Zora Folley how good is his resume?

"if Valdes could figure out Charles, he could figure out Pastrano"

Certainly he might.

But if Valdes could lose badly to Johnson, he conceivably could lose to Pastrano.

 

that is true :good

 

Are we back to Valdes beating Charles on a working holiday to Miami again?? Charles thought he was facing a guy who lost to guys he knew he could beat, took Nino lightly and paid a price. Charles screamed for a rematch but made do with knocking out two guys who beat Valdes.

Meanwhile Valdes preserved his surprise high-ranking by staying unbeaten but looked awful bottom feeding against Parker, McBride, Charlie Doc Williams. Even Jackson was only 16-2.

Valdes lost to a lot of small guys like Moore x2, Satterfeild and Harold Johnson. Why not Pastrano?

 

This is the kind of biased double talk that makes you look ridiculous. You want to criticise Pastrano for beating an old Moore but laud Valdez for beating Charles. Including his fight with Valdez Charles won just 12 of his last 29 fights and had taken Valdez lightly even then. He, like Pastrano, was fighting above his best weight, and wasnt even winning half of his fights. His age, ringwear, and inconsistency at HW is often used as a knock on Marciano's defense against him and a sign of how weak that division was at the time. Only you would use him as some proof that Valdez, five years earlier, could beat an entirely different and prime prospect in Pastrano. Pastrano wasnt unbeatable but neither was Valdez. To pretend Valdez would have just walked in and beaten Pastrano without question is ridiculous. All of this again goes to my point that the division was weak in the 1950s during both Patterson and Marciano's reigns and there was a ton of flux between contenders. Very few guys outside of the champion really showed any kind of dominance and its exactly why you would be a fool to think Valdez, Machen, or Folley stood head and shoulders above anyone else or was a real threat to the champion. All three of those guys (and Williams also) were capable of losing to any number of styles at any point in their careers and never once showed the kind of consistency or performances to make one think they were championship calibre.

 

There is a gulf between good fighters and world beaters. Valdes and Williams were certainly not World beaters or close to it.

 

Probably the same reason Valdes got outslugged by Miteff or how Mcbride just seemed to have Valdes number.

 

And Pastrano beat Johnson, a Hall of Famer with an excellent HW resume, who also defeated Charles in 54. He also beat Layne who defeated Charles in 54...so?

 

Yes, a split decision over a near 36 years old Johnson.

 

Taking Johnson to a split verdict is still better than Valdes and Machen though isn't it?

Williams and Valdes never stood out any more than the likes of a Pastrano in the grand scheme of things. The only world beaters in the division were marciano, Moore, Floyd, Ingo and Liston.

 

Its a remarkable win given Johnson had been undefeated for about 8 years and was coming off wins over Jones, Machen, Cotton, and the like.

More impressive than Valdes being one of three men to catch Charles during a tough stretch.

 

It actually is. Johnson had been damn near unbeatable for almost 8 years when Pastrano finally ended his streak.

Charles was on a tough stretch when Valdes caught him, and had been dropping a few fights here and there. He also showed up in poor shape for Valdes at his career heaviest. But we already been through that.

 

Im probably in the minority here but I think Johnson improved as he aged and was not the fighter he would be later in the 50s. In 53 and 54 he was still getting buzzed by right hands with alarming regularity for someone who is supposed to be a world beater. Getting blitzed by Billy Smith is nothing to brag about and he was making the same mistakes in 53 and 54 that he made in that fight. In fact Smith actually tips his hand in that fight by landing that right over the top and buzzing Johnson. Johnson years later would have caught that and not fallen for it again. Instead a few moments later he gets knocked out by the same punch he just got hit with. No, the early 1950s Johnson was not the same or better as he would be later.