‘Long Count’ owns this date

Upon further review, something even bigger than the birth of Tom Lasorda happened on this day, 80 years ago. History should label Sept. 22, 1927, as a day of fantasy and fisticuffs.

While Lasorda was emerging into a world that he would soon see only in shades of Dodger blue, a famous boxer was losing a match that would make him even more famous and beloved than if he had won.

In front of a crowd of 104,943 that was probably closer to 125,000 by the time the ushers and cops had finished sneaking all their relatives into massive Soldier Field on Lake Michigan’s waterfront, Gene Tunney beat Jack Dempsey to retain his heavyweight title.

It was the legendary “Long Count” fight, and despite the passage of time, it remains among boxing’s most celebrated moments, even though nobody flew into the ring in a machine powered by a fan or bit off anybody’s ear.

In 1927, the Dempsey-Tunney rematch was a super bowl of sports interest, a Yankees-Red-Sox playoff series multiplied by 10. Dempsey had held the heavyweight title for seven-plus years, from 1919 to 1926, and Tunney had taken it from him 364 days earlier in a fight before an announced 120,757 in a stadium in Philadelphia called Sesquicentennial.

According to Mel Heimer’s 1969 book, “The Long Count,” the gate for the 1926 fight was an unheard-of $1,895,723. A year later, the rematch brought higher ticket prices and a gate of $2,658,660.

The rematch drew 1,200 press credentials. Bus drivers around Times Square in New York City sold seats for 50 cents to people wanting to sit and listen to the radio. The warden at the New Jersey State Prison allowed all his detainees radio access, except for the four men on death row.

It remains enough of a big deal that it will be a centerpiece of today’s California Boxing Hall of Fame induction ceremony luncheon at Sportsmen’s Lodge in Studio City. Among the boxers going into the Hall will be Oscar De La Hoya, Shane Mosley, Fernando Vargas and Genaro Hernandez, as well as the late Diego “Chico” Corrales, whose wife, Michelle, will accept his award.

Because longtime promoter Don Fraser runs this event, and has an appreciation for his sport’s history, Dempsey-Tunney and the “Long Count” will be the backdrop.

“I had forgotten the exact year until I came across it, paging through some books,” said Fraser, who turned 80 himself in January. “When I saw that, I knew it was perfect, and I grabbed the date for our Hall of Fame.”

To prepare for the event, Fraser enlisted the help of actor and boxing historian J.J. Johnston, a veteran of 35 movies, 55 TV shows, three Broadway plays and hundreds of hours watching film of the “Long Count” fight.

“Tunney outboxed him from the start, just like he did the year before,” Johnston said.

“Dempsey was one of the greatest champions ever, but he let too much time slip by between fights, and he wasn’t in the shape he once was when he got around to fighting Tunney.”

Dempsey was from a poor family of mixed Irish descent who grew up in Manassa, Colo. The ninth child, he was fun, outgoing, bigger than life. When he became champion, he gravitated more toward the bright lights of Hollywood and less toward the harsh, early morning light of training camp. Dempsey fought to 75 decisions, winning 60, losing six and having nine end in a draw, according to Jack Cavanaugh’s book “Tunney.”

Tunney, also of Irish descent, grew up in a flat over a grocery store in Manhattan and began his boxing career in the Marines. In the service, he learned a training work ethic that kept him fit through all 86 of his fights, only one of them a loss. Less outgoing, he read Shakespeare, enjoyed poetry and was sneered at by Dempsey before their first fight in ’26.

“I’m gonna beat that big bookworm,” Heimer quotes Dempsey as saying.

Johnston said that a key moment was before the fight started, when referee Dave Barry told the fighters that new rules dictated the count for a knockdown would not start until the standing fighter got to a neutral corner. Dempsey, a true brawler, had been known to stand over fallen prey and pounce again the moment the count ended and the victim rose.

Both fighters nodded agreement and went for six rounds without that mattering. Then came the seventh.

“Tunney made a mistake, and Dempsey hurt him with a good punch,” Johnston said.

Five or six punches quickly followed and, as Heimer wrote, Tunney “collapsed like a building falling to the wrecker’s ball.”

But Dempsey didn’t move to a neutral corner, standing nearby instead. Barry ordered him to do so. By most estimates, it took four or five seconds to get Dempsey to where he was supposed to be -- after a shove in that direction by Barry -- and it was not until then that Barry began the count. The knockdown timekeeper, Paul Beeler, later estimated that Tunney was down for at least a 14 count.

“That extra time gave Tunney, a very smart guy, time to clear his head,” Johnston said. “You can see it. By the time Barry’s count began, he was already starting to clear his head. I have no question that, even without the extra time, he would have gotten up and won the fight, like he did.”

Tunney got up at nine, knocked down Dempsey in the eighth, and went on to finish his two-fight domination of one of the best and most-famous boxers of all time. For his troubles, Tunney became the goat, the guy who was lucky to win the fight. Many sportswriters wrote it that way, the public bought it, and the “Long Count” fight became legend.

Tunney fought once more and quit, becoming a wealthy corporate executive and father of former Sen. John V. Tunney of California. Gene Tunney died in 1978 at 81.

Dempsey struggled on for a few more fights, mostly exhibitions, until he lost a four-rounder to a colorful Chicago fighter named Kingfish Levinsky, who was managed by his sister, Leapin’ Lena. Dempsey stayed active and public through his restaurant in Times Square, Jack Dempsey’s, which closed in 1974. He died in 1983 at 87.

Barry continued to referee, but for years after, he was greeted by fans who would rise and, in unison, count to 14.

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Bill Dwyre can be reached at bill.dwyre@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Dwyre, go to latimes.com/dwyre.