Ray Robinson NOT top five all-time

this week ive:
been circumcised,
lost £180 coz i put an extra 0 in a twenty quid bet,
had my best lodger leave.
but when i showed a srr fight and the response was 'just like hopkins' that really hurt

 

It's interesting that Ezzard Charles is sometimes cited as in the same breath as those others nowadays.
He was rarely described as even a great fighter in his own time.

 

That may or may not be the case but he did dominate Archie Moore and Charley Burely, two of the best fighters of all time and then moved up and had a terrific career at heavyweight ... with all Robinson accomplished I think a very strong case can be made that Charles fought and defeat far better opposition above his natural weight class ..

Who's better to you , Moore or LaMotta ? Burley or Olsen / Turpin or Fullmer ?

 

:rofl

Great fights too, you posted. Also like LaMotta VI and Graziano. Gotta love how content Robinson was to keep things on the outside with the Rock, coming in for occasional (furious) exchanges, but then after the KD he gets pissed and decided to end it right then and there, just because he could. The sight of Graziano's mouthpiece flying out is permanently imprinted to my memory. :yep

 

Hilarious !!!

 

Robinson is undoubtedly aided by how he looks on film IMO with a lot of his case resting on ability. There are a few that can claim to have better resumes or top wins although Gavilan is arguable top 20 himself, a top five Welter and H2H force. I consider Charles a natural LHW, having grown into the weight class and doing his most significant work there, just as Robinson was a featherweight/lightweight in the amateurs and had his first 20 or so professional bouts as a lightweight. Charles was the bigger man in against Burley who fought and beat Holman Williams less than week before his second fight with Ezzard.

 

The true test of a fighters greatness lies with what his contempoaries thought of him compared to the other fighters of his time...And take it from me who was growing up in that era, RAY ROBINSON was held in AWE by the writers, the fighters and the public
of that time...As the years go by the true ability of a fighter becomes diluted by the erosion of time...Just as a true story of an event ,becomes less true from one person's tale to another, that years later the real ability or story becomes less real...From my point of view Robinson was even a greater fighter in the public's eye than he is today...
I would say that at that time Robby was#1 followed closely by Joe louis,then Willie Pep, then Ike Williams, and Ezzard Charles, with Archie Moore trailing the pack...Charley Burley who my dad saw[ and I foolishly missed out] was whispered about those days too....But Ray Robinson remains to me to this day, the best fighter I ever saw and hope to see...

 

Burt, What's your take on RING's Top 10 of the 1930s/40s/50s that was put out in February 2012? They had it like this:

1930s:
01. Henry Armstrong
02. Joe Louis
03. Barney Ross
04. Tony Canzoneri
05. Jimmy McLarnin
06. Freddie Steele
07. Panama Al Brown
08. Benny Lynch
09. Jack Berg
10. Kid Chocolate

1940s:
01. Ray Robinson
02. Ezzard Charles
03. Willie Pep
04. Joe Louis
05. Ike Williams
06. Manuel Ortiz
07. Sandy Saddler
08. Billy Conn
09. Jake LaMotta
10. Marcel Cerdan

1950s:
01. Ray Robinson
02. Archie Moore
03. Kid Gavilan
04. Rocky Marciano
05. Pascual Perez
06. Sandy Saddler
07. Gene Fullmer
08. Carmen Basilio
09. Joe Brown
10. Harold Johnson

 

Just my opinion of course :
In the 1930's I have Billy Petrolle and Lou Ambers and John Henry Lewis ahead of Kid Berg, Lynch and Al Brown...
In the 1940s I'd have Charley Burley ahead of LaMotta who had quite a bit of off nights in his career...
In the 1950s, I'd still put Ezzard Charles of the early 1950's, definitely in place of Gene Fullmer to round out the 10 top fighters...I have never been a fan of the strong but limited Fullmer, who would have been eaten by the 1930s middleweights, such as Steele, Apostoli, Zale, Al Hostak, Solly Kreiger, Billy Conn [a hell of a young MW] etc... As well as the "poor man's Harry Greb ", Ken Overlin...IMO...

 

Burley was without a doubt the most glaring omission. Definitely agree on Lou Ambers, who seems to be somewhat underappreciated today and probably hurt by the era he fought in, even though he boasts some mighty impressive wins.

 

good topic but robinson is number 1.to make the top 20 out of the hundreds of thousands of fighters ever and several greatones is an honor.robinson had a prime and retired.like pep before the airplane crash he was litterly unbeatable.then came prime 2 and he won the middle title several times beating some all time greats.at 40 he beat fullmer but got a draw.he fought and beat the whos who of boxing and did everything so well.1.robinson2.pep3.greb4.armstrong5.marciano6.louis7.ali..for the final 3 its like pick a card.walker benny leanard duran ross canzanerri joe gans are the first group of cards..archie moore charles hagler langford and a few others like tunney are in the second group of cards.any short list like this leaves out several greats worthy of thought for sure.

 

Well in Langford's time his opponents all said he was the best. Many of Greb's said the same ...

There is validity to a degree in your post but there is no compensation for the overall quality of opposition .... it is absurb to argue over if Ray Robinson was an exceptional all time great because of course he was .. I'm just saying that especially at middleweight he did not fight all time great opposition ... the two greatest fighters he defeated were Gavilin at welter and LaMotta at middle .. Ray displayed excellence against at ton of guys of all sorts ... many , many of whom were world class and very tough but there is an argument that can be made that some other guys fought and competed against higher levels of competition ... that's my point ..

I think Langford did without question. Blackburn, Walcott, Gans, Ketchel, Johnson ... that's a pretty murderous line up ...

Is there anyone Greb did not fight from 160 to heavyweight in his day except Dempsey and that was because Jack would not make the fight ?

Back to Charles, especially the pre-Sam Boudini version, whom fought the toughest guys in possibly the toughest era ...

I'm not arguing against Robinson by any means .. however Ray , if you study his career, was extremely cagey and hands on in opponent selection ... once he became a draw and this was pretty fast, he decided who he would fight and under what circumstances ... he was the rarest of the rare , a black fighter from that era who called the shots ... and in calling them he managed to avoid some of the tougher fights of his time ... I am not saying he would not have won them all but the facts are the facts .. there were more than a few of the toughest black fighters of the era that Ray managed to never go near ..

Anyway ... my feelings are that Robinson was exceptional but I don't hand him the pound for pound title on a silver platter ...

 

he, I agree with you 101%. The silly thread was if Robinson was "top 5 all-time" ? There truly cannot be any doubt he was in the top 5 based on his incomparable ALL AROUND skills...But yes Ray was "cagey" and drove a hard bargain in his self promotion and choice of bouts...And yes Ray unlike a Harry Greb, Fitz, Langford, Henry Armstrong truly avoided much bigger
punchers than himself...Therefore my formula for the best P4P fighter is based on cleaning out your division AND tackling much heavier top bangers than your own weight class...And yes Robinson avoided the great black murderers row fighters of the time, even though they weighed a few pounds heavier than he did...While wer'e at it, let's not forget, Barbados Joe Walcott,and Jack [the giant killer] Dillon,alongst Mickey Walker in that mix...These guys were truly fearless in their time...Cheers.

 

Burt...let me ask you...how good was George Costner ?

 

George Sugar Costner had the ability to beat anyone not named Ray Robinson...He was in the Tommy Hearns mould, fast and a terrific puncher but was plagued with two things...Ray Robinson, and bad eyes which resulted in him going blind...Costner and one of my favorites Johnny Bratton would be WW champions today...