Obviously not the strongest era but I always wondered how anyone can call an era with the list of men I’m going to name “weak”. A decade that began with an old Joe Louis, had Marciano and Patterson in the middle and ended with a young Sonny Liston couldn’t be all that bad. Let’s start Joe Louis Ezzard Charles Joe Walcott Rocky Marciano Sonny Liston Floyd Patterson Archie Moore Ingemar Johansson Zora Folley Harold Johnson Eddie Machen Nino Valdez Joey Maxim Rex Layne Bob Baker Henry Cooper Cleveland Williams Bob Satterfield Jimmy Bivins George Chuvalo Roland Lastarza Ernie Terrell And so on...not a bad short list of names. Sure I’m missing some important names there but hardly an era of weak fighters. Even if some of the names weren’t house hold names till the 60s they still had plenty of fights and were fighting in the 50s. I’d say the top 20 hold up well in any decade.
Today I would have to say they are a bit under rated. It was not the strongest era, but some people are far too quick to dismiss it.
The 1950's was a fans era that produced some good fights. I think the talent level was better than the 1930's and 1940's, but not nearly as good as the 1960's or 1970s.
I think the trouble is especially when people compare head to head with the modern era most of them are dismissed as too small. That may or may not be the case, but doesn’t stop them from being very good fighters.
I was going to come here and disagree with you citing the inclusion of a prime Ali, Liston, and Patterson, but realized a lot of the 60s fighters were also washed up leftovers from the 50s.
Still incredibly overrated. Some great names that had gone to seed or were mere green shoots sprouting from fistic compost. The rest were mostly hacks by latter era standards. God Bless them all. They were fighters.
Neither Terrell ,Wiiliams or Chuvalo were ranked in this decade. The best of that era were in their late 30's,so what does that say about the depth of the era?
They fought in the 50s they even fought ranked opponents. Regardless you’re missing the point. They literally fought in the 50s. They had staying power and were stars in the 60s (despite some accruing losses from 50s journeymen) . Happen to find the depth of the 50s to be one of the deepest of eras. It’s their lack of top heavy prime guys that’s a problem (Liston and Louis weren’t prime in the 50s). Depth is not a problem though lots of talent there.
The 1950s guys were good fighters. @Boilermaker made an excellent thread about a linear ranking system of the entire heavyweight division that rated a fighter on a who beat who basis which clearly determined who really should be ranked where in the rankings. A fighter was replaced in the ranks by the one who beat him. As each decade proceeded the results year by year stood up really beyond dispute and what transpired at the end of the decades was that the best eras were the ones where the mid ranked contenders still around from previous decades were unable to live with current guys. Whist sifting through records he was soon able to note in the 1970s that: “The other interesting thing, I see is that despite this being considered a golden age, it does seem that the old average and retiring 60s trained fighters have really competed favourably against younger fighters of similar level. Bonavena Chuvalo Patterson, Terrell seem to be as successful in the 70s as they were in the 60s despite aging. Later guys like Thad Spencer or Bob Stallings level fighters were still having success against lower level guys. I can certainly imagine several old timers of the era saying they didn’t make fighters like they used to in the 50s and 60s and being laughed away. But the actual results make a pretty decent argument. Maybe this also coincided with when the last of the Pioneer style Jack Johnson era fighters died off?” So some decades that seemed great don’t necessarily have quite the depth that people think. For this reason I believe it is worth considering that the 1950s guys were actually good. The results and depth among the real linear ranked guys really stood up very well in the 1950s in relation to most decades.
The fighters at the very top are excellent in every era. What you want to look at, is whether the talent gets a bit thin in the bottom half of the top ten.
That’s what is evident in some decades. Sometimes Everyone outside the very top are just not not beating good fighters. That did not happen in the 1950s.
I would say that the 50s were stronger than the post war portion of the 40s, and also stronger than the early 60s.
