I've read a book recently about contenders who never got there shot at the big time.One of the names that comes up is Charles Burley.It suggests that he was avoided by Sugar Ray Robinson.
Just wondering what the general veiw is on this and if they would have met what would be the likely outcome.I've seen a few Robinson fights but cant say much of Burley,apart from what i've read.

I've read a book recently about contenders who never got there shot at the big time.One of the names that comes up is Charles Burley.It suggests that he was avoided by Sugar Ray Robinson.
Just wondering what the general veiw is on this and if they would have met what would be the likely outcome.I've seen a few Robinson fights but cant say much of Burley,apart from what i've read.

Burley has a good chance to win.

robinson would have won, depends what year this was in, but in my opinion robinson would win it.

robinson would have won, depends what year this was in, but in my opinion robinson would win it.

How could you be so sure about that when there is basically only one video of Charley Burley out there, which was his rematch against Oakland Billy Smith? I think watching one fight of him is too little to really guess about how a match with Ray Robinson would have went. Although, Ray did once tell his manager that "I am too pretty to fight Burley" and did constantly outprice himself in negotiations with him. Burley's biggest problem was that he was too classy and nice of a guy to call a fighter out, if he had done that more then he would have got the big fights, plus they say he was "too technical" so people would have found his style to be boring so he wasn't a big draw. As for a description as to how Burley fought, his former sparring partner AJ "Blackie" Nelson compared him to a more technical Roy Jones without the showboating. Also Eddie Futch said that Burley was the best all around fighter that he ever saw. I wish we could have seen him fight Sugar Ray, Billy Conn, Marcel Cerdan, Jake LaMotta, etc but those guys didn't want to fight him.

I've read a book recently about contenders who never got there shot at the big time.One of the names that comes up is Charles Burley.It suggests that he was avoided by Sugar Ray Robinson.
Just wondering what the general veiw is on this and if they would have met what would be the likely outcome.I've seen a few Robinson fights but cant say much of Burley,apart from what i've read.


BTW, I am guessing the book that you are referring to is "Charley Burley and the Black Murderers Row", I haven't had the chance to read it yet but what was your opinion of it?

BTW, I am guessing the book that you are referring to is "Charley Burley and the Black Murderers Row", I haven't had the chance to read it yet but what was your opinion of it?

The book that i read was called 'They could've been contenders' by Jim McNeill.It doesn't just focus on Burley,it gives a write up on various fighters who didnt get their big shot for various reasons.