ow much prime/near prime film do we have of Ezzard Charles?

since charles eventualy beat both bivins and lesnevich it proves he was beter than both. 1942 though, im not so sure. with the hindsight of what hapened to him in 1943 its dificult to forecast but I accept without knowing what DID hapen in 43' I would favour charles to win a title at that point. whilst the christofordis win proves his pedigree it cannot erase 1943.

Had charles indeed won the title at that point (and did ot defend against either marshal or bivins) at 169 he was the same size as billy conn who did very well for himsself against joe louis. im sure his braintrust would want that fight in a flash. Either way charles would only have defended that title in 1943 if he could not land joe louis or a HW contender.

However, in light of what did hapen to charles in 1943 I think things worked out prety well for him the way it did pan out. After all he went on to beat louis, lesnevich, bivins and marshal the way round that he did it.

 

Thats all fair points.

The only lose that means alot to me in 1943 is the Bivins loss , it was just after beating Maxim for the second time. So Charles should have still been in form, I just have a niggling feeling he maybe was genuinely injured. So then the loss wasn't as bad as people make out.

 

It could have been that Bivins just caught Charles early and he wasn't able to truly recover. Bivins may be an underrated early round "threat", previous to fighting Charles he knocked Gus Lesnevich, Bob Pastor and Tami Mauriello all down numerous times in the early rounds.

 

I agree with that. I think that may have been the case also.

 

It's always a treat to see scholars involved instead of instead of the usual handful of keyboard punks who add no value ... this has turned into a terrific thread and a joy to read ...

 

thanks he grant:good

 

choklab, I must say you have provided some nice insights and opinions into this debate that has got me re-thinking and adding a new perspective to my thoughts.

You couldn't PM me your email address I have a few things you would like that I want to send you, relating to Ezzard Charles.

 

Got to the bottom of why the Brown-Lesnevich title bout was scrapped

Just need to find out why the whole bout was scrapped. Ezzard Charles was touted as a replacement but he was unranked by the NBA so I can't see why he would have been accepted and Lesnevich did not want the fight anyway.

Edit: Lesnevich was called back by the Navy on June 17th 1942, therefore rendering him unable to face Mose Brown at all.

Also it is very interesting that Maxim was ranked as a Light-Heavyweight.

Also Choklab you was right about Lesnevich's title being frozen, although it was not one of the first three to be declared frozen. The first mention of it being frozen was in January 1943.

 

I'm sure Eddie Futch said Ez told me-
"There was never a time i couldn't get down to 175"

 

I wouldn't doubt that.