They Could've been contenders

pehaps. List the availible champions and the year he would beat them.

Perhaps Burley was good enough to be a champion and alot beter than most chalengers but zivic and charles did beat him. Burley just wasnt box office dynamite like Louis and armstrong were. Burley was beter than servo but i just think the war got in the way as it did for a lot of other fighters who sold more tickets.

 

To put it bluntly,

Peter Jackson Yes
Jack Blackburn Yes
Charley Burley Yes
Joe Baksi No
Lazlo Papp No
Kirkland Laing No
Tony Janiro No
Mitch Green No
Tony Ayala Jnr No
Billy Collins No
Willie Classen No
Sam Langford Yes
Harry Wills Yes
Jimmy Bivins Yes
Luther McCarty No
Les Darcy Yes
Gyspey Joe Harris No
Mickey Rourke Definitely not
Rahaman Ali No
Rex Layne No
Teofilo Stevenson No

 

Of course you can never be sure.

Much would depend upon luck and when the crucial matches fell.

At welterweight Burley would have had to go through either Armstrong or Zivic (who he lost to) in most of the theoretical scenarios, though he might have been able to challenge Fredie Cochrane (virtualy a gimme).

His best bet is probably at middleweight, where he is coming into his own when the title is vacant and the main claimant is Billy Soose (who he has beaten). If it gets past that stage then he would have to fight Tony Zale, which might be winable.

 

I agree that middleweight was burleys best chance but he was between weights or unrated when soose was champ. At middleweight he only apeared in the ratings once the title was frozen in 1942 anyway.

However, during a 1940-43 peak burley only remained unbeaten in one year- 1941. as a middleweight (1941 onwards) on any given night Burley was just as likley to lose as win against albeit great fighters bivins, Loyd marshall, holman wiliams or there was georgie abrams and young ezzard charles who burley could not beat. This is why I find it difficult to say Burly would be a certain champion.

The problem with charlie was when newyork was the centre of the universe he only fought there one time and that was at st nicks. Charlie was even top of the bill against a tomato can, won in one round but was never asked back. incidently new yorker rocky graziano drew that night in his 4th fight down the card.