Was Cus D Amato too over protective of his fighters? Floyd Patterson.

Okay.... Floyd was an Olympic gold medalist. He then turned pro at the age of like 17 or 18.... fought as a rather small heavyweight. Won the title by age 21.. defended it, then lost it, then rematches the guy who poleaxed him and became the first heavy to win it again. Then beat him again in rubber match. Eventually faced sonny Liston... got killed... fought him again and got killed. Then fought for several more years and even contended a couple more times for the title..... so what about all that did cus do wrong ?

 

But I don’t see Patterson’s career as being failed. Sure there were better challengers he should have fought but it was a great career. And he made it out both successfully and in one piece

 

Beyond that? Floyd had a fantastic run after Liston. He fought until he was 37 and took hard fights until the very end. After retiring he was a really good person who did a lot of charity work and even headed up the NYSAC.

I can’t really think of any way Cus negatively impacted his life.

 

Certainly seemed that way. Can't have being good for Floyd's esteem to hear Cus being overly cautious.

 

Was Ingemar Johansson actually seen as an easier opponent for Floyd Patterson compare to boxers like Folley, Machen, Williams?

 

Ingo was best known for being DQ’d in the Olympics for not trying. His silver medal wasn’t even awarded. That probably shaped his reputation pre-Patterson than anything he did as a pro before winning the title.

Before Machen, Henry Cooper was the only name on his resume that most boxing fans would have recognized. Those two results, in retrospect, should have served as warning that there was something to him — at least his power was real — but he was also passive in his training for the first Patterson fight and wasn’t much breaking a sweat in workouts (and was basically bragging about his approach). He was seen out at nightspots as much as he was in the gym. This didn’t enhance his credibility.

Johansson was a 5-1 underdog to Patterson. The fight was regarded as another soft-touch defense for Floyd at the time. The guys you mentioned probably would have had better odds and been considered more able challengers than Ingo at the time, fair or not.

 

Here's my "for what it's worth" Patterson (D'Amato's most famous charge) opponent ranking at time of fight.

1956 (4 fights):
Tommy Jackson (pre-title) - NBA #1, Ring #2 (Patterson ranked at Lt Heavy)
Archie Moore - NBA #1, Ring #1 (Patterson #2)

1957 (2 fights):
Tommy Jackson II - NBA #1, Ring #1
Pete Rademacher - unranked

1958 (1 fight):
Roy Harris - NBA #3, Ring #5

1959 (2 fights):
Brian London - NBA #4, Ring #8
Ingemar Johansson - NBA #1, Ring #1

1960 (1 fight):
Ingemar Johansson - world champ (Patterson #2 NBA, #3 Ring)(Liston #1 from May 1960 until he got his shot)

1961 (2 fights):
Ingemar Johansson - NBA #3, Ring #2
Tom McNeeley - NBA unranked, Ring #9

1962 (1 fight):
Sonny Liston - WBA #1, Ring #1

I think D'Amato was overprotective of Floyd. Patterson, as champ, fought a top 5 contender once a year, or in the case of 1957 and 1959, had an easy fight within a few weeks of his top 5 contender fight. Meanwhile, Sonny Liston was #1 from the middle of 1960 until he got his shot in September 1962. IMO, Patterson should have found time for Machen and Folley defenses. Cooper, Chuvalo, and Lavorante would have been legitimate top 3 challengers at various times during Floyd's reign, too. Patterson could have had a better reign, legacy-wise and activity-wise. Interestingly, as we know he did beat Machen, Cooper, and Chuvalo after he lost the title. He was scheduled to fight Folley at one point, too, but pulled out.

From a manager's perspective, D'Amato did Floyd right in that he negotiated a low risk - high reward path for Patterson.

 

Yes.

 

Interesting post, very thought provoking, I mean protecting your charge is paramount to his health, so the reverse would be lets unprotect the fighter, that cant be right can it ? .
Any, and all managers that protect their fighters are to be commended surely, so the likes of Cus et al should be seen as a very good manager, and if the said fighter earns well, and comes out the other side with all his marbles, then job done. keep well.

 

Makes perfect sense to me, very good post matey. keep well.

 

There is a lot of ifs that we just dont know. Without Cus would Floyd have been able to get to a title fight with Moore? Was Cus too overprotective of Floyd? I don't know. He did lead him to being world champion and a contender that spanned the 50s, 60s, 70s. Should he have had Patterson avoid Liston, I think the answer is yes as we know the results of those fights. Should there have been and should there be a mechanism in place so guys like Liston don't get avoided for large spans of time, also yes

 

i think the cus overprotection is entirely misunderstood.

cus was certainly strategic. In reality he had a magnificent light heavyweight. But the opportunity arose that he could get his light heavyweight fighter into a vacant title fight with the LH champion for the HW crown.

once he won it Floyd, a 21 year old light heavyweight, would then have to defend against heavyweights. If Cus really was overprotective of Floyd why didn’t he have Floyd drop back down to LHW?

Instead Cus had him rematch the #1 contender Huricane Jackson who had previously took Floyd to a split decision in literally Patterson’s only real previous fight with a heavyweight. Again, If Cus really was overprotective why would he chance this fight? Instead Cus rolled the dice and it paid off.

The Radmacher fight was an extra bout arranged within weeks of the Jackson fight to save going into camp again. Had Cus been over protective, I guess he would prefer Floyd took some time out and go into another camp to prepare properly. Instead another gamble paid off.

It was a pity there was no winner of the title eliminator between Machen and Foley. Cus was committed to putting his champion in against the winner. But it was a draw. Cus could have kept Floyd idle until Machen and Foley had a rematch to decide who was good enough to challenge Floyd. Instead Floyd, Machen and Foley all took different paths. Cus took the next highest ranking fighter Roy Harris, Machen took Ingo and Foley took Cooper. The results of those fights? Ingo beat Machen, Cooper beat Foley and Floyd beat Harris. I don’t know who Floyd was protected from. He won his fight and they all lost.

Sonny Liston was not even around then. The next highest rated guy after Harris had been Pastrano. But he lost to Brian London around the same time Machen and Foley both lost. So the top few contenders had been replaced by Europeans. Ingo, Cooper and London. In that order. If anything Cooper was ducked because he beat London as well.

There was no American rated higher at that time. The recent results showed that Patterson’s next challenger was always going to European. Not American.

So if Cus had anything to do with it, And he really had wanted to protect Floyd from the highest possibly rated contenders…the next world title fight would not have included a European challenger.

Around the time Floyd fought his number one challenger Ingo, Sonny Liston was rated #9 in the ratings.

Beyond this point contracted rematches really prevented anyone other than Patterson and Ingo fighting for world titles. If Cus was protecting Floyd after Patterson was knocked out by ingo he would have opted out of a rematch if he could have. Instead Patterson went right back into the ring with Ingo after his defeat.

I can’t see a protection here.

The only time a protective accusation could be made against Cus legitimately was once the series with Ingo was over.

But it was not that long after the last Ingo fight that Floyd fought Sonny anyway.

I would have liked to have seen Henry Cooper challenge Floyd in place of Brian London. A minor quibble. Apart from that I don’t think anything much had to do with Floyd being protected.