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

I think champions should defend against the best regardless of how exciting they are.

Anyway, I'm skeptical that being boring was such a big issue. Many talented black fighters didn't get title shots.

Gus Lesnevich ducked Ezzard Charles but this can hardly be blamed on Charles being boring.

 

According to Charley Burley's record, his bout with Antonio Fernandez was his last one before he moved to Minneapolis with Bobby Eaton as his new manager. Could his bout with Fernandez have been the last straw for his previous manager, Irwin Silverman or Luke Carney, depending on the source?

- Chuck Johnston

 

This is a fine post!

 

Salient points made here.

 

Boxing doesn't work like basic arithmetic ,as your examples show.

 

I'm not sure we can attribute Giardello's competition to his era, if thats the case than why didn''t his contemporaries face the competition that he did? Giardello is pretty unique for that time period in facing so many dangerous opponents when he was under no obligation to do so.

You also have some guys like that in the 1940s, Fritzie Zivic for example did fight some of the black murderers row members like Burley and Booker.

 

He also bought Burley's contract ,ensuring he wouldnt have to face him again!

 

"I think champions should defend against the best"

Yes, and who decides who the best is? Does the public have a say?

It seems to me the problem with this take on the post-WWII middleweights is that it is not at all clear who was the best. Burley hadn't beaten any of the other top contenders and was coming off a loss to Williams who in turn was beaten by Cerdan and LaMotta. Graziano was running up spectacular KO's against smaller men, which was viewed as impressive back then. I think a case can be made for several contenders. Zale not surprisingly chose the one who was the biggest draw.

 

Yup Tone went for his pension plan, boxing is a business and a very tough one to be in.

 

If I gave a **** about every sore ass moron like you and Gregory Speciale who got their ass handed to them on this forum Id have a lot more ****s to give. As it stands I have zero. Zero ****s to give about you, him, or either of ignorant famboy non fact based starry eyed hero worship opinions. Zero.

 

I think we can reasonably conclude that a guy who built his reputation beating welterweights and beat virtually no middleweights of note is not the most deserving contender. Burley, Cerdan, LaMotta, Belloise, etc would have been more reasonable choices.

Burley by no means is the only option but fighting Graziano seems pretty indefensible from a rankings standpoint. If he was fighting for the welterweight title he would have a good case but the guys he was beating were not rated at middleweight and didn't enjoy much if any success at the weight.

 

It was a ripper indeed.

 

"I think we can reasonably conclude that a guy who built his reputation beating welterweights and no middleweights of not is not the most deserving contender."

My question is who are "we" and how relevant is the opinion of this "we" when considering Tony Zale. I doubt if anyone advised him that perhaps someone in the 21st century might look at things differently.

It seems to me that the bottom line issue is how did the folks at the time look at it? Like everyone else, Zale was a man of his time and dealing with the opinions of the time in making defenses. Whatever "we" think, Graziano in fact was highly rated at middleweight--the #4 contender in 1945. The #3 contender at the end of 1946, after losing a title shot to Zale. (aside--I would like to know Graziano's rating the night he stepped into the Yankee Stadium ring against Zale. No one seems to have it.)

But ratings aside, the public obviously wanted Graziano to get the title shot. Why?

Well, the size thing could be viewed another way. Here is LaMotta's fights against men he outweighed by 10 or more lbs.

Jimmy Edgar 160 to 149 (won decision)
S R Robinson 158 to 145 (lost decision)
Jackie Wilson 161 to 145 (won decision)
S R Robinson 161 to 145 (won decision)
S R Robinson 161 to 145 (lost decision)
Fritzie Zivic 161 to 150 (won split decision)
Tommy Bell 161 to 148 (won decision)
Tommy Bell 161 to 151 (won decision)
Tommy Bell 161 to 151 (won decision)
Cecil Hudson 165 to 155 (lost split decision)
Vern Lester (165 to 154 (won split decision)

That is 11 fights. Most were top men, except for Lester (24-21-15 going in ) and possibly Hudson, who was shaky. But welters or at best modern junior middles. LaMotta goes 8-3 with no stoppages.

Graziano had a 10 lb or more weight pull three times.

Red Cochrane 153 to 143 (KO win)
Bobby Claus 160 to 149 (KO win)
Charley Fusari 160 to 148 (KO win)

So Graziano goes 3-0 with 3 KO's. If you look at welter champions only, Graziano is also 3-0 with 3 KO's (over Cochrane & Servo) while LaMotta was 3-1 with no KO's to 1946, and overall 4-5 with no KO's (3-1 with Zivic, and 1-4 with Robinson). Now we can draw different conclusions, and Robinson being so great is a wild card, but Robinson aside, nothing in this shows LaMotta being particularly impressive, losing quite often to guys he had a big weight pull over.

Graziano did win all these fights until Chuck Davey. He had weight pulls but blew his opponents away and did so consistently.

Or to put it another way. Does LaMotta with weight pulls of 7 to 11 lbs. over Zivic losing once, and going to two split decisions (losing at weights of 159 to 152) trump Graziano KO'ing Servo with a weight pull of 152 to 145?

I can see different ways of looking at it, but what stands for me is that the folks at the time (especially the average boxing fan) were more impressed with the fighter who was scoring obvious and decisive victories because he was knocking out his opponents, over a guy who despite big weight pulls loses here and there and has quite a few split decisions controversial wins.