Did Ray Robinson duck blacks?

Excluding Gavilan, all of Ray's most significant opponents were white. Is this a coincidence or were there good black guys around during this period he might have fought (perhaps had they been more marketable)?

 

Yes blacks...asians too !! He feared Asian style of boxing.

 

I'd like a serious answer to this mate, lets not take it down a silly path.:Thumbs:

 

He did price himself out of a Burley fight, raising his asking price from $25k to $50k, and proclaiming himself to be "too pretty to fight Burley".

Burley, for his part, says he would've done the same thing and avoided Robinson if the situations were reversed.

 

I would say no. I think he was looking for the big bucks... the bottom line is that he beat all of the best white fighters who had beaten the black fighters he could have been accused of "ducking"

does anyone seriously think Johnny Saxton or Johnny Bratton had a chance in hell of beating Robinson?

 

Charley Burley is one of the great myths of Robinsons career. Their careers at the weight classes they fought in never really intersected. By the time Robinson jumped up to Middleweight Burley was pretty much already done or retired.

Yeah, Robinson fought some Middleweights while he was a Welterweight, but that's not exactly ducking. It wasn't his job to clean out the division above him.

He fought his share of very good black fighters, though maybe not "marketable" names.

Sugar Costner, California Jackie Wilson, Henry Armstrong (admittedly past it), Tommy Bell, Jose Basora, Cecil Hudson, Randy Turpin, Tiger Jones

There's really nobody he ducked. Burley would be the closest you could pin on him. Maybe Dick Tiger if you want to hold it against him for who he fought while in his 40's. :dunno:

 

Yet Ray Robinson wipes the floor with every fighter imaginable in MM.

 

Pretty much all of the Black Murderers Row were bigger than Ray. I don't think he had much of an obligation to fight bigger men.

Now Ray could have fought Burley, but Burley himself didn't even blame Ray.

 

& he's not even a modern-fighter! He didn't even have modern Boxing techniques (which no one can identify, interestingly) or protein shakes!

How the ignorance of the masses must eat away at you with Robinson's lofty standing.

 

He did have incredible speed however, much faster than Floyd.

I mean, look at how much faster he was in comparison to the slow white guys he was fighting!

It was almost like Floyd-Gatti, or Floyd-Baldomir....except not really.

Oh, and he didn't dominate them as badly, but that's only because back then the white guys were TOUGH...and had GRANITE chins, and Gatti and "Bumdomir" were just bummy white guys posing as boxers.

 

Are you going to tell us all about modern Boxing techniques you can't individually identify, TLC? ::

 

How about Civil rights? :giggle:

Equal Opportunity?


There's a reason George Mikan was so dominate back in the day, fella. :laugh11:

 

C'mon Ramonza. Just pop in a tape of Ricardo Mayorga..........or John Ruiz........or Jean Pascal..............or Carl Froch............or Clubber Lang.

The fighters of today are just more streamlined and athletic. Their technique is flawless, their skill has evolved far beyond the primitive Sugar Ray and his technicolor opponents.

They train in jacuzzi's and smoking jackets goddammit.........jacuzzi's and smoking jackets!!!!!!!

 

Technicolor?

You didn't NEED color for Ray Robinson's opposition...


They were all WHITE! :laugh11:


Also, if Mayorga fought in the 40s, he would've finished 183 and 10 with 170 KOs.

No doubt about it.

 

Hmmmmm.


You make a good point TLC. Your insight has moved me and I'm now perched high atop a precipice, praying for a swift kick to send me to my certain doom.

ray:

 

Is TLC joking or what? By the time Robinson was fighting, boxing had already undergone its evolution of technique. Even a novice boxing fan should be able to watch a clip of Robinson and know he was something special.

 

I'd honestly like to see TLC banned from the boxing forums. Let him post in MMA & TAAA on subjects he has a remotest interest in. Worst troll in the history of the fucking internet.

 

Well I don't think he "wipes the floor with every fighter imagineable".

I would favor him over any welterweight, but there are a handful who would give him a pretty competitive fight.

The likes of Duran, Leonard, and Hearns come to mind.

 

FUCK OFF, YOU OBNOXIOUS LITTLE PRICK

 

:bears:


You know what? Sometimes people disagree with what you type, but never give you credit for the how large you type it.

 

I personally find TLC's point interesting in terms of opinions. Robinson is considered by many, including guys like Leonard and Ali, as the best boxer to ever live. Yet he did have difficulty with white fighters of his era.

Were white fighters just better in the 50/60's or would Robinson's skill really not hold up in modern boxing?

He has a dickhead way of making the point, but it's a legitimate question.

People talk about being able to see Robinson's skill on film. And it's true, he seems very special in terms of range, speed and the way he just flowed. That being said, when I watch similar film from the era, I don't get the impression that the Fullmers and Maxims were completely more gifted or heads and shoulders more skilled than the Gatti's or Baldomir's that TLC references.

Personally I blame it on the toughness of the era, the generation. These guys fought to live. Not for fame or an undefeated record. Even the most dedicated, determined boxer today has the luxuries afforded by the 21 century. They are, inherently, softer.

 

You are right --- they are softer, & it does contribute. However, I feel there's just too much emphasis placed on generational differences --- why this era or that era produced better men on the whole. There should be more focus on the Fullmer's, Basilio's, etc. These guys were simply very effective, world-class operators, & would be in any timeframe (Basilio, especially). Who since Hopkins lost the belt could stop either of those two, for instance, claiming the Middleweight crown? Would anyone circa 1998-present definitely & definitively have kept Basilio from the Welter title? I don't see the man for it.

 

Boxers made plenty of coin back in the day. hno:

 

All of this is true, but he really didn't struggle until he began facing/campaigning at middleweights. The GOAT version that people most often reference was the guy that was virtually unbeatable as a welterweight.

It's still a valid point, mind you. However, my guess is that the counter would be that it's tough to name a better fighter than prime WW version of SRR

 

For the record. TLC's opinion is fine. UGTBK has a similar one, Irish is of a similar mind. Go to Ugo's thread from earlier today, I played devils advocate and expounded on a similar opinion this very day. Your post is great and I enjoyed reading it.

TLC's opinion isn't his fucking problem, it's his total snide douche stink child obnoxiousness & complete lack of contribution to discussions in putting his opinion across. He basically swans in, says boxers from the pre-Floyd era are rubbish, calls a couple of people 'Bert Sugar' then snipes a couple of half arsed, bored retorts to the annoyance he causes, presumably as he juggles 7 other browser windows, downs a Mountain Dew, scratches his scrotum and yawns. He's complete fucking rubbish.

 

Furthermore, SRR was worse than Floyd in that he bankrupted himself by frivolously spending away his massive earnings.

He wasn't "soft" though....:doh:

 

I'd go further and say he didn't start struggling until after the Maxim fight & subsequent lay off. Given the extraordinary circumstances surrounding it, dropping a decision to Turpin hardly constituted 'struggling' quite yet, IMO.

 

Well, I was responding to TLC and the discussion of struggles with white fighters. You have to assume that was all post Welterweight.

Although, Robinson did have his share of close fights and controversial decisions before his MW run.

It's funny because I've read literally thousands of newspaper articles describing fights pre 1960. With Robinson, newspaper coverage made fights seem closer than they probably were.

I've always like to think that boxing writers were always impartial especially in places like Chicago and New York. But the truth is, there was some serious bias in reporting.

 

That's because the underdog always gets the benefit of the doubt.......and Robinson was never the underdog. Even when he was still a Welterweight and fighting Middleweights like LaMotta on a regular basis, he was always the favorite.

 

Hmmmm. Good point.