Graciano Rocchigiani

Graciano Rocchigiani
Data
Birth Name	Graciano Rocchigiani
Fight name	Rocky
Weight class	Super middleweight , light heavyweight
nationality	German
birthday	December 29, 1963
place of birth	Rheinhausen , Germany
Date of death	1st October 2018
Place of death	Belpasso , Italy
style	Legal display
size	1.88 m
Combat Statistics
Struggles	48
Victories	41
Knockout victories	19th
Defeats	5
draw	2

Graciano "Rocky" Rocchigiani (born December 29, 1963 in Rheinhausen , Germany ; † October 1, 2018 in Belpasso , Italy ) was a German boxer . He became world champion in the super middleweight and light heavyweight classes .

Boxing career

Rocchigiani, born in Rheinhausen, came to West Berlin as a toddler. “I'm a Berliner, that's just the way it is”, he said in 2017. According to his own statement, he grew up “middle-class”. While walking, he and his brother Ralf saw that boxing was taking place in a school gym in the neighboring street. While his brother started boxing straight away, Graciano Rocchigiani played football for another year before switching to boxing. His father, who was Italian junior champion as a boxer, was the motivation for him, says Rocchigiani: "I always wanted him to be proud of me."

amateur

In 1982 the southpaw Rocchigiani in Sindelfingen became the German light middleweight champion for the Neuköllner Sportfreunde , with whom he had learned boxing, and switched to professional business the following year. He played 122 amateur fights.

professional

His professional debut took place on September 10, 1983 in Cologne , where he defeated the veteran Esperno Postl from Austria with a technical knockout in the second round. In 1985 he won the German middleweight championship through a technical knockout in the third round against Rüdiger Bitterling at the age of 21 in Düsseldorf and in 1986 the light heavyweight championship title through a point win over Manfred Jassmann .

On March 11, 1988, he won the IBF world title in super middleweight, a newly introduced weight class that at that time did not enjoy the reputation that it later gained. Rocchigiani, who was looked after by Wilfried Sauerland as manager at the time , defeated the American title holder Vincent Boulware in his 24th professional fight in front of 6,000 spectators in the Düsseldorf Philipshalle in the eighth round by technical knockout. He was thereby, after Max Schmeling and Eckhard Dagge , the third German world champion in professional boxing. He was the youngest German boxing world champion. For winning the World Cup he received a fee of 10,000 D-Marks, and when he defended his title in early June 1988 in the Berlin Deutschlandhalle , the boxer trained by Wolfgang Wilke was paid 180,000 D-Marks. In his third fight as world champion at the end of January 1989 against the South African Thulani Malinga, Rocchigiani received 400,000 D-Marks, the highest salary that a German professional boxer had received after the Second World War. After three title defenses, he resigned the title to box again in the light heavyweight division. There he secured the European title in 1991.

In February 1994 , Rocchigiani, now under contract with Klaus-Peter Kohl , was defeated by the previously undefeated British Chris Eubank in front of 11,000 spectators in the sold-out Deutschlandhalle in Berlin in the battle for the WBO title in the super middleweight division. Eubank was the better boxer in the first rounds and hit a large number of body hits before Rocchigiani, who was loudly driven by the spectators, appeared. The three judges saw Eubank ahead after twelve rounds. In December 1994 Rocchigiani's attempt to become European champion for the second time against Frederic Seillier failed ; in front of 4,000 spectators at the sports forum in Berlin-Lichtenberg, he only drew against the title holder from France. Rocchigiani's promoter Kohl accused Seillier's supervisors of treating a tear on the Frenchman's eye with a forbidden paste during the fight, which was seized by an official of the Association of German Professional Boxers after a tussle.

In 1995 he became the two-time opponent of Henry Maske . Already at the end of February 1992 (the European Championship fight broke due to disagreement about the wages of the two boxers) and in 1994, this settlement was planned, but Rocchigiani and his manager at the time Kohl did not want to get involved in the options for subsequent fights demanded by Mask manager Wilfried Sauerland , should lose mask. Before the first duel in Dortmund's Westfalenhalle, Rocchigiani described the duel as a battle between East and West Germany: "Hit the Wessi in the snout, hit the Ossi in the snout - that's how the audience sees it". The fight, marketed as "A Question of Honor", according to the title song recorded by Sarah Brightman , was on the brink because Manager Kohl, with whom Rocchigiani had ended his collaboration in order to be able to take on Mask, obtained a temporary injunction that was eventually overturned by the Berlin district court. Kohl also waived any claim for damages against Rocchigiani. This lost the first fight, for which he received a fee of 1.15 million DM, controversial on points. Rocchigiani had attacked Mask very effectively with uppercut from the start of the fight, hiding himself behind his tried and tested double cover. Mask was apparently chipped twice during the fight, in the last round even on the ground, whereby the referee did not consider this to be a regular rainfall, but rather the result of a bump. Maskes point victory was justified by the fact that "Rocky" had given up many other laps due to insufficient activity. “You have to win against Henry by knocking out”, said Rocchigiani after the fight, which gave the broadcasting station RTL a new record with 13.18 million TV viewers, and believed that show and money were on his opponent's side. "Graciano didn't lose for me," said Rocchigiani's coach at the time, Wolfgang Wilke.

The rematch between Rocchigiani and Maske took place in Munich and was referred to in advance as "the preliminary climax of the new German boxing boom". The fight was a one-sided affair with a clear superiority of Maskes, which Rocchigiani could not bring into trouble at any time and therefore clearly lost. Rocchigiani said after the defeat he was “boxing too doggedly and cramped”. Mask had determined the fight with his leading hand, while Rocchigiani had too little effect from a distance and was unable to force his opponent into close combat.

He also competed twice against Dariusz Michalczewski : Again, the first fight, which took place on August 10, 1996 at Hamburg's Millerntor , was very controversial. After Rocchigiani was able to dominate the first half of the fight, the fight was stopped in the seventh round for hitting after an interrupt command for foul. The duel was counted as a draw on points under whistles from the audience, whereby Michalczewski remained world champion, who had provoked the termination by signaling the incapacity to fight - which Rocchigiani later interpreted as simulating in view of the supposedly easy hitting. He felt as if he had been betrayed against Mask and saw the reason in his low lobby, as he had no promoter and was not that popular. “I got good exchanges and I never complained about them. But the lobby was held by the others and that was often decisive. I would have won the first mask fight on points in any other country in the world and I would have won the first Michalczewski fight, too, "was Rocchigiani's retrospective assessment in 2017. As with Mask, he was also in the rematch against Michalczewski April 2000 without a chance and lost prematurely. A possible third fight never came about despite several attempts; a last date, which was planned for May 2008, failed due to the organizer's incorrect contract.

On March 21, 1998 he picked up the vacant light heavyweight title of the WBC after beating Michael Nunn . Winning the title was controversial in that the defending champion Roy Jones Jr. never officially gave it up. However, the association had interpreted it this way and therefore launched the fight for the supposed title. A few days before the fight, Rocchigiani's brother Ralf took over the coaching position after the separation from Emanuel Steward . Rocchigiani received a gross fee of two million D-Marks for his win against Nunn, which was attended by 7,500 spectators in the Max-Schmeling-Halle in Berlin and 9.15 million viewers on the television sets. This title win was later withdrawn from Rocchigiani by the WBC Association, whereas Rocchigiani successfully sued. He was awarded $ 31 million in damages and the WBC filed for bankruptcy . In mid-July 2004 Rocchigiani accepted a settlement offer of $ 4.5 million.

He lost his last fight on May 10, 2003 against Thomas Ulrich .

List of boxing matches

41 wins (19 by knockout), 5 defeats (1 by knockout), 2 draws
year	Day	place	opponent	Result for Rocchigiani
1983	September 10	Cologne , Federal Republic of Germany	Esperno Postl	Victory / Technical Knockout (TKO) 2nd round
	October 7th	Frankfurt am Main , Federal Republic of Germany	Marnix Heytens	Victory / TKO 1st round
	November 5th	Mannheim , Federal Republic of Germany	Jan Lefeber	Points win / 4 rounds
1984	January 14th	Düsseldorf , Federal Republic of Germany	Chaed Ringo	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	February 10th	Sporthalle Süd, Frankfurt am Main , Federal Republic of Germany	Mauro Hernandez da Cruz	Points win / 6 rounds
	February 24th	Alsterdorfer Sporthalle , Hamburg , Federal Republic of Germany	Mick Morris	Points victory (unanimously) / 4 rounds
	April 27	West Berlin	Franz Dorfer	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	September 15th	Dortmund , Federal Republic of Germany	Butangi Nzolameso	Points win / 6 rounds
	5th October	Frankfurt am Main , Federal Republic of Germany	Tony Britton	Points win / 8 rounds
	December 1	Düsseldorf , Federal Republic of Germany	Philippe Seys	Points win / 8 rounds
1985	9th March	Düsseldorf , Federal Republic of Germany	Tony Jenkins	Victory / TKO 6th round
	26th of April	Festhalle , Frankfurt am Main , Federal Republic of Germany	Steve Johnson	Points win / 6 rounds
	August 31	West Berlin	Moussa Kassongo Mukandjo	Points victory (unanimously) / 10 rounds
	November 8th	Düsseldorf , Federal Republic of Germany	Rüdiger Bitterling German Light Heavyweight Championship	Victory / TKO 3rd round
	November 29th	Frankfurt am Main , Federal Republic of Germany	Antoine Alcantara	Victory / KO 2nd round
1986	1st March	Cologne , Federal Republic of Germany	James Cook	Points win / 8 rounds
	12th of May	Bad Homburg tennis hall, Bad Homburg , Federal Republic of Germany	Ian Lazarus	Victory / KO 8th round
	October 3	West Berlin	Manfred Jassmann German light heavyweight championship	Points win / 12 rounds
1987	September 14th	Bad Homburg tennis hall, Bad Homburg, Federal Republic of Germany	Ahmed Laghlali	Victory / TKO 2nd round
	October 3	Safariland Stukenbrock, Holte-Stukenbrock Castle , Federal Republic of Germany	Tommy Taylor	Points win / 8 rounds
	October 17th	Gifhorn sports hall, Gifhorn , Federal Republic of Germany	Lahcen M'Hamdi	Victory / TKO 3rd round
	30th of October	Electoral Palace, Mainz , Federal Republic of Germany	John hero	Points win / 8 rounds
	December 5th	Philipshalle , Düsseldorf, Federal Republic of Germany	Mustafa Hamsho	Victory / TKO 1st round
1988	March 11	Philipshalle , Düsseldorf, Federal Republic of Germany	Vincent Boulware vacant IBF World Championship super middleweight title	Victory / TKO 8th round
	3rd of June	Deutschlandhalle , West Berlin	Nicky Walker Defense of the IBF World Championship Super Middleweight Championship	Points victory (unanimously) / 15 rounds
	October 7th	Deutschlandhalle , West Berlin	Chris Reid defending the IBF Super Middleweight Championship World Championship	Victory / TKO 11th round
1989	January 27th	Deutschlandhalle , West Berlin	Thulani Malinga title defense world championship IBF super middleweight	Points victory (unanimous) / 12 rounds
	December 1	InterContinental Berlin , East Berlin , German Democratic Republic	John Keys	Victory / KO 2nd round
1990	7th of September	Sports hall in Charlottenburg, West Berlin	Rodrigo Benech	Victory / KO 3rd round
	December 7th	Berlin , Germany	Mike Sedillo	Points win / 8 rounds
1991	February 28	Philipshalle , Düsseldorf, Germany	Crawford Ashley vacant European light heavyweight championship	Point victory (majority decision) / 12 rounds
	13.september	Dusseldorf , Germany	Alex Blanchard defending the European Light Heavyweight Championship	Victory / TKO 9th round
1993	June 26th	Alsterdorfer Sporthalle , Hamburg, Germany	Lester Yarbrough	Points win / 8 rounds
	September 11	Tivoli ice rink , Aachen , Germany	Kevin Whaley-El	Victory / TKO 6th round
	15th October	Schoeneberg Sports Center , Berlin, Germany	Ricky Thomas	Points win / 8 rounds
1994	February 5th	Deutschlandhalle , Berlin, Germany	Chris Eubank World Championship WBO super middleweight title	Loss of points (unanimously) / 12 rounds
	28th of May	Tivoli ice rink , Aachen, Germany	Charles Oliver	Victory / TKO 6th round
	October 22nd	Hansehalle , Lübeck , Germany	Willie Kemp	Victory / KO 2nd round
	10th of December	Sportforum Hohenschönhausen , Berlin, Germany	Frederic Seillier European Super Middleweight Championship	Tie / 12 rounds
1995	May 27th	Westfalenhallen , Dortmund, Germany	Henry Mask World Championship IBF Light Heavyweight	Loss of points (unanimously) / 12 rounds
	October 14th	Olympiahalle Munich , Munich , Germany	Henry Mask World Championship IBF Light Heavyweight	Loss of points (unanimously) / 12 rounds
1996	April 6th	Stadium sports hall , Hannover , Germany	Pietro Pellizzaro	Points win / 10 rounds
	August 10	Wilhelm Koch Stadium , Hamburg, Germany	Dariusz Michalczewski World Championship WBO light heavyweight	Tie (abandonment) / 7 rounds
1997	March 22	Max-Schmeling-Halle , Berlin, Germany	John Scully	Points victory (unanimously) / 10 rounds
1998	March 21st	Max-Schmeling-Halle , Berlin, Germany	Michael Nunn vacant world championship WBC light heavyweight	Point victory (majority decision) / 12 rounds
2000	April 15th	Preussag Arena , Hanover, Germany	Dariusz Michalczewski World Championship WBO light heavyweight	Loss / TKO 10th round
2001	February 10th	Estrel Hotel , Berlin, Germany	Willard Lewis	Points victory (unanimous) / 8 rounds
2003	10th of May	Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle , Stuttgart , Germany	Thomas Ulrich vacant WBC International light heavyweight title	Loss of points (unanimously) / 12 rounds
Source: Graciano Rocchigiani in the BoxRec database

Private

Rocchigiani's father Zanubio is an iron bender from Sardinia , his mother comes from Berlin . He had a brother, Ralf Rocchigiani, and a sister. Rocchigiani attended secondary school up to the ninth grade and learned the trade of building cleaner . According to other information, he dropped out of training. He lived in the Schöneberg district of Berlin until the early 1990s .

In 1995 he married his girlfriend Christine. In 2001 the couple separated.

Rocchigiani ran his own boxing training center called Rocky's Gym on Grabenstrasse in the Neudorf district of Duisburg , where he trained several boxers (including Selcuk Aydin and Herbie Hide ). From January 2009 there was a cooperation with Arena Box-Promotion under the direction of the promoter Ahmet Öner . The training center closed in early 2010.

Rocchigiani has been sentenced to several imprisonment sentences, including for assault and property damage, but also repeated driving without a valid driver's license. In January 2007 he had to serve a nine-month prison sentence for the second time in the Bielefeld-Senne correctional facility for violating probation requirements. At his own request, he had himself moved to the open prison in Moers-Kapellen so that he could continue to operate his fitness studio in Duisburg. Rocchigiani was released early from prison in November 2007.

Grave site in the old St.-Matthäus-Kirchhof in Berlin-Schöneberg

In 2007 he published his autobiography Rocky - Meine 15 Runden in Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf Verlag .

In June 2012, he was fined 3,600 euros for coercion. In an argument that had been smoldering for days, he had snatched a friend's cell phone away. A little later it became known that Rocchigiani, who had intermittent alcohol problems, had lost his fortune and received unemployment benefit II .

In 2018 he played the leading role in the Austrian short film TNT Boxerstory by director Mark Gerstorfer . He also moderated boxing matches for Sport1 with his brother Ralf Rocchigiani, also a boxer .

On October 1, 2018, at around 11.30 p.m., Graciano Rocchigiani was killed in a traffic accident in Piano Tavola, Sicily , in which he was hit by a car as a pedestrian on Strada Statale 121. He left behind his Italian partner and three children.

On October 13th he was buried in Berlin in the Old St. Matthew Cemetery (grave C-009-014).

Web links

Commons : Graciano Rocchigiani  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Graciano Rocchigiani's website
• Literature by and about Graciano Rocchigiani in the catalog of the German National Library
• Graciano Rocchigiani in the BoxRec database
• Graciano Rocchigiani in the Internet Movie Database (English)

Individual evidence

1. ^ ^{A b} Boxe, è morto Graciano Rocchigiani L'ex iridato investito da un'auto in Italia. In: La Gazzetta dello Sport . October 2, 2018, accessed October 2, 2018 (Italian). 
2. ^ ^{A b} Graciano Rocchigiani - boxing trainer; Jörg van Hooven in conversation with ex-boxing professional Graciano Rocchigiani. In: münchen.tv on youtube.com. Retrieved October 24, 2019 . 
3. ^ Homepage of the NSF boxing department
4. ↑ Mother jumped into the ring with her son ... In: Die Welt. November 11, 1985. Retrieved October 24, 2019 . 
5. ↑ ^{a b} https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1988/pdf/19880314.pdf/ASV_HAB_19880314_HA_017.pdf
6. ↑ ^{a b} Graciano Rocchigiani . In: Internationales Sportarchiv 09/2004 of February 28, 2004, supplemented by news from MA-Journal up to week 24/2012 (accessed via Munzinger Online ).
7. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1988/pdf/19880604.pdf/ASV_HAB_19880604_HA_048.pdf
8. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1989/pdf/19890130.pdf/ASV_HAB_19890130_HA_016.pdf
9. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1994/pdf/19940207.pdf/ASV_HAB_19940207_HA_016.pdf
10. ↑ Chris Eubank vs. Graciano Rocchigiani. In: youtube.com; Fox Sports Two. Retrieved October 25, 2019 (German). 
11. ^ Look up at Donike. In: Hamburger Abendblatt. December 12, 1994, Retrieved October 25, 2019 . 
12. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1992/pdf/19920103.pdf/ASV_HAB_19920103_HA_023.pdf
13. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1995/pdf/19950526.pdf/ASV_HAB_19950526_HA_025.pdf
14. ↑ Graciano Rocchigiani vs Henry Maske - May 27, 1995. Retrieved October 22, 2019 (German). 
15. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1995/pdf/19950529.pdf/ASV_HAB_19950529_HA_019.pdf
16. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1995/pdf/19951013.pdf/ASV_HAB_19951013_HA_022.pdf
17. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1995/pdf/19951016.pdf/ASV_HAB_19951016_HA_022.pdf
18. ↑ https://www.abendblatt.de/archive/1998/pdf/19980323.pdf/ASV_HAB_19980323_HA_019.pdf
19. ↑ Rybarczyk, Christoph: The hour of reckoning . In: Hamburger Abendblatt , January 14, 2000 (accessed via LexisNexis Wirtschaft ).
20. ↑ Graciano Rocchigiani: The ex of boxing star Rocky - The alcohol ruined a lot . In: bild.de . ( bild.de [accessed October 4, 2018]).
21. ↑ Graciano "Rocky" Rocchigiani is the new trainer at Arena Boxstall . In: bild.de . ( bild.de [accessed October 4, 2018]).
22. ^ RP ONLINE: Duisburg: Mask invites Rocchigiani to fight. Retrieved October 4, 2018 . 
23. ↑ Here Rocky packs for jail , bild.de, January 3, 2007
24. ↑ RP ONLINE: Moers: Rocky arrived the day before yesterday. Retrieved October 4, 2018 . 
25. ↑ Rocky: Sex, Jail and Scandals . In: bild.de . ( bild.de [accessed October 4, 2018]).
26. ↑ n-tv news: Rocchigiani has to pay . In: n-tv.de . ( n-tv.de [accessed October 4, 2018]).
27. ↑ FOCUS Online: "Ultimately, he can only help himself . " In: FOCUS Online . ( focus.de [accessed on October 4, 2018]).
28. ↑ Mother of Graciano "Rocky" Rocchigiani: "He was so happy down there". In: BZ October 2, 2018, accessed October 3, 2018 . 
29. ^ The grave of Graciano Rocchigiani. In: knerger.de. Klaus Nerger, accessed on October 16, 2018 . 

predecessor	title	successor
vacant Chong-Pal Park	World super middleweight boxing champion ( IBF ) March 11, 1988–1989	vacant Lindell Holmes
vacant Roy Jones junior	Light Heavyweight Boxing Champion ( WBC ) March 21, 1998 - July 1998 (revoked)	vacant Roy Jones junior