balls and courage to fight in those conditions. Ketchel was the personification of a hunter and warror. That's how you become legend

[MrManuel822]

Ketchel was a swarmer and he couldn't punch fast enough. He had incredible endurance and staying power.He possessed relentless pressure and forced you to work. His greatest defense was his offence and he was successful, The Ketchel-Thomas 4 fight rivalry are forgotten classics.The second fight that went 32 rounds and the third fight fought in the middle of a giant rainstorm for 20 rounds. The accounts are in the Library of Congress newspapers and in the recent Ketchel book.

[MrManuel822]

Continued - A great body puncher who constantly worked downstairs and fought much bigger men than himself. Alot of the heavyweights Ketchel fought were during his Butte Montana days in the casino's and work as a bellhop. Many of those fights were brutal and fought with bare knuckles.

At the peak of his career Stanley was the symbol of a fighter who endured enormous amount of pain in order to win fights if need be. To outlast, outwork, outfight, outbattle and he relished long battles.

[MrManuel822]

Continued - When the best of the best didn't hesitate to fight one another and give us ring classics on a daily basis. These days we have to always keep our fingers crossed and pray for a super-fight to take place or if it ever takes place. But in Ketchel's day when pure fighting and ring wars were the way of the world... that's the golden age of boxing many fans wish could come back.

If it did it would be the greatest sport in the world, Stan had devastating power in both hands.

[MrManuel822]

Continued - This is the first nourishment I've had in two days. He Jabbed my appetite back to my nursing bottle days. I've never met a man as cleverer as Stanley Ketchel."- Jack O' Brien

This story speaks volumes to me.and lets me know to never under underestimate your opponent no matter how easy they look or how crude they may appear because they may have tricks of their own and more clever than you'd expect them to be. Stan represents the fighters of yore I wish were in our own time.

[MrManuel822]

Continued - "That was always banging against my teeth. Look here. If you don't think he landed his left, look at this."

O' Brien took both hands and opening his mouth he lifted his upper lip gently away from his teeth and turned it up. It was completely lacerated from Ketchel's inside work & uppercuts landing at close quarters.

" I guess he didn't jab me none", commented O'Brien, " Now you fellas know why I'm drinking broth and not eating a big steak.

[MrManuel822]

Continued - " I know cleverness when I meet it. I'm supposed to be a bit nifty on that score myself. I want to inform you that in all my career I've never met a fellow as CLEVER as Ketchel. He doesn''t look so . He seems easy to hit and isn't at all. He Left jabbed me on the mouth more times than i've ever been poked in all my career.

"I just couldn't get away from his left. I Kept trying to beat him to it, and you fellows are always crediting me with scoring when it was Ketche'ls left.