Sport: As Advertised

he toughest little bulldog in the ring is 174½-lb. Mickey Walker who started his career as a welterweight, won welterweight and middleweight championships, then became a heavyweight and fought Heavyweight Champion Jack Sharkey to a draw a year ago. Matched against Walker for the reward of a return fight against Sharkey last week was amiable, capable Max Siegfried Otto Schmeling, heavyweight champion until Sharkey won the title on a disputed decision last summer. As Advertised

The good little man Walker and the none-too-good big man Schmeling were brought together at Madison Square Garden’s Long Island City Bowl, before a crowd whose every sympathy was with snapping little bulldog Walker. They got their money’s worth.

In the first round Schmeling, fighting slowly and methodically, smacked Walker’s face with two swift lefts to the head. Walker tumbled like a nine pin, then bounced to his feet, straining every nerve to cut his big opponent down. In the second round hulking Max Schmeling, to his pained surprise, received a thunderstorm in the stomach. His eye was cut. It was a clean round for the little bulldog.

So was the third. So was the fourth. It has been a long time since prize fight addicts have seen a real fight for their money. Yelping with excitement, the crowd (estimated 50,000) surged down the shallow rim of the bowl, and against the bleats of remonstrating policemen, scrambled into the half empty $11 ringside seats. Schmeling fought timidly through the rest of the round like a man reluctantly chastising a smaller brother.

For two more rounds Schmeling ducked and dodged, uncomfortably aware of his abdominal thunderstorm. Experts who had picked him as a 2-to-1 favorite felt confident that the onetime champion was biding his time, waiting to put away his opponent, as previously advertised in most Metropolitan sport sections. The crowd pleaded tearfully “Stay with him, Mickey, stay with him boy!” But those whose view of the match was not distorted through the bottom of a pint flask realized that the tide was turning. They were right.

In the eighth round Max Schmeling suddenly pulled himself together and went to work. Mickey Walker was smacked to the canvas for a count of nine, then for a count of six. His mouth protector was slapped right into Schmeling’s corner. The referee picked it up, awarded the decision to Schmeling, without boos. Even the Walker cheering section had to admit that Max Siegfried Otto Schmeling had fairly proved his claim to a match to regain his championship.