How did Ray Robinson navigate such a gifted path as a pro ?

But the NBA was an official sanctioning body who controlled 50% of the world title and had sway in a lot of states. People often post the Ring's ratings (I admit I'm one of them) as they're more widely available, but in truth they're no more than a guideline as to how fighters were perceived by people at the Ring at a particular point in time, and as you pointed out could also be arbitrary. More importantly, fighters, promoters, commissions etc did not and were not obliged to make fights based on the Ring's ratings. Whatever status you afford the NBA, it had more official standing than the Ring.

 

Excellent point. Plus, I don't see how Cerdan actually could have fought Williams until after the war ended in Europe. It is certainly a stretch to argue he should have been leaving his homeland during the war to cross the Atlantic.

And, were Cerdan and his people really that conversant with American ratings or the American scene except for probably the world champion?

In 1962, Johansson professed to have never even seen Liston on film until Sports Illustrated arranged to show him film. And film of boxers was much more common in the sixties than it would have been in the war years.

"unless you read French newspapers and sources"

Great point. Plus newspapers aren't necessarily truth with a capital T sources anyway. I think many assume that if something appears in print it is true, but that is far from the case.

Bottom line is that regardless of how one judges LaMotta not fighting Williams and Burley during the war years when they were all in the USA, Cerdan is a very different case and shouldn't be lumped with Jake.

 

I think even if you consider it "official" it is more like 1/4. The NYSAC had its own standards and named its own champions at times. There was also the EBU which had its own champions during the 1930's. And the British BBBofC is also in the mix. Both Europe & the British Empire included more of the world population than the NBA. Who really cares what the North Dakota athletic commission, if there was one, thought about who should get a world title fight?

But everyone is ducking the issue I raised. Does the general public have a say and if so how much of a say should they have? Is boxing in any sense democratic? It relies on the fans, so should fan opinion count or only the opinions of either self-promoted magazine raters like Fleischer, or the bureaucratic and political powers that be at the NBA, NYSAC, and EBU, along with the behind-the-scenes gangsters pulling the strings.

Graziano raises this issue starkly as he was clearly the fighter the public wanted to see fight Zale for the title, and they shelled out their money to see those fights in a way they never did for Burley, Williams, or even LaMotta.

And racism as an explanation runs into the fact that while not that interested in Burley or Williams or perhaps Lytell, they were very interested in Robinson who proved even bigger at the box office than Graziano.

And justifying LaMotta not fighting Burley on the basis of Burley's weak box office performance undercuts criticizing Zale for fighting the by far biggest box office attraction, Graziano.

 

Jack Hurley, a truly great all-around boxing man, didn't like the "safety-first" boxers at all. As a manager of fighters, he tried to match his charges in situations that they could make a good showing that would please the fans. There was a possibility that his fighters could lose in such situations, but Hurley felt that he still would be ahead if his losing fighters made a good showing. As a result, Hurley tried to steer his fighters away from the "safety-first" boxers because he didn't want his fighter to be in bouts that were likely to stink out the joint.

As a matchmaker in Chicago during the 1930s and 1940s, Hurley looked to put together exciting bouts. As a result, I found it interesting that Hurley never had Charley Burley fight on his boxing shows in Chicago. This is despite the fact that Hurley worked quite often with Tommy O'Loughlin, who managed Burley for a number of years during the 1940s. Keep in mind that Hurley was known to go out of his way to do favors for boxing men whom he worked with. Hurley did have Elmer "Violent" Ray, another fighter that O'Loughlin managed, fight a number of times on his shows.

In the September 11, 1941 edition of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, there was an interesting article about Milt Aron, a welterweight from Chicago who was scheduled to fight Fritzie Zivic in a rematch at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh on September 15, 1941. In the first bout between the two fighters, Aron won an epic battle by a knockout in the eighth round at the Coliseum in Chicago on December 27, 1939. For the second bout, Hurley was handling Aron.

For the article, Havy Boyle interviewed both Hurley and Aron. When Aron said that he was thinking of fighting in middleweight division against fighters such as Tony Zale, Billy Soose and Georgie Abrams, Boyle brought up the name of Charley Burley. Although Boyle wrote that Aron and Hurley "could see no real objection to such a fight" with Burley, Hurley stated that Burley was a hard fighter to make a good showing with because he is "cute," adding that Aron would rather fight punchers.

Aron would go on to lose the rematch to Zivic by a knockout in the fifth round. A short time later, Aron would be hospitalized after coming down with pneumonia. Complications set in while Aron was in the hospital, resulting in him coming down with a blood infection. After being hospitalized for five months, Aron eventually died from the blood infection on March 5, 1942.

- Chuck Johnston

 

So if you don't go the extra mile and dig deep things can be a bit uncerdan?

 

I won’t use the promoter excuse, but I will say the politics of winning and defending all belts in GGG’s time was very different than Robinson’s. Robinson had more freedom to make matches. He did not have mandatories like GGG did.

Whomever you think GGG avoided was surely for a much shorter period of time in comparison to the top fighters Robinson avoided.

That’s a fact and keep in mind GGG is still an active fighter and could face anyone you named.

I wonder when we’ll get to review one of the top black fighters that SRR fought who beat him clearly and then compare and contrast him to the numerous black fighters he did not fight in the ring.

 

I don't really think GGG avoided anyone. I would have loved to see him against Pirog, and Saunders is another but that might still happen. The fact is that every fight won't happen. Especially not a weight class up, of course. But the absurd claim on SRR is that he should have cleared out both WW and MW, when still a WW. It's without any merit or touch with reality and should just be dropped.

 

Ok, so let's walk down SRR:s easy path for a bit:

1940: Turns pro in october and has six fights. No ranked opponents that I can see.

1941: LW champion Angott (both just over the limit), LW contender Lello (both just over the limit), former WW champ and contender Zivic, future WW champ Servo (unranked at WW but possibly ranked at JWW).

1942: Angott, Zivic and Servo again plus ranked WW contenders Rubio and Jannazo as well as LaMotta (not ranked by The Ring at MW at the beginning of the year but probably when Ray faced him in october since he made the rankings the next year).

1943: Only six fights because of getting drafted to WW2, but still manages to face Zanelli (ranked by the Ring for 1943) LaMotta twice plus Armstrong (ranked at WW).

1944: Gets back from the war and only have five fights. Faces fringe contenders Jannazo (WW) and Dellicurti (MW).

1945: Faces Basora (top 5 ranked at MW), LaMotta (now an established top contender) twice and Dellicurti again.

1946: Faces Angott (ranked at WW) before getting his crack at the WW title in a fight against Bell (whom he had beaten the previous year).

So by the time got his title shot he had beat top WW contenders and former champions Angott, Zivic and Armstrong, the previous champion Servo and the guy, Bell, he was facing for the title. Add to this two top MW contenders in LaMotta and Basora plus several fringe contenders at WW and MW.

 

This is it. Not getting why it's so hard to accept.

 

Yep. The idea of Cerdan in mid-1946 getting lumped in with "white fighters" allegedly avoiding prime black fighters flies in the face of common sense, because Cerdan wasn't even fighting in the USA at the time, made his debut in the USA a the end of 1946, and he wouldn't have had any real workable connections to the American scene prior to 1944 at the earliest (and that's a stretch, because everyone still had wartime obligations).
Despite Cerdan often now being portrayed as this built-up favourite who crashed the American scene with a load of publicity, and the claims that he jumped the queue to the title shot, the reality even in 1946 was probably that they were looking to fight credible ranked Americans in meaningful fights on both sides of the Atlantic. Which they did.

 

It's safe to say the premise of this thread is so far off-base it has no validity whatsoever.
Some good posts on this thread expain why that's the case, with some good info being imparted from many good posters.
But really the issue was settled (for anyone in doubt to begin with) as far back as page 2, I imagine.
All attempts to defend the OP's premise have been EPIC FAILS.

 

Charley Burley and Sugar Ray Robinson fought in separate bouts on the same boxing cards at least twice. At Convention Hall in Philadelphia on September 25, 1941, Robinson won a decision over Marty Servo in the ten-round main event while Burley won a decision over Antonio Fernandez in the ten-round semi-final bout. According to the ringside report in the September 26, 1941 edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer, there was an attendance of 11,000 and a net gate of $15,300.

The main event was a competitive bout, prompting talk of a rematch. In the semi-final, Fernandez made Burley look bad a number of times with his ducking and weaving, but still took a "sounding hiding." This bout probably was the last for Burley under the management of Luke Carney. Afterwards, Burley would move up to Minneapolis, where he would eventually get a new manager, Tommy O'Loughlin, who was the promoter of boxing shows at the Armory in Minneapolis. It was in Minneapolis that Burley and Robinson fought in separate bouts on the same show during 1942.

Note- It was someone named Bobby (or Bobbie) Eaton who bought Burley's contract during November 1941, resulting Burley moving with his family to Minneapolis. With Eaton at the helm, Burley started to fight more often than when he was managed by Luke Carney (Although it was Irwin Silverman who bought Burley's contract early in 1941, there was a rumor that Fritzie Zivic put up the money to buy it. Anyway, it was obvious that Carney, the longtime manager of Zivic, was calling the shots in regards to Burley for much of 1941.)

- Chuck Johnston

 

For those who think GGG should have fought Priog, I ask when? Priog retired in 2012!

Billy Joe Saunders won the WBO belt in 2015. I don't think he wanted GGG until very recently and us suspended for PED usage.

Do you agree or disagree with the above, Bokaj?

My point is Robinson or if you prefer his promoters avoided many talented black fighters for years.

 

You obviously didn’t read my post, or the many that have explained to you why it's silly to say that Robinson avoided these guys. So do that and then make a new try.

Edit: I see now that I by mistake wrote that I don't think GGG avoided everyone. I meant anyone. As in I don't think me made an effort to stay away from Pirog and Sunders. I would have liked to have seen the fights, though. It was of course possible, since they fought in the same weight class for six year. But that doesn't mean that the fight didn't happen because someone actively avoided it.

 

I read the post. Sugar Ray Robinson could have fought anyone he wanted to. The fact is he left several top black contenders out of the action for title shots, so many of them were left fighting each other

Robinson did fight Randy Turpin in 1951. Both were above the jr middle limit, and Turpin who was black won that fight. Was Turpin better than Burley, Williams and the other members of the murders row? We didn't explore that yet. Your thoughts?

Maybe there is a reason why Robison sailed around the top black talents of the times and the main reason is a path his promoters not wanting to risk these type of fights? I think that is plausible.

We agree on GGG, there was no time for a Priog match, and Saunders is suspended. GGG did not avoid anyone highly ranked for a period of time.

A few takeaways from Robinson vs. Turpin 1951

• Robinson's purse was $84,000 and Turpin received $25,500.

• A sellout crowd of 18,000 produced a gate of $250,000.

^^^ I don't see a problem with the gate or purses here. The Associated Press scored the fight 9-4-2 for Turpin.