Elmer Ray: A top 30 heavyweight of all time

As My2Sense hasn't picked up the challenge yet, this old midwestern hick will put his head on the chopping block again.

I have three comments

1. Checking their records, the gap between their level of competition is huge. In 70 fights, Layne fought 8 men with losing records. Ray fought 27 men with losing records in 107 fights. But I think the gap is even wider than that because Ray didn't fight his first losing opponent until his 32nd fight. That means 27 of 76 opponents during his PRIME had losing records! In your list above, Ray's absolute peak, Lowman, Parks (2), and Mann had losing records (or 4 of 12).

In 1945, when Ray was rated in the top five, he fought 14 times. 7 were against opponents with losing records! He had this sort of run around the Walcott victory--Earl Lowman (20-32-0). George Parks (17-19-3). Clifford Mann (2-3). Walcott. George Parks (17-21-3).

Then there's this run--Grant Shade (0-5-0). Cyclone Lynch (3-8-1). Grant Shade (0-6-0). Dan Merritt (15-29-3). Al Patterson (11-11-1).

Now I know records might be incomplete, and there might be guys with losing records who are tougher than their records imply, but I think it fair to say that Ray's record is spectacularly padded with guys a top contender should not have been fighting.

What if Layne fought the same level of competition? As Layne ko'd all 8 fighters he fought (6 in 1949 when he was a tyro) with losing records, what might his record have been if he had fought the same percentage of losers as Ray did (25%). Layne would then have had about 18 fights with losers. If he followed form, and knocked them all out, he would have had 44 ko's in his career and a better ko percentage than Ray. If we replace 10 of the guys who beat him with losers he could easily ko, he ends up 60-7-3 with 44 ko's, a better statistical record than Ray.

2. But padding a record with losers does not necessarily prove one can't beat the tough guys. Marciano fought some losers but went 16-0 against rated opponents. So how impressive is Ray against tough opponents. Well, you more or less isolated Ray's impressive accomplishments to compare with Layne.

I only have access to the yearly Ring Ratings, and I checked each man and came up with these results against the rated opponents each defeated--

Heavyweights--Ray defeated LeRoy Haynes, Otis Thomas, Lee Savold, Jersey Joe Walcott, Ezzard Charles (his only ko was over Savold)

Lightheavyweights--Ray ko'd Larry Lane

Haynes was coming off a 7 bout losing streak. Lane was way on the downhill slide. Thomas had gotten into the ratings off a pair of draws with Buddy Walker and then vanished after losing to Ray, possibly because of WWII.

So this boils down to the split decisions over Walcott and Charles, and the ko of Savold as impressive achievements. Not much else.

Heavyweights--Layne defeated Bob Dunlap, Joe Kahut, Turkey Thompson, Cesar Brion, Bob Satterfield, Jersey Joe Walcott, Ezzard Charles

Lightheavyweights--Layne defeated Dave Whitlock, Henry Hall, Bob Garner

Layne ko'd 4 of his 10 rated opponents. Ray ko'd 2 of his 6 rated opponents. Layne defeated Charles in the equivalent of a split decision, but Walcott and Thompson by UD, and Satterfield by ko.

I guess one could argue ko'ing Savold is more impressive than ko'ing Satterfield, (and also that Satterfield could be viewed as a lightheavy), but I don't see anything here that points to Ray being a more dangerous fighter, or even puncher.

End of part one--intermission

 

Entre acte and Part 2

3. Now let's get down to where the rubber hits the road--common opponents. If Ray is the more formidable fighter, it should show here. I went through their records as carefully as I could, and I found three common opponents--Walcott, Charles, and Thompson, arguably the three best heavyweights Ray met (though not Layne).

Ray--Went 2-4 with 1 no decision and 3 ko defeats. All three men knocked him out. In my judgement, Ray did not prove superior to any of them in these head to head matches. The wins over Walcott and Charles were each a close split decision.

Layne--Went 3-2 with 1 ko defeat. He won a controversial decision over Charles, but suffered two bad defeats to him, one by ko. He defeated Walcott and Thompson by UD. I judge Layne proved himself better on those nights than Walcott and Thompson in the head to head matches. Layne did about as well as Ray against Charles.

Bottom line--Layne has a solid edge over Ray against common opponents, and these opponents are the cream of Ray's opposition. This I think is a heavy point.

4. Film--I don't see this argument regardless of how Layne looks on film. There is no film of Ray to judge in comparision.

Final Judgement--Layne fought brutal top level competition all the way through his career once he moved up into contender status. Ray's opponents were carefully picked with 36% of them during his peak years having losing records. Ray's only advantage, consistency, seems based more on being able to point to big fights while having no meaningful competition in others than on being all that superior a fighter. Because Layne was so often matched tough, he had opponents who could take advantage of an off night.

I would give Layne the slight edge in historical ratings. I think a fighter should be rewarded for fighting tough men.

 

I am going to put this one back up there because of the research on Ray's opposition.

*I am going to add a point here that I thought of reading My2Sense below:

1949 top heavyweights in the yearly Ring Magazine ratings.

1--Ezzard Charles
2--Lee Oma
3--Turkey Thompson
4--Jersey Joe Walcott

Layne turned pro in May of 1949. The four above were the top rated heavyweights in January of 1950. By the end of 1950, Layne had beaten Thompson and Walcott. I just don't see an argument that he was carefully managed or brought along slowly. He was thrown to the wolves if anyone was.

 

I think during the time period ray is behind louis, walcott, charles and bivins certainly. a man barely top 5 in his era won't be top 30 all time.

 

WTF IAWTCSM MTFBWY :good

 

Peaks never KO'd Bivins, and in fact had lost to Bivins prior to fighting Ray.

"Reasonably capable" is rather broad and vague description. What do you define as "reasonably capable," and which of Fox's victims would you apply that term to?

And likewise, a small contingent of the press can be found hyping virtually each individual fighter that was ever a prospect or contender. It's something of a double standard to accept what the press says in once instance, and yet ignore or dispute it in another.

Actually, this was not taken from an account of the fight itself (unlike the one posted by Donnellon), but rather from a report on the preparations for the rematch - so while you had questioned whether the writer in Donnellon's article had "paid attention" to the fight, this one raises the question of whether the writer had even seen it altogether.

Regardless, even if we do give credence to this report, the remainder of the article does coincide with Donnellon's account in raising questions as to whether the punch that left Ray unable to continue was actually a foul.

An LA Times article on rematch, which also said Thompson had appeared to be "behind on points" when the ending of the first fight occurred, also said Thompson had "belted Ray with a terrific left to the stomach shortly after the sixth round opened," and that "Referee Lee Ramage said it was a 'foul' blow, although he was on the other side of the wallop."

Actually, ALL the accounts posted here (including the LA Times one I mentioned above) have all been rather vague, and gave only brief, boilerplate-language descriptions - i.e.: "it was fairly even," "Thompson was behind on points," "Ray pounded Thompson," "Ray had the crowd cheering," etc. None that I've seen so far actually give detailed, round-by-round accounts of the fight.

First of all, no one today (if not ever) actually knows, or can confirm what the "contractual terms" for any of these guys' fights were.

Secondly, there's just as much, if not moreso, criticism that can be made of the way Layne was trained and managed than of Ray. You could just as well argue that Layne was being "thrown to the wolves" when he was tossed in with a leading HW contender like Walcott as a 4-1 underdog, far away from home, on the big stage at Madison Square Garden. Even Walcott himself told the press even after the fight that Layne was being rushed too soon, and wasn't being allowed to develop his full potential. Also, you could probably make an even better argument that Layne was being thrown to the wolves when he was tossed in with Charles coming straight off a brutal KO loss to Marciano. And when attempting a comeback shortly after those brutal back-to-back stoppage losses, Layne was rushed into a fight with Willie James only two weeks after his prior fight. Even Jenson himself, who you credited as looking to "advance" Layne's career, acknowledged that this was bad management: "We didn't know what we were running into. We took the match on six days' notice, which didn't give Rex time enough to train down to his 190 normal fighting weight." Besides which, there were plenty of questions and criticisms about Layne's training and conditioning all through his career - probably justified given his ever-expanding waistline.

Conversely, you could just as well argue that Ray's people took a much more calculated risk when they matched him with John Henry Lewis, a smaller great fighting out of his ideal weight class, in which Ray had a 15 pound edge (according to the accounts of the fight, not boxrec), and also succeeded in luring Lewis down to Georgia near Ray's home turf.

It's only because one fighter succeeded under these circumstances while the other failed, that one instance is excused as "looking to advance a career" while the other is dismissed as "thrown to the wolves."

And the overwhelming majority of those opponents he faced were nowhere near as good or dangerous as Thompson had been. Even Savold, despite being a rated contender at other times in his career, was often described as just a "veteran journeyman" in contemporary reports. So the fact remains, his "improvement management" under O'Loughran consisted mainly of being kept away from Thompson-level opponents as much as possible.

Here's another contemporary view of Ray's post-Thompson streak:

"Violent Elmer boasts 47 straight victories, including 42 knockouts, but most of his victims were hand-picked palookas. The only opponents who approached prominence were Lee Savold, George Fitch, Larry Lane, Earl Lowman, and Vern Escoe. And all of them were far past their peaks." - The Windsor Daily Star, November 15, 1946.

Also, the source for the article you posted, the Afro American, is another one which has given conflicting accounts of Ray's quality as a fighter. For example, this is from one of their reports only a few months after the one you quoted:

"Walcott, perhaps, is the best of the heavyweight lot. But its a pathetic lot when spoke of in the same breath with Joe Louis." -April 5, 1947.

 

That argument is rather deceiving, as 2 of his 5 losses during that time were to the rising ATG Harold Johnson (who was already good enough to beat Jimmy Bivins around that same time), and another loss was to a pretty good prospect/contender in Doc Williams, who had some other pretty good wins around that time (and who Hall had already lost to back when you say he was at his "peak"). Also, one of Hall's non-wins just two months before fighting Layne was actually a draw with Jimmy Slade, who showed himself to be a very good, efficient fighter at both LHW and HW (he twice beat leading HW contender Hurrice Jackson, for example). That result should actually be considered an achievement, rather than a failure, by Hall.

Also, two years after losing to Layne (roughly five years past his prime, by your calculations) he beat John Holman - something Ray was unable to do at the same stage of his career, and vs. an even less experienced version of Holman. Hall also went on to fight a split decision with Eddie Cotton and draw with top 5 rated HW Heinz Neuhas in Germany.

Based on what I've said above (and even considering the possibility that Hall was not still at his absolute peak), I would say Hall was still at least as dangerous as those guys, and probably moreso.

Again, based on what I've said above, I actually find it pretty thinkable.

I was specifically referring to their 2nd fight, in which Charles chose Ray as a comeback opponent after having killed Baroudi, which had been traumatic enough for him that he had announced his retirement shortly after that fight. Yet despite fighting Charles with that advantage, Ray was unable to beat him or even last the distance.

But in more time than it took a smaller, less powerful Charles to do the same to Ray.

Charles' only other losses around the time of the three Layne fights were to his HOF arch-rival Walcott. It wasn't until after the third Layne fight that he started losing to the likes of Nino Valdes and Harold Johnson.

Not necessarily. For example, as I discussed above, James got to Layne when he was considered a jaded fighter trying to come back from back-to-back stoppage losses against two HOFers, one of whom is considered one of the hardest hitting CW-sized fighter ever.

Conversely, in an article I posted earlier in this thread, Ray's own people admitted that their man was not yet "ready" for a challenge of Louis, because his easy wins over "bums" (THEIR words) would not prepare him for a tough fight.

So again, this issue does, in fact, come back to the matter of each man's overall level of comp.

Savold was NOT a "reliable" contender at all. Quite the contrary, he dropped fights fairly often and went through lengthy stretches of his career unranked - and if I'm not mistaken, it was during one of those unranked stretches that Ray beat him. As I noted earlier, in descriptions of Ray's win over Savold, he was described as just a "veteran journeyman."

 

If your intent is to assess each man "at his peak," then I actually do actually dispute your selection for Layne. I would say Layne probably hit his peak with his win over Walcott, and remained at his peak until his first fight with Charles - which, as it happens, satisfies your 12-month "requirement" for this test.

I think your test somewhat loses sight of your stated "hypothesis." For example:
-Struggling with the likes of Cesar Brion or Henry Hall should not be considered "inconsistent" with a fighter being a world class championship caliber, since both had proved good enough to give trouble (and in Hall's case, beat) world class fighters. At the very least, they should be yellow, if not lime green.
-Beating someone like Lee Savold (even decisively) should not offer more than "moderate" support for someone being championship caliber, given the regularity and kinds of opponents he otherwise lost to. Also, it should not be considered of greater "support" than beating Thompson or Kahut, and it certainly should NOT offer the same support as a clear and decisive win over Walcott.
-Getting a highly controversial split decision over a champion and/or HOFer, as Ray had over Charles, should not offer as much as "strong" support for the hypothesis, and should not offer the same support as a clear and decisive win as Layne had over Walcott. Also, a clear and decisive win over someone like Walcott should be distinguished as offering greater support than ANY other win on either list.
-Losing to a champion/HOFer should be considered neither "consistent" nor "inconsistent" with being a championship caliber fighter.
-I think your test should distinguish between draws and outright losses against "mediocre-to-low-level" comp.

Harold Johnson was an actual champion, and he was dropped and beaten by Satterfield

Layne won the fight decisively with a brutal KO - is that not "emphatic"?

Layne's win was also an upset of a more dangerous and highly regarded opponent than Savold, and it was considered impressive enough that it led to Layne being favored over Marciano.

I don't think Savold's list "stacks up well" at all with Satterfield's. Even as a HW, Johnson beat the likes of HOFers Moore, Charles, and Bivins, and leading contenders likes Clarence Henry and Eddie Machen, plus future leading HW contenders like Valdes and Doug Jones. Valdes was rated #1 across the board for roughly a year or so, had a very decisive win over Charles, and bombed out other top 5 contenders like Hurricane Jackson, Heinz Neuhas, and Don Cockell, plus also lost a reportedly close, competitive decision to Moore. On top of that, several of the names you listed were already fading or outright washed up when Savold beat them. I certainly don't see how someone like Gus Dorazio could ever be considered as "stacking up" with Johnson, Valdes, or Baker even on his "best" day (he was washed up when Savold beat him).

Besides, if you give credit to Savold for beating the names you listed, then you'd also have to expand Satterfield's list of victims to include Lee Oma, Tommy Gomez, John Holman, Johnny Summerlin, and Cleveland Williams.

Maybe not, but only because he had been campaigning for the LHW title instead (and was rated there at the time).

Prior to fighting Layne, he had proven himself as a HW by KOing leading contender Oma, and also fringe contender Gomez.

Besides, to my knowledge, Savold was not rated at the time he fought Ray, either.

 

This seems to be a particularly contradictory argument from you, seeing as you've REPEATEDLY made issue of Walcott being "a few pounds above his peak weight" for his fight with Layne - even in this very post, in fact - and yet you've ignored or downplayed all the times Layne has himself been in the same position - which includes his struggles/losses against Hall, James, and Matthews, all of which you've used to discredit Layne.

That Layne's weight was a factor in his subpar performances is also reflected in accounts of those fights as well, such as this one:

"The bid of New England Heavyweight Champion Willie James for national recognition was dimmed somewhat today because of the poor showing of Rex Layne, whom he outpointed with ease last night.

...His victory came more through the ineptitude of Layne who went into the fight a 10 to 4 favorite, but who was slow and apparently out of shape." -United Press.

Also see the quote I posted earlier from Jenson.

Also, from where and how have you determined that Ray was "close to the total package."

This may be a better "system" than the prior one, but I would still argue (as in the prior one) that Ray's wins over Savold and Charles are overvalued using this system, while Layne's win over Walcott is undervalued.