Sonny Liston was robbed

How was Williams ducked? Give me any time during Patterson's reigns when he was the natural contender?

And how were both Folley and Machen ducked? When were they supposed to have gotten their title shots respectively?

Please be specifik, because specificity is badly lacking when these claims are made.

 

Terrell wasn't and hard to make a case for Williams, the other two are certainly debatable.

 

Look, if Pete Rademacher could get a match in his first pro match in 1956, consider all of those guys except Terrell ducked. They were all much higher ranked than Pete Rademacher.

 

Ok, so every time a champion took on a challenger that wasn't as good/deserving as other challengers, he ducked them? By that logic a shitload of ducking has been done.

Louis, Ali, Frazier, Foreman, Tyson, Holy —you name them — have all defended against guys that weren't the best out there, so they have been ducking too?

Patterson ducked Williams as much, or actually maybe less, than Tyson ducked Witherspoon. And Tyson didn’t duck Witherspoon.

 

Can we please keep to he rule that you don't get to say that Patterson ducked x without stating when x was clearly in line for a title shot?

 

Most of the fighters you just named are all known to have ducked other fighters as champions...

 

Those were the choices that Sonny Liston made by aligning himself with the underworld, thus Cus D Amato clearly shielded Floyd Patterson from the likes of Liston for awhile until Sept 26 1962 when Sonny dismantled Floyd from his belt. As the old saying goes, people judge you by the company that you keep. Sonny fell for the Greediness Bug, which is speculatory that that same company led Liston to his eventual demise years later. The underworld turned off a lot of the managers of various contenders. As has been written, the Liston vs Patterson title fight fell into the hands of politics, President Kennedy met with Patterson in the White House, strongly suggesting to Floyd that he better beat Liston because of the negative influence that Liston if should win, Liston would have on the youth of America. And remember that the President's brother, Robert F. Kennedy was the U.S Attorney General, who had been deporting very dangerous mobsters. A lot of pressure on Floyd Patterson.

 

Somebody told Sonny Liston a boxer he knew was getting the electric chair. (I don't recall the crime) Sonny said he hopes " they remember to give the fighters Manager 30% of the juice"

 

Good Post.

 

No, they're not. The opposite if anything (with the exception of old Foreman).

But please say just when the guys Patterson supposedly ducked should have gotten their shot.

Folley in '58 I agree with, since he was NBA nr 1 at the time, but for the rest?

EDIT: It was rather Machen who should have gotten the shot, since he must have been nr. 1 when Patterson signed with Harris. Folley was nr. 1 when the fight took place, but not when it was signed.

 

Bokaj, it was unwise of me to try and debate you on this. I don't have a lot of time on my hands right now, otherwise I would be researching rankings.

 

Henry Flakes?

 

Great quote....

 

Nobody will satisfactorily forward when they think these guys were ducked.

The tax situation back then meant that a champ couldn’t defend more than twice a year without having to fight for nothing.

Johansson was always rated higher than Liston before the rematch clause, and not Cus, kept Sonny out.

Jackson was rated higher than Machen or Foley.

#3 harris went ahead of Machen and Foley because the two of them blew a title eliminator that ended in a draw. After Floyd beat Harris both Foley and Machen lost to Europeans.

London was ahead of Williams.

The defences against Radmacher, Mcneeley and London were all warm up fights for bigger fights that were already made or in the case of Radmacher an extra bout made without even breaking camp from the previous defence.

Those guys did not necessarily go ahead of more worthy challengers.

The way it was then, the champ had a date to fight and whatever the biggest fight for the most money was that could be made that month was usually the fight that was made.

with contenders fighting each other all of the time the order and placing of contenders at the time when the champion was available to fight lends people to think better fights could have been made.

They couldn’t.

There really was not a conspiracy to avoid certain contenders at all. A lot of it was down to the limitation of when the champ was available to fight outdoors.

 

Prop Berbick