BoxRec

Hey guys,

Just curious if there are fighters out there who you just love to watch
but who never really made it in the big time or who lacked that championship talent.

For some reason I am impartial to watching

Jesse Fergusson
James Tillis
Pedro Agotso
Bert Cooper
Mitch Green

To name a few of the top of my head.

Kym

Chatchai Chionoi. Easy.

Miguel "Happy" Lora
Rodolfo Gonzalez
Ken Buchanan
Curtis Cokes
Jose "Mantequilla" Napoles
Ernesto Marcel
Bob Montgomery
Sammy Angott
Flash Elorde
Hilario Zapata


Good fighters that we do not talk much about...Also Gato Gonzalez, Jerome Coffee, Brian Mitchell, Samuel Serrano, Alfredo Escalera, Jose "Chegui" Torres, and Santos Laciar

..funny...i was thinking about curtis cokes the other day (while reading FAT CITY, the novel the movie was based on and in which cokes had a part) and reminded of how he was one fighter i thought was too good to virtually go without mention since his title reign. maybe not an all-time great in a competitive division, but was a good boxer puncher. i was going to put together a list myself if i could thnk of any, and this thread saved the strain on my little grey cells.

Depends on what you mean by obscure, could mean alot of different things. Could mean guys who were once well known, but aren't now. Could be guys who had the potential, but their careers never took off for one reason or another, or they burnt out before their time.

Tommy Gomez- Heavyweight, is unheard of by most fans, but was the most successful Latino Heavyweight up until John Ruiz came along; easily one of the greatest punchers of all time, but never could get over that extra bump and had a glass jaw.

Lew Jenkins- Lightweight, could have been one of the ATG's and was a brutal puncher, but alcoholism and whoring and several head and body injuries burnt him out and after losing the title just a year after he won it, he had a miserable downhill slide and ended up with a record of 71-40-4; easily one of the toughest men in ring history, in my opinion.

Andre Anderson- Heavyweight, was a pawn on the mob for many years, losing fights on purpose to pad some other fighters records, could have been a really great fighter, but after refusing to lose to pro wrestler Wayne Munn and knocking him out, he was gunned down and killed some months later.

Everett "Bigfoot" Martin- Fought all the big name men, Bowe, Foreman, etc and was rarely ever knocked out, but lost to every prospect and contender at Heavyweight who was remotely worth while.

There's alot of them, to be honest...I even liked watching K-1 champ Rick "The Jet" Roufus make his boxing debut and him going for minor Cruiserweight titles.

Yeah, your right, but nonetheless, Martin more times than not was a perpetual loser and every once in a while a freak occurence happens in boxing.

Gypsy Joe Harris

Like the little guys: Laciar, Estaba...

Just mentioning fighters whom I have watched, but there are a slew of obscure favorites from pre-1950:

I don't really consider these guys as obscure, but most people would unless they are actual "die-hard" boxing fans.

Jaime Llanes
Carmelo Negron
Billy Douglas
Engles Pedroza
Jaime "Rocky" Balboa
Art Hafey
"Jesse" James Hughes
Juan Jose Estrada
Florentino Fernandez
Earl Hargrove
Colin Jones
Mark Kaylor
Eduardo Lausse
Joichiro Tatsuyoshi
Tyrone Trice
Jimmy Heair


If I was mentioning fighters from all era's Tommy Gomez would certainly be on my list. Gomez was one of, if not the, hardest puncher, p4p, of his era. He was right up there with Bob Satterfield, which surprisingly the one time that Satterfield and Gomez fought it went the distance, but Gomez was right up there with Satterfield, Marciano, etc. as the heaviest fisted fighters of the 40s and 50s!

Paul 'Scrap Iron' Ryan (Hugely exciting fighter).

Georgie Smith (Power to burn).

Donovan 'Razor' Ruddock (OK, not that obscure, but he never won any major 'world' titles, but he was great to watch, as you never knew what would happen with him).

Mark Kaylor (Another exciting fighter who had some of the best domestic [British] fights in the 1980's).

Mark Kaylor (Another exciting fighter who had some of the best domestic [British] fights in the 1980's).

I remember when he got KOd by an American boxer. I think it was Buster Drayton who came back to the UK and beat another British boxer who I can't remember. Finally they had Drayton box James "The Heat" Kitchen in England and the "Heat" got a gift decision. Drayton won the IBF jr middle title and lost it to Matthew Hilton in Montreal around '87.

Terry D wrote:

Syntax Error wrote:Paul 'Scrap Iron' Ryan (Hugely exciting fighter).

Good call. Remixed theme song and a good "watch it in the pub" fighter.

Brilliantly defined.

This isn't quite in the spirit of this thread but I love it when a guy comes out of nowhere to win a major fioght or put themselves on the boxing map.

It's easy to forget now but when Toney beat Nunn it was as if he'd come out of nowhere. Very few people gave him a chance and Nunn was really looking like the next great 160 champion. It was a major upset.

Monzon's win over Benvenuti is very similar.

Nelson's gallant effort in defeat to Sanchez was also from a fighter who seemed to coem from nowhere.

Vinnie Curto
Ibar Arrington
Manning Galloway

Barry mentioned Jimmy Heair. I used to watch him on Spanish television in the early, mid 70's. He fought on the West Coast alot, and Spanish TV was always showing bouts from the LA area. I thought he was going to go far, until he got beat by the Filipino Rudy Barro, a guy who was much better than his record indicated.

Some others I liked have been Terrance Alli, didn't have the power or chin to be a champion, but he always came to fight. Irish Mike Nixon, and of course James "Hard Luck" Green.

Jimmy Heair was a very good fighter who did very well during a period when the West Coast was absolutely bursting with top notch fighters.

Some others from that ilk who do not get anywhere near the kind of recognition that guys like Danny Lopez, Ruben Olivares and Bobby Chacon get are the following:

Of course I already mentioned Art Hafey, Octavio Gomez, Valente Vera, Arturo Pineda, David Sotelo, Shig Fukuyama, Raul Cruz, Albert Davila and Frankie Crawford.



>>>It's easy to forget now but when Toney beat Nunn it was as if he'd come out of nowhere. Very few people gave him a chance and Nunn was really looking like the next great 160 champion. It was a major upset.<<<

Speaking of James Toney coming out of nowhere...how about Dave Tiberi!

Frank "The Aniamal" Fletcher from Philly always came to fight but another boxer that ended up in prison.

Robinson wrote:Hey guys,

Just curious if there are fighters out there who you just love to watch
but who never really made it in the big time or who lacked that championship talent.

For some reason I am impartial to watching

Jesse Fergusson
James Tillis
Pedro Agotso
Bert Cooper
Mitch Green

To name a few of the top of my head.

Kym

I always wished that Feruson and Cooper would have fought each other. They both fought many champions/contenders and both almost always lost, though both were often competitive. They both had a lot of common opponents. Cooper was a more exciting fighter of the two.
I specifically remember Cooper's comments after he gave Holyfield a scare in a title fight. He thought he was now a real factor in the heavyweight division and said "no more ESPN fights for me". Of course then fought on ESPN again.

Tim Tomashek was another obscure fighter that I liked. How can you not like a guy who would often use the word "jeepers".

..there is one fighter i lked a lot but he is so obscure i can't remember his name or what weight division he fought in. maybe somebody here can help me.

thank you in advance...

Jose Basora

Not too obscure, but not part. famous.

Jesus Chavez
Lou Nova
Dujuan Johnson
Syd Vanderpool
Duncan Dokiwari

Lots of obscure Telefutura fighters who'll put on very entertaining brawls but I don't remember their names.

Joe Hipp, was one of my favorites, but knee injuries and the like kept him from staying healthy enough to compete long enough to make more of an impact on the division; is the only Native American to win a HW title of any kind (beat Bruce Seldon for that particular title).

George Chaplin- Baltimore Heavyweight robbed against Page, Lost to dokes,Cooney as well.

Only obscure from his weight class- Yoko Gushiken- There used to be a series when I was a kid that showed Gushiken & Canto fights on Saturday mornings.

Mark Johnson, Lou Brouillard, Tommy Freeman, Young Jack Thompson, Jackie Fields, John Henry Lewis, Gilberto Roman, Sixto Escobar, and Fidel LaBarba are not mentioned enough in this forum

..gaspar ortega was a good fighter....fought in the other guys home town a lot...and fought in towns where nobody had homes......haven't checked his record and i'm sure there are a lot of losses....but i think he fits this thread perfectly...(i've got myself curious now so when i click off here i'm going to look at his record..


re: monzon....ring magazine didn't even have him rated in the top ten before he beat benvenutti...after he won the title and started his domination, howard cosell was obviously biased against him..talked about his use of elbows, butting, etc...mostly in his own imagination...

now that boxbuzz has read this, he may do a sinatra/lee mortimer and go pee on cosell's grave...