Did Ali have the easiest Heavyweight reign 65'-67'

No doubt in my mind that he would have fought Spencer if not for his title being stripped off.

Wouldn't have been much more interesting than a Cleveland Williams fight either as Spencer fought with his feet stuck in mud.

 

thats right machen was a journeyman what kind of publicity would ali get in fighting and whopping a journeyman:think

 

Go and be a nuisance at some other forum.

 

I dont know. I dont disagree with that point.
It's just that sometimes the "softies" chosen for "filler" fights are ridiculously bad to the point where they are absolutely unworthy of contesting the world's championship.
Jean-Pierre Coopman was absolutely unworthy, for example.

 

Yeah. If not for the draft thing and Ali being forced to fight outside the US for most of '66, it seems reasonable that he would have faced Terrell, Folley and Spencer that year. And then he'd probably taken something similar to the European tour (a rematch with Cooper would always draw in England after all). After that Bonavena would be next and then the emerging generation of new HWs (Mathis, Quarry, Frazier, Ellis etc).

 

That's what I meant by "less trouble".

 

Irony is that Ali's resume for fighting quality opponents is second to none,yet he's the one over all others who gets criticised for the odd soft touch here and there.

 

ali needed publicity and he went after it taking a machen fight would have had no fan interest at all:think

 

He was. But if Wladimir fights Vitaly and Haye next year I won't really be bothered if he fills up with two non-hopers between. Not one bit.

 

I agree.

True.
A couple of other Patterson defences are indefensible though.

 

It is amazing really. A guy who beat some 20 top 5 ranked guys in his career gets stick for not taking on an over the hill Machen and legends like Corletti and Spencer.

 

Is he ?

I think Holmes and Louis and Johnson and Dempsey and Frazier and Tyson and Holyfield etc. get a similar level of scrutiny/criticism.

 

Same here !

 

The only Patterson defense that I find truly indefensible is the Rademacher fight, for which no excuses can be made except for greed, after all who wouldn't take one of their biggest paydays against a rank amateur. But it cheapened the title for sure.

McNeeley had no business sharing the ring with Patterson, but the promoters attempted to hype up a Patterson-Liston fight with a double header (Liston fought Westphal, another inept opponent), so the intentions behind that fight were good (creating interest in the champion fighting his outstanding contender) with the two dominating their lesser opponents.

 

Exactly ! Next thing we know,is that some people will start slagging Muhammad off for not fighting Jack Bodell,after Bodell lost to a 36 year old Henry Cooper.