Most Overrated and Underrated heavyweights of patterson/Listons era

Well ask Roger Richer how hard London punched...

Eddie Machen and zora Folley WERE better than Brian London. But I accept the timing and circumstances why he got a shot ahead of them. The answer is Willie Pastrano.

Machen, Pastrano and Folley were part of the new guard within the ratings. the top American contenders together. Pastrano was seen as the most saleable initially but then Machen and Folley quickly joined him in the ranks among New kids on the block. Within a short time all three lost to Europeans. Machen most spectacularly. Ingo was placed ahead now but the champ wanted to take the next best guy as a tune up for ingo. He chose London over Cooper on account of him beating pastrano better than Cooper beat Folley.

 

Well, memory sometimes plays tricks,

but I remember reading about the London fight that Patterson was going to fight the winner of the Cooper-London fight before fighting Johansson in June. Cooper won, but as I remember suffered such bad cuts that he couldn't fight by May.

I went over and looked at Cooper's record and he didn't fight again until near the end of August.

With Cooper unable to fight, London got the shot.

Now memory might fail me, but this is how I remember it from The Ring and Sports Illustrated.

 

"did Brian London deserve a shot over guys like Machen and Folley?"

No, but Johansson was actually at this point the leading contender and the big money fight. Patterson wasn't going to take on Machen or Folley for a warm-up.

"Did Roy Harris deserve a shot over Eddie Machen?"

No. But I do think he had as good a credentials as anyone else.

**It is important to understand historically what was happening. D'Amato was fighting the IBC monopoly and the mob that was behind it. Was he sincere, or was this merely a ploy to protect Patterson from Machen and Folley? Either could be right. One thing is certain, the Justice Department agreed with Cus about the IBC and ended up breaking it up. If I remember correctly, some top IBC figures ended up doing jail time.

You obviously take the position that Cus was purely cynical.

I'm not so sure.

Apparently the guys who controlled Harris were free of IBC involvement, and as they also controlled Williams, this might explain why Williams couldn't get big fights.

By 1961 the IBC was finished and Williams began to move. This might not have been a coincidence.

 

Those losses were years earlier.

Cooper wasn't talked of as a contender until 1959 after he had beaten Folley and Machen had been KO'd by Johansson.

 

if the Winner of Machen v Folley won by KO it would have eclipsed Roy Harris. They were too good to be used in tune ups.

 

The disappointment of the Machen v folley fight result eclipsed how good they were.

 

Folley sure didn't.

He lost by KO's to Summerlin and Young Jack Johnson in 1955,

from that point on he ran up the following victories to the Machen fight

Watson Jones, Ponce Deleon, Rocky Robinson, Roger Rischer, Nino Valdes, Wayne Bethea, Wayne Bethea, Howie Turner, Johnny Hollins, J D Harvey, Jimmy Wood, Julius Griffin, Jeff Dyer, Edgardo Romero, Monroe Ratliff, Duke Sabedong, Edgar Romero, Garvin Sawyer,

Looks like a good win over Valdes,

and wins over fringe types Bethea (two split decisions) and Rischer,

and the rest wins over "Who?" record padders.

Machen was the top contender, but Folley doesn't seem to me to be quite on the same level going into 1958.