By Jim Amato
Middleweight Ralph Moncrief lost eighteen of 47 fights. Records are deceiving though as you will see in this article. Born in 1950,Ralph turned professional in 1972 and won his first three bouts.He suffered his first defeat in 1973 being stopped by Detroit’s tough Lee Barber. Two fights later Ralph lost on points to crafty Al StylesJr.
Moncrief would win six straight including a rematch kayo over Barber. Then in the first many career upsets he won the verdict against unbeaten Ernie Singletary. In his next fight Moncrief took on another unbeaten prospect Dwight Davison.Ralph lost on points. He beat journeyman Johnny Heard and then lost a close decision in a rematch to Singletary.
It’s now 1979 and Moncrief outscored hard hitting Lamont Lovelady. In 1980 Ralph would travel to South Africa where he would upset Gert Steyn in seven rounds to gain a world ranking. It was short lived though as he dropped a ten round decision to the highly touted and undefeated,Bernard “Superbad” Mays.
From here on out Moncrief’s career became very checkered losing to Jean Marie Emebe and James Kinchen in 1982. In 1983 he lost to Sumbu Kalambay and in 1984 he was halted by Britain’s Mark Kaylor in London.On November 22,1985 Ralph would meet Eddie Hall in Cleveland for the Ohio State middleweight title. Moncrief was the loser in this one.
Three years after his loss to Hall, Moncrief would score another upset. This time Ralph outpointed “Diamond” Jim McDonald. In 1989 he was stopped by the outstanding Mike McCallum but would bounce back to upset Phillip Morefield. Ralph ended the year losing to the capable Antoine Byrd. In his only bout of 1990 Moncrief lost a ten rounder to Marvin Hagler’s half brother Robbie Sims.
Ralph opened 1991 losing to Percy Harris. Then came Moncrief’s marquee victory. Ralph stopped veteran top contender Michael Olajide. The win paved the way for some decent paydays and four straight losses. After being stopped in one round by Bernard Hopkins and dropping a ten rounder to Lindell Holmes,Ralph was headed for the boxing scrapyard. Moncrief would win his last four fights against losing opposition and then call it a day in October 2000.
Moncrief’s ended his career with a 29-18 record. He scored 15 knockouts and was stopped himself on six occasions. He met four world champions and eight who challenged for a world title. He fought in England,France,Italy and South Africa. Ralph Moncrief was another from a long list of class fighters to come out of Cleveland,Ohio.
Jim Amato
As in September, I once again ran out of gas in the 10th & 11th championship rounds of October & November with this column, but I recovered to complete them and will unleash a few more flurries to close out the 12th and final round.
In the first week of October, Hassan N’Dam won a UD over Curtis Stevens in an eliminator for the right to challenge Jermaine Taylor who defeated aging Sam Soliman to regain the IBF Middleweight title. How Taylor even earned this title shot is another story altogether, but it is all irrelevant as he is now the champion. However he will not have too much time to savor his victory as he has assault and battery charges pending against him and an upcoming court fight that may turn out to be the toughest fight of his life, just when things started to look up for him in boxing, we wish him luck.
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