[Rocco Del Sesto]

Ring Magazine Jan 1940
The New Faces column that featured a piece on Charley Ketchuck had a photo of him and his stable mate, Joe Banovic, LHW of Jersey Jones who fought a good number of the top LHW's of the 1930s. By 1939/40 Banovic had not fought in 3 years till coming out in Sept 1939 to fight one heavyweightm Nick Rabin and then later in Aug 1940 would end his career lost TKO to Joe Matisi. Found that LeeSkye had done a rating of him as a HW. Looking some into his record and past, broke down his career to an early MW portion and then the majority and most successful part as LHW.

Joe Banovic aka Joe Borlan - MW / LHW / HW

Career Record: W52(KO 7) / L22(KO 6) / D5

Unknown information has been left blank.
DOB and DOD listed on BoxerList.com
Manager was Jersey Jones.

Original HW rating was by LeeSkye

He was pictured in the Jan 1940 Ring Magazine with his stablemate Charley Ketchuck both of whom were managed by Jersey Jones.
BoxRec notes under alias being known as Bingo Joe Banovic and as Joe Borland.

18 Mar 1930 Tue, The Wilkes-Barre Record,PA - Article talking about Banovic's climb in fame in boxing over the past year. Some articles looked at in earlier years of his career back only even into 1928 his fight accounts were as Joe Borland. This article starts out, "So far as Joe Boland's ring success is concerned there certainly is something in a name change regarless of the old saying". Jersey Jones had discovered the young fighter from Binghamton, NY took a liking to him and took over his management sometime that year before. Binghamton writers told Jersey Jones when he started looking at him, that they young fighter was known as Joe Boland but his real name was Joe Banovic, and he was of Slovak descent. Jones took "Boland" under contract. Under the New York State Boxing Commission rules, Jersey was obligated to use the fighter's real name, so "Boland" was "laid on the shelf" and Joe Banovic started showing up in the boxing newspaper accounts around the area.

May 1927 newspaper accounts on "Boland" at the time noted him as a middleweight at the time of his fight with Jimmy McAllister. The 30 Jun 1927 Press and Sun-Bulletin, Binghamton, NY there was a very short piece account of "Boland"'s fight with "Frankie Kearns of Utica defeating Joe Boland, First ward middleweight,"'

You then see a break until 3/30/28 in "Boland's" career when he's back and fights Frank Cawley, a light heavyweight at the time. So this seems a distinct time that Banovic's career stopped being a Middleweight after the Frank Kearns fight and he came back 9 months later and started his light heavyweight career he is known for.

25 Mar 1928, Sat The Evening News, Wilkes-Barre, PA - Piece on Frankie Cawley, the Pittston light heavyweight to take on Jim Bolin, "a classy light heavy who hanges his hat in Binghamton, NY and who until recently sported the State amateur championship in the middleweight adn light heavyweight divisions." Is this Joe Boland/Banovic? Could he have quit pro ranks after the McAllister fight and go back to fighting amateur? Some other articles found on line discussing Cawley's fight with this "Jim Bolin" by the date assume it was his fight on 3/30/28 listed in BoxRec with Joe Boland/Banovic.

So, looking at this information I have broken Banovic's record down as follows:
Middleweight: 12/21/25 thru 6/30/27 W9(KO 1) / L2(KO 0) / D1
Light Heavyweight: 3/30/28 thru 7/1/36 W42(KO 6) / L19(KO 5) / D4
Heavyweight: 9/27/39 and 8/22/40 W1(KO 0) / L1(KO 1) / D0

After his last fight on 7/1/36 against Henry Taylor at LHW, he then did not fight in the ring until that 9/27/39 fight when he came back at 217 lbs! In that three years he had been working doing a lot of sparring work for various fighters of the time still under management of Jersey Jones as he became a stable mate with Charley Kerchuck and photographed sparring with him in the Jan 1940 Ring Magazine's "New Faces" column.