How come Sugar Ray Robinson failed to fight many of the top black fighters of his era

He took on the top rated black fighters that he should have.

Henry Armstrong, California Jackie Wilson, Tommy Bell, Kid Gavilan, George Costner...

http://www.boxrec.com/media/index.php/The_Ring_Magazine%27s_Annual_Ratings:_Welterweight--1940s

 

Wins over guys like Charley Burley and Holman Williams and his resume would be out of this world. Not like it isn't already, but currently I have him behind Greb and Langford. Wins over those 2 and there's no way he can't be P4P #1 in my opinion.

 

Its certainly an issue the amount of good black fighters in robinson era that he missed out on, i think its harsh to be looking at people like charles, marshall and moore and ask why robinson didn't fight them, they where much bigger than him, all 3 i believe where fighting at around about 170 lb by 1944 when robinson was only occasionaly fighting middleweights and still weighing himself around 145. It would be like crticising maywether now if e fought abraham and someone was then to say why hasn;t he fighting pavlik, robinson should get credit for giving up so much weight and fighting a brillaint middle in la motta instead of saying why did he not fight these other fighters at a weight he at the time had no business being near IMO

Also i'm not sure how many actually tried to make the fight with robinson, i know burley did and i think cocoa kid may have but i've not read anything about any of the others. Also some of the black fighters that robinson did face for instance jackie wilson where great fighters, wilson for instance beat ceferino garcia, cocoa kid, fritzie zivic, mke kaplan etc. I think he was probably as good as a lot of the murderers row.

The main gripe i have is robinson not facing burley, the offer was made, burley would have definetly been the best fighter he would have faced at the time and probably the best fighter in robinson whole career if he taken it, it was the most money robinson had ever been offered for a fight and he turned it down, robinson is one of my all time favourite fighters but i can't excuse him not taking this fight

 

Marshall last fought at 160 in 1944 ,against Lamotta,he was a little too big for Ray imo.,he turned pro as a full fledged middle and then went up to Lhvy beating Maxim,and Mills ,,it would not have been a wise match for Ray imo.
Holman Williams last good year was in 1945, when he was 34 ,then he began to slide,it was quite easy for Ray to bypass him I think.
Burley is the one that was dodged ,imo.
Ray made a statement "I have my doubts I could have licked him in my prime years".

 

i think this is much ado about nothing. none of those second raters stood a chance with him - Robinson can only hold his head up high.

 

awkward bums and ham and eggers. dont buy into the hype!

 

Exactly.

This myth that Robinson "didn't fight the top black fighters" is exactly that - a myth.

People who are perpetuating this myth are basically just singling out what black fighters he didn't happen to fight, and ignoring the fact that the ones he fought in their place were rated at least on par with them, if not better. These guys you listed here were all rated in the top 1-3 when Robby fought them.

The fact that he gets criticized for not going up to middleweight while only in his 2nd year as a pro and fight Charley Burley, rated at or near the top at that weight, just goes to show how far people have to go in order to perpetuate this myth.

Not only that, but many of Robinson's fellow contenders blatantly avoided him, not vice versa. In fact, when an elimination fight was set up to determine a successor to Marty Servo, the NY commission actually had trouble getting any other contenders to fight him - even with a title at stake!

 

Because none of them were rated as high as Angott, or any higher than Pete Lello, nor were as accomplished or well known in their division. Moreover, how many of them that you know of were actually looking to fight Robinson?

 

You think he was better p4p than charles?

 

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He should have fought Joe Louis.