Should Floyd Patterson be criticized for for defending his title against

"Mongoose yesterday argued that Valdes wasn't a big win for Machen because his ranking of #3 came from the NBA and not The Ring."

You should take that up with Mongoose.

I don't think any of these ratings are definitive. The Ring is a magazine. The NBA was an Amerian organization giving out world rankings. The modern alphabet groups can give out rankings but they amount only to organization rankings. Boxing has never had a group which can put out unimpeachable rankings?

I think Machen's wins over Valdes were probably his most impressive ever.

 

No. You haven't followed. Machen Folley was delayed and Patterson signed the next best guy as the interim to avoid being stripped.

 

Sorry for butting in. But I never saw him make the claim that Harris was better than either of those two. Only that he was selected over them on the basis that one of them was injured and that their public appeal was damaged due to a recent poor showing. And that Patterson needed a title defense in timely fashion, with Roy Harris being the most reasonable and available opponent.

 

No, I never said anything like that...

:huh

The pages are there if you want to retrace them. I didn't even know Valdes was even rated that high by the NBA, and even you appeared to mistake it for a RING rating until I dug deeper.

 

That article tips the evidence to Folley being rated the #1 contender by the NBA,

District Judge Irving R. Kaufman's ruling in the case of Machen v Johansson does indicate that The Ring and The NBA disagreed on who was the #1 contender.

Kaufman also stated that after Johansson knocked out Machen, Johansson was only the #2 contender for the NBA. (I assume behind Folley)

It is interesting that an American organization rates a man who hadn't defeated Machen over a man who knocked out Machen.

After Folley lost to Cooper, they must not have had a choice.

The Ring at least moved Johansson to #1 right away.

 

-Why? We don't even know who the NBA #1 was during that pressing.

-I already said Machen was better, I never argued otherwise. It's become apparent I don't think you are even reading my posts or understanding them. The worst thing to happen in these board debates is somebody makes up their mind they want to argue a point and will continue to push it regardless of what the other person has been writing.

 

No, I never wrote anything like that. What the hell, dude.

:think

 

With those four out of the bidding, I wonder who the five contenders were?

But your whole point-of-view is based on D'Amato not actually being sincere in fighting the IBC monopoly.

 

Sure. It would've been nice if Floyd Patterson defended against Zora Folley and/or Eddie Machen. He didn't.

But he did defend guys who "owned" one or the other - namely Sonny Liston and Ingemar Johansson. And he later fought Machen and won.

After Patterson defeated the favored Moore for the vacant title, he destroyed #1 rated Tommy Jackson - who Floyd had squeaked by in an eliminator before facing Moore.

Rademacher was the dominant Olympic champion. Unlike Teofilo Stevenson or Felix Savon, Rademacher wanted to fight the heavyweight champion. So he got his supporters to raise $250,000 to pay Patterson to defend against him.

Patterson had gone on exhibition tours before the Jackson defense. Even though his title was on the line, I don't know how concerned he was about Rademacher.

Rademacher got the fight in his hometown, he scored a knockdown and if the fight was a three-rounder he might have won. But Patterson came back to destroy him, as well. So it was certainly entertaining.

And, before he faced Roy Harris, Patterson attempted to lure Rocky Marciano out of retirement. He called Emile Lence, who promoted his fight with Tommy Jackson, and asked him to offer Marciano $1 million. Frank Sinatra and Irving Kahn, the CEO of the closed circuit company TelePromTer, offered Rocky $750,000 and stock in TelePromTer, if he'd fight Patterson. That went on for many, many, many months.

Had Patterson gotten Marciano next, I don't think anyone would've worried that he'd just faced the Olympic champ Rademacher. But, after many talks, and after working out and seeing how he felt, and leading people to believe he'd come back, Marciano turned them down.

So that took up a lot of time for nothing.

Folley and Machen were the top contenders, and they'd just fought to draw. Roy Harris was #3. D'Amato chose him.

After the Harris fight, Patterson was looking for another challenger. The top three challengers at that point were Machen, Folley and Pastrano.

But, over the period of one month in 1958 (Sept. 14-Oct. 14), Machen was knocked cold by Johansson, Folley lost a 10-round decision to Henry Cooper and Pastrano was defeated by Brian London.

So the top three American challengers (Machen, Folley and Pastrano) were all defeated by the top European contenders (Johansson, Cooper and London).

Actually, since he'd beaten Machen in dramatic fashion, Johansson was the first choice. Ingemar had some promotional and managerial difficulties. So it took a while, because people on Johansson's side were fighting with each other. Eventually, Patterson and Ingemar came to an agreement in January 1959. But, as part of the agreement, Patterson was going to have a tuneup fight.

So D'Amato offered Henry Cooper (who'd beaten Folley and followed that with a win over Brian London) a title shot. D'Amato offered Cooper $75,000. Cooper wanted $150,000. So D'Amato went to London (who had beaten Pastrano) and offered $75,000 and London took it.

That's why Patterson fought London two months before Johansson - he was Floyd's tuneup for Ingemar. (Patterson would eventually fight Cooper later in a non-title fight and stop him, too.)

So, really, the ONLY guy Patterson missed was Folley. I don't see Folley outpunching or outpointing Patterson. Although that's just an opinion.