Arturo Godoy vs Oscar Bonavena

In the case of Godoy and Lovell you can understand it. If there were only two really good heavyweights in South America, it would make sense for them to have a series. Also there was a regional rivalry between Argentina and Chile. The involvement of Toles in the region does seem a bit odd.

 

Lovell beat a Eusebio Ramirez NINE times! He has a boxrec record of 2-22-1.

 

You are using the Ring's Annual ratings which were not only unofficial but were nothing more than a snapshot in time and not truly indicative of where they rated a certain fighter when he fought the fight in question. Tack that onto Fleischers practice of rating undeserving foreign fighters to boost circulation in those areas and those ratings are basically meaningless, especially in regards to foreign fighters. Lovell for instance had fought just twice in fights that Fleischer could have seen when he was rated as high as #4 in the annual ratings in 1937 and would lose his next fight to Gunnar Barlund which really makes Fleischer's ratings suspect.

 

There was much more working against overseas fighters, than working in their favor back then.

 

I’d have to go with Godoy. He was very hard to land clean on unless you could get better inside position than he could or you could get your shots off at the right angle, which is why Joe Louis had such a hard time with him.

I don’t see Bonavena’s stamina holding up in the later rounds and Godoy would likely frustrate the heck out of Bonavena, since the first thing Godoy would do is neutralize Bonavena’s power by sticking to him like a second skin and would just rack up the point by going to work.

 

Sometimes it was so obvious as he tacked on no hopers from Europe at 9 or 10.

 

Not in terms of getting rated in the Ring.

 

Oh yeah, constantly. You can see this almost every issue. They even gave cover stories to many European ham and eggers that didnt warrant it.

 

I think that introducing new fighters in the last two spots of his ratings was standard practice for Fleischer regardless of where they came from. That way, if they worked out as true contenders, Nat could claim that he recognized them early on. If they didn't work out, then they just faded away. Not saying he didn't use the practice to increase circulation around the globe. He definitely did, but the practice had other advantages as well.

 

Compared to a fighter based in New York, a South american fighter, or even a German fighter, had a mountain to climb.

You had to be an exceptional fighter to break the American scene, if you wee born in another country.

Fleischer might just have been acknowledging that!

 

You had a mountain to climb because the competition and money wasnt there. Getting rated site unseen with few if any noteworthy wins means you had it easier, not harder, if you broke into the ratings. The bottom line is that 9 times out of 10 fleischer wasnt rating these foreign foghters on merit so why use his ratings as gospel? Especially the annual ratings which are less than meaningless.

 

You think they could have beaten Johnson or Jeffries?

 

So if you are right, then presumably Arturo Godoy got exposed fairly quickly, when he fought Louis, and indeed other top American fighters?

Given that he didn't, you have to think that Fleischer's rankings were more or less accurate!