Were "Patterson & Frazier" protected by C. D'Amato & Yank Durham?

Of course they were . Patterson did not fight Zora Folley , Eddie Machen and a few more as a titleholder .
Frazier picked d easy route except from Foreman whom was not expected 2 do what he did and Frazier's swarming (at least trying 2) @ him is my proof .

 

I had thought that Patterson and Cuz seperated sometime after the Liston goes, am I wrong here?

At the time of the Foster-Frazier bout there were serious questions about whether Bob could lay several of his big left hooks or right hands that had ko'd others on Joe and would he go down. I remember the Ring ran a story about how an early computer fight between the two of them they arranged turned out,,,,can't recall the result though.

 

Partterson yes, big time protection by D'Amato. Frazier fought everyone, e went thhough entire division, fought Bonevena twice, fought everyone.

 

Patterson could not have fought Liston any earlier than he did since johansson was rated higher. ingo had outshone folley and machen big time and floyd still went on to beat machen, cooper and chuvalo anyway. there is no proof folley was better and patterson beat fighters who beat zora too.

So WHO was patterson protected from? maybe there were fighters with better credentials than harris, radmacher and London but big cat williams was never rated until 1961-62, I dont know who on earth he ever beat to warent a shot anyway. during floyds championship years Valdes was by then badly fadded, only 50-50 at world level and no better than dejohn or metiff who nobody would ever talk of as being avoided.

 

yes to the former, not the latter

 

Ibc?

 

Ali was THE biggest fight in history, and Frazier NEEDED the damn fight in order to achieve universal recognition as champion. Plus Ali was still undefeated and coming off stoppage wins over leading contenders Quarry and Bonavena. Trying to somehow distort that fight into Frazier being "selective" with his opposition is absolutely absurd, to put it mildly.

As far as the Stander and Daniels fights go - yes, those were considered "easy" fights even at the time. But look at who the top contenders were heading into '72:
1. Ali
2. Quarry
3. Foreman
4. Bonavena
5. Mac Foster
6. Ellis

In other words, 4 out of the top 6 contenders had already been beaten decisively by Frazier, and one of the remaining two (Foster) had recently been beaten by Quarry (and would lose again to Ali in early '72). Frazier had already run through the majority of the division and there simply were no new big fight prospects left - which further demonstrates that Frazier had NOT been "protected" at all.

The fact that Foreman (who was rated #2 behind Ali) was such a big underdog against Frazier is not indicative of being "protected" - rather, it's reflective of the lack of depth the division was perceived as having at that time, that even someone ranked as high as #2 was still considered so far below the league of the champ and #1 contender.

 

Agreed.