Ezzard Charles vs The Murderers Row..??

[The Old LefHook]

I am not sure Charles is one of the best of all time as he is always given credit for, but he handled the cleverest of them all in Burley and I think he would handle the rest. From the small amount of footage I have seen, he was more aggressive and muich faster in his younger days, as is to be expected.

[billeau2]

One has to make certain assumptions here; namely that given the range of opponents Charles fought, the range of weight classes he fought in professionally, his amateur background in Chicago Golden Gloves i believe... that Charles would have success against any, even the best fighters of any era. Whether one thinks Burley was great, or overrated, he best represents the murderer's Row type opponent and Charles beat him.

[Ray Corso]

The "Cincinnati Cobra" he was multi-champion at welter & middle in the Ohio State Championships. (46-0)
His first defeat as a pro came in his 17th bout against Ken Overlin who at the time was 119w-19l-6d and in 164 bouts was stopped
TWICE!!!

Charles finishes his great career at 95w-25l-1d and 5 of his 7 tko losses were after his defeat to Marciano. By 1955 he was trying to pick up the pennies but he wasn't good enough after 1954!

As a light heavyweight he only has a few losses against quality me his looses came as a heavy and as I said past 1955 he lost 13 of his last 22 bouts all as a heavyweight.

To me Charles is a top five ATG at 175 and he would be competitive in any era and he would rule today. No one today is in his league.

Ray

[Anthony342]

Yeah, considered by many to be the best light heavyweight ever? How come this guy never got a shot al the light heavy belt? Was he just ducked or was it racism or something else?