[Rocco Del Sesto]

Been bouncing around between my hobbies baseball and boxing. Boxing been playing some time on LOB. Over there on the Summit Dephi Site, a thread is going where new heavyweight fighters (that wt right now) are being rated by players. Anyway that got me relooking at some of the early guys we looked at on this TB HW thread here and decided here to I'd look at doing some fresh look at. I was looking at Andre Wyns from Belgium, an early opponent for Gerhard Zech. This new rating I've split him up into LHW and HW ratings as his career was played out as such.

ANDRE WYNS - LHW/HW - BELGIUM
Career Record: W11(KO 2) / L34(KO 19) / D2

Unknown information has been left blank.
DOB has been estimated.

Fought and lost to Marcel Limage in April 1955 for the Belgium light heavyweight title.

Lost to Andre Cottyn for the same title in January 1956 when Limage had vacated the LHW title to move up to heavyweight.

The May 13, 1955 Boxing News had a pretty good article on Andre Wyns' fight against Arthur Howard in Kensington, Wyns' only fight outside of Europe in his entire career. The accounted noted how Wyns soon into the fight revealed his lack of technical ability in the ring as he fought pretty much upright, used the entire ring quite well but what punches he attempted lacked any decent punch. He managed a few short lefts and rights to Howard's face but they lacked sufficient power behind them to do any damage.

The January 1957 Ring Magazine noted current Belgium HW champ Alain Cherville defeating Andre Wyns in a fight, weights not noted. The Feb 1957 Ring noted Wyns' fight against Wenzel Bociek as a cruiser fight. The July 1957 Ring notes the Wyns vs Jacques Bro fight a cruiser action.

After winning an 8 round decision to light heavyweight Adrien Verburgh in January 1958, his 9th win against 13 losses and 2 draws as a light heavy, Wyns' record would appear to indicate then him moving up and finishing his career as a heavyweight with his next fight against Manfred Schneider. Career record wise, it prooves to be a poor decision.

BoxRec and the July 1958 Ring note Wyns fight weight at 191 against Manfred Schneider in thier fight on 4/19/58, then in the November 1958 Ring, the short account of Wyns' loss to Mariano Echevarria refers to Wyns as a "muscular but crude Belgian cruiser".

The March 1959 Ring Magazine notes Wyns fight weight at 188 against Karl Mildenberger who was fighting his 5th career fight at 178.

After fighting semi consistantly through 1960, after Wyns looses a 6 round decision to Gerhard Zech, Zech's 5th pro fight, in early April 1969, Wyns then appears of the ring pretty much till 1965, save for a couple appearances in late 1961 and early 1962. He's then out of the ring for 3 years when he comes out in late April 1965 to take on Adrien Verburgh for the then vacant Belgian Heavyweight Title. Verburgh had not fought since April of 1960!

The results of the fight shown in BoxRec are recorded in the 5/14/65 edition of the Boxing News, noting the fight as for the vacant Belgian heavyweight title. The August 1965 Ring shows a short account of this fight stating that Verbrugh, who campaigned during the fifties as a middleweight, reappeared after a lengthly absence to defeat "trialhorse of bygone times, Andre Wyns for the vacant Belgian middles title"?? An apparent misprint by the Ring. Does mention Wyns retired in the 8th round.

Wyns goes on to stay fairly busy through 1965 and 1966 fighting some of the somewhat better names in the European heavyweight class. Dante Cane, Peter Weiland, Manfred MarkGraf, Juergen Blin, Giuseppe Ross and Hans Jorgen Jacobsen. Unfortunately he only manages to loose all 7 fights fought between his comeback loss to Vergurgh and finally a 4th round TKO loss to new comer Hans Jorgen Jacobsen.

Wyns then dissapears from the ring for 3 years again. Then in 1969 Wyns fights 5 more times in his career against almost all total unknowns, save maybe Victor Chapelle against whom Wyns managed his 1 win, a 6 round decision in those 5 fights.

From Sept 1952 on thru his fight against Adrien Verburgh his BoxRec file looks to be he fought as a Light Heavyweight compiling a record of W9(KO 2) / L13(KO 9) / D2.

Starting with the Manfred Schneider has his shift up to heavyweight through the remainder of his career, he compired as horrendous record of W2(KO 0) / L21(KO 10) / D0.