117-2-1 heavyweight who never got a shot.

What about the man who wrote the 1961 article Edward Brennan? That article talks of Paul eventually having won 117 of 120 fights as he languished in the New Jersey club circuit of 21 small fight clubs after beating Galento in the Garden.

 

He was a bit more than just a resident writer on a New Jersey paper supporting a local fighter.
After 15 years with the Jersey Journal, Eddie Brennan went to the sports desk at the New York Journal-American … where once again he exhibited his superb writing craftsmanship. While with the New York Journal-American he covered the Benny ‘Kid’ Paret versus Emille Griffith fight and wrote a story about it in the Monday, March 26, 1962, issue of the paper, entitled:

“Slaughter on Eighth Avenue,” by Ed Brennan, and it was a briUiant piece of newspaper writing.

Brennan was also a former manager of fighters and Had a job with Nat Fleischer at Ring Magazine, as Assistant Managing Editor. Brennan won several writing awards and was regarded as a very distinguished expert on boxing. One of his former boxers became a police chief and said Ed was “a virtual boxing encyclopaedia, and I put him on the same level with Barney Nagler, of Ring Magazine.”

 

I think there is a real chance that these fights took place against unknown local fighters in the club circuits of the 21 small fight clubs that existed just in New Jersey during that period. Paul fought for 18 years. Two separate published articles by reputable writers mention over 100 wins. The fighter himself had a good reputation as incorruptible during a very shady time. His reputation as a referee was excellent.

The new losses we can find were not that decisive. There are no knockout defeats. No mention of scorecards. at least one of them previously went down as a draw. Others could likely have been previously officially no decision bouts that were never recorded as losses until unofficial newspaper decisions could be found. Three of the “new” points losses are against men he also beat. Maybe all of them were? It is quite probable these were all indecisive distance fights against the same guys over and over. Absolute Stinkers.

he recorded two wins over two very famous heavyweights when all three of them were at a similar stage of their careers to each other. Then he seems to have languished at local level until retirement whilst the other two hit the big time. One explanation for this is because he was “too good for his own good”.

perhaps he was? Unless you have access to every monthly Ring Magazine you don’t know he wasn’t. Also, in those days winning records were less important. What was more important was who were the wins against and where did they take place. I fully accept Cavalier was under the radar. The 1961 Brennan article says that Cavalier (whilst chief sparring partner to the champion) asked Mike Jacobs for a shot at Joe Louis But was told it could not be done because he knew Louis boxing style too well.

The boxrec record is officially incomplete.

Until you can prove that his available incomplete boxrec record is the complete record you cannot say anything is incorrect or a fairytale.

 

Because Jacobs wanted to put Louis in as many fights as he could before his champion got drafted into the war. And he was basically taking the champion on a barn storming tour at that time. Louis fought every legit contender and as many local hero’s that they could find. But not Cavalier. Why?

who would pay to see Paul Cavalier fight Joe Louis? all the same people that came to see Joe Louis defend his title on a monthly basis against guys like Johnny Paycheck, Jack Roper, Al McCoy, Harry Thomas, Tony musto and Gus Dorazio.

I think it’s down to boxrec actually. They are the ones who have an incomplete record with less fights on it than was mentioned in two boxing magazines in the 1960s.

At the very least, Paul Cavalier was a better than average heavyweight with a statistically good record.

If a boxer only fights two good men his entire career, and he beats them, then only continued to fight terrible opponents for the rest of his career and retires with a good record nobody can really say he should have been a champion.

However if he dosnt really lose decisively at the lower level you can say this guy probably was kept from fighting more good fighters in case he beat them.

 

McCoy lost 11 of his previous 22 fights going into the Louis fight. Most of the many guys who beat him over the last three years had already lost to Joe Louis. Not sure that made McCoy a strong challenger. Sure before more losses he beat Laughran but he also drew with Laughran which cancels that out. Olin was on a losing run. Thomas was hardly capable.

5’7” Tony musto had already lost to Red Burman and Arturo Godoy. He had not yet fought Bivins or Savold. That was much later. You are adding wins that had not happened. In fact, against Louis Musto had already lost a third of his fights. He was not a better opponent than 6’2” Paul Cavalier.
Musto beating an 8-4 Shepherd was nothing to shout about. Franklin was 10-3 and months from being knocked out by Eddie Simms when he met 23-2 Musto. But years later Franklin would revenge this loss by quick KO.

Roper also lost a lot of fights. In fact he did not get the win 50 times from 112 fights. He was 35 years old and had been knocked out 13 times including a one round kayo against Jimmy Braddock who Cavalier beat three years earlier.

Those guys were running on empty when Paycheck beat them. Art Laskey had knocked him out. Ettore was having his last but one fight after a hard 80 fight career.

so Thomas beat nobody then. Going into a title fight Harry Thomas Lost two of his latest four fights. Schmeling had knocked him out just before losing to Louis in one round. Thomas was a foregone conclusion signing for a title fight. He had lost to a one round victim of the champion.

is that worse than McCoy, Musto, Thomas, paycheck And Roper?