Ingemar Johansson vs Willie Pastrano

Ingo liked fighters to come to him, I think it would go the same way as ingo v joe erskine who beat pastrano. pastrano was no beter a boxer than joe and hit no harder.

 

Johansson would knock out Pastrano early. Now this is a good matchup for him. Not Liston.

 

Angelo Dundee was Willie's mgr....so Angie would have had some form of a plan to fight Ingo.....one being don't stand in front of Ingo.

Interesting that back in the late 50's some of the top LtHvy's like Moore, H. Johnson, and Pastrano ventured up a division against those smaller heavies.

 

Pastrano moves, spoils, and frustrates to a decision.

 

there were big guys around but they were not as good.

I think it was to do with smaller gloves. with 6 oz gloves a tired 220 guy wont hit any harder than a 190 pounder who isnt so tired. since the 1970s heavyweights wore gloves up to 10oz which levels things quite a bit for little guys later in a fight. fighters stopped boiling down to a lowest posible weight and became concerned with being outweighed.

The veiw used to be that bigger guys were dangerous until they got tired. It was therefore harder for novis giants to get going because they were often at a disadvantage when they stepped up in class as many of the experienced fighters were faster, fitter and hit as hard for longer.

cleveland wiliams who fought througout the 1950s couldnt get a rating until 1962 when the next generation of heavyweights (and the gloves) got bigger.

 

Yep. Had to do with the money. Heavyweights got paid a lot more than light heavys. I read Dundee's bio and he had Willie always drinking milk so that he could beef up to heavy. One day Willie came into the gym with a little buzz on (he was a heavy drinker and womanizer) and Dundee could kind of smell the liquor on his breath. He asked Willie to let him taste the milk from his container and sure enough Willie was mixing it with liquor. When Dundee asked him about it Willie said something along the lines of "Ah c'mon coach...it makes the milk taste better" lol. Thought this was a good story to share.

Anyways, I have Pastrano winning a decision. Ingemar would have had a tough time catching Willie with a solid combination or punch. Willie had extremely good legs and feetwork.

 

so did joe erskine..

 

According to Ingo´s own biography Pastrano was one of the possible opponents for the big show in Gothenburg. First choise was Zora Folley, but he had another fight comming up. As they wanted an absolute top opponent this left Archie Moore, Eddie Machen and Willie Pastrano. Moore refused the money offered, Pastrano was not believed to draw a big gate, so they made Machen a good offer and he took the fight.

Woller

 

regardless of his most recent loss to henry cooper it was Brian London's stoppage win over pastrano that got him the shot at patterson in 59'.

Pastrano got a world rating as a heavyweight in 1955 beating rex layne and john holman but was taking on mostly top europeans after losing on points to roy harris in texas.

Ingo fought machen the same month pastrano was stopped by brian london on a cut. Pastrano beat european champ franco cavicchi in Italy soon afer ingo did but unbeaten machen had a beter resume at that time.

The machen fight was a big gamble that paid off big time for ingo.

 

and yet joe erskine, who was a beter boxer than pastrano (beat him clearly) was knocked out by ingo in 13 rounds.

Its willie pastrano NOT willie pep!

 

pastrano was on a roll at the time, and he was not old. Erskine was a fine boxer without a hard punch much like pastrano was at heavyweight only joe couldnt make 175lb otherwise he and not pastrano would have been a champ.