Sonny Liston vs Lennox Lewis [Archive]

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 07:29 AM

Interesting that no on mention yet is made of Liston's heart. It seems Liston gets a free pass for quitting blatantly against a light hitting opponent right after his career best win.
Just compare that to Mike Tyson. Tyson fought his heart out against Douglas, but showed signs of quitting mentally against Holyfield (first time), yet still took his beating like a man. The same thing seemed to happen when he fought Lennox Lewis. It was only after that that he really lost interest in winning (but no one holds that one punch cold KO against Liston at high age against him, right?) that he started quitting.

Yes, Liston fought and finished with a broken jaw against Marshall.
Who, in case you forgot, was a journeyman that was barely over the lightheavyweight limit but he beat that big bear. Tyson also showed great heart against Bruno (I), Douglas and Botha. That doesn't stop him from getting a shitload of criticism, "Tyson couldn't handle pressure", etc when these sort of discussions come up.

Why does Liston get a free pass on this department? Because he has 15" fists? Fact is that Lewis has never been intimidated and Liston would be no different. Liston was intimated like hell by Ali and folded like a cheap suit once, perhaps twice. Liston is the one without self-confidence here. He has been controlled his entire life. Just hear him speak, he has that shy-stutter despite that he can beat the shit out of 99% of the people. You cannot ignore these factors. Lewis has proven his heart beyond any doubt in the Mercer, Bruno and Klitschko fights. Liston's is a question mark.

I'll take Lewis by knockout or decision. He has a much bigger actual reach (forget that wingspan bullshit, 6'3 80" Williams clearly had a much bigger reach than Liston) and more importantly, much faster hands. After the fight, people would comment on how remarkably small Liston looked when he got in the ring with a big heavyweight for a change. The mythical picture of a 6'8 250lbs bear was in fact 6'0 200-212lbs.

I don't like Liston's punching compared to Lewis. Lewis' was much more smooth. Watch for instance Liston finishing Williams in their second fight. It seems he pushes those right hands out, slowly telegraphed and one by one. Compare that to a finish like Lewis-Botha and you'll see the difference.

Liston has a grand total of 2 fights against punchers. Williams' career only KO is Terrel and a long string of Texas bums. Satterfield KO'd him also. Lewis faced a ton of punchers, Ruddock, Tua, Klitschko, Tyson (still good for a few rounds), Bruno, Morrison, Grant, Mercer, Briggs, Golota, Tucker, Mason, Rahman, McCall.
Lewis is the more proven man here.

Marciano gets a lot of criticism for beating small heavyweights, but how often did Liston face a 210+lbs heavyweight? One is Williams who was unranked. The other is Ali who beat the crap out of him twice.

To summarize:
Power: Even

Boxing ability: I never saw Liston hook off the jab like Lewis did. I never saw Liston fight off the backfoot for the full fight like Lewis did. I never saw Liston put together a 4-punch combination like Lewis did against Holyfield, Mercer, etc. Edge: Lewis.

Handspeed: Lewis, easily. Despite being 35lbs and 5 inches bigger naturally. Just watch the film and see for yourself.

Chin: I think this one is close. Liston didn't get KO'd the way Lewis got, but Liston only faced one good puncher twice. If you pick two random punchers off Lewis' resume, chances are that Lewis comes out the same way Liston does. Lewis is a lot more proven in that he took many punches from a lot of different kind of big punchers with no trouble, and it's been noted before that Lewis was ready to continue against McCall. I don't really trust that referee knowing that Don King had bet $450.000 for McCall to win. Liston got knocked out cold when he was nearly 40, Lewis when he was 35. Notice though, that Martin was the first noteworthy puncher that Liston faced since he was 32 while Lewis fought McCall, Akinwande, Golota, Briggs, Grant, Tua, Rahman 2x, Tyson and Klitschko as punchers when he was older than 32. But okay, for now i will give Liston the edge.

Footwork: Lewis. Lewis moves around the ring better, faster and can figth off the backfoot, something Liston never showed. Lewis is more versatile, faster and doesn't always chase you in a straight line like Liston did.

More proven against big heavyweights: Lewis.

More proven against big punchers: Lewis.

Stamina: Liston went 12 only once against Machen, but to be fair, he showed no problem there. Lewis went 12 several times. Against Tua he kept moving all the time. Lewis could have very high punch outputs despite his size. He averaged 55 punches a round against Holyfield (landed 57%). Edge: Lewis.

Size: Lewis has 35 lbs in natural weight, 5 inches in height and despite their wingspans both being 84", i can guarantee you that Lewis has the longer reach. He is 5 inches taller and his hands look much longer, compared to Liston's hands who were less long than Williams'. Edge: Lewis.

Experience: Lewis beat much more top ranked contenders than Liston. Liston has something like 7, Lewis something like 20. That's about three times more.

Ring Generalship: Lewis. He could dictate the fight. He made Tua fight the way he wanted to. He easily outboxed Holyfield in the first with the jab and swift combinations, in the second he went more toe to toe for the judges and still won an 8-4 or 7-5 decision. He completely neutralised Tyson with the jab, the uppercut and holding. Lewis has adaptability. The only time he made a mistake was against Mercer when he was yet to face someone he couldn't knockout and chased the KO too much. But he learnt from that. Liston did well against Machen but couldn't hurt him (Johanson knocked him out in 1) and had 3 points deducted for low blows out of frustration. He was clueless against Ali. Now i don't blame him THAT much for it, since he was undertrained and in a bad stylistic matchup, but it was a bad stylistic matchup for a reason: Liston had no idea how to cut off the ring and was slow. Lewis has neither those problems (not saying he'd beat Ali, though).

Heart: No explanation needed here i suppose. Edge: Lewis.

I think Lewis would using footwork, timing, speed and reach to beat Liston's jab, and come over the top with a right hand now and then, which is easy when you're inches taller. Of course it could also go the other way. But i'll take my chances with Lewis in this one.

McGrain

12-06-2007, 07:39 AM

Interesting that no on mention yet is made of Liston's heart. It seems Liston gets a free pass for quitting blatantly against a light hitting opponent right after his career best win.

Never happened. ;)

You mention Marshall. Liston also showed his great heart outside the ring, and plenty. When you hold Liston up for examination as regards heart you are left with the Ali fights - both suspect at the very least.

Why does Liston get a free pass on this department? Because he has 15" fists?

More because, apart from against Ali, there is just no sign,anywhere, in that Liston has quit. Once you've accepted the rightous truth into your heart as regards these fights, it all becomes clear to you.

Fact is that Lewis has never been intimidated and Liston would be no different

Agreed

I'll take Lewis by knockout or decision. He has a much bigger actual reach (forget that wingspan bullshit, 6'3 80" Williams clearly had a much bigger reach than Liston) and more importantly, much faster hands. After the fight, people would comment on how remarkably small Liston looked when he got in the ring with a big heavyweight for a change. The mythical picture of a 6'8 250lbs bear was in fact 6'0 200-212lbs.

I think your pick is not unreasonable as I have said. But I do beleive that Lewis has to dominate to win. Your "mythical picture" of Liston and its innacuracies is fair - a simialir thing happens to Foreman sometimes - the difference is that Liston is twice the composite puncher that Foreman was, more accurate, better on the inside, better in between, and all of it backed up by the one of the three best (my pick for THE best) jab in the HW division. Meanwhile you have the Lewis chin. Meahwhile you have Liston live every minute he is in there, unless you chose to concentate so firmly upon the past prime heavily controlled long odds loser that fought Ali.

I don't like Liston's punching compared to Lewis. Lewis' was much more smooth.

At his very best, I agree. The thing is, Lewis was far more patchy. He was perfectly capable of having a shit round in the right circumstances, he was perfectly capable of range finding and pawing a bit with the jab - although when on song as against Tua or in Rahman II he is lethal with it. IF Lewis can dominate but has a bad round 7 he can still lose. If Liston dominates, Liston will win.

Liston has a grand total of 2 fights against punchers. Lewis is the more proven man here.

Granted. But Liston will be the best puncher Lewis has ever faced. Similairly, Lewis will be the best puncher Liston has ever faced. This is often the case when ATG fighters bump heads but HERE it is relevant, because, i'm sorry to say, it doesn't take an ATG puncher to dump Lewis on his ass.

I think Lewis would using footwork, timing, speed and reach to beat Liston's jab, and come over the top with a right hand now and then, which is easy when you're inches taller. Of course it could also go the other way. But i'll take my chances with Lewis in this one.

A perfectly valid pick. But you wouldn't be laying any money here, would you Chris?

groove

12-06-2007, 08:51 AM

Liston didn't think Ali was a light hitter. He said he was surprised by his power. Liston would catch Lewis a lot easier than Ali and whether Lewis can take them without falling is another matter. 50/50 fight for me. Lewis best wins are against past prime fighters - Holyfield (he was peak against Tyson), Tyson (he was peak 15 years prior). He won't be remembered as a top 5 heavy in all-time ranks.

Minotauro

12-06-2007, 08:53 AM

I think Liston takes it you saw how Lewis reacted when Bruno was outjabbing him I see the same thing with Liston only Sonny don't freeze like Frank. Liston KO 7.

McGrain

12-06-2007, 08:59 AM

I think Liston takes it you saw how Lewis reacted when Bruno was outjabbing him I see the same thing with Liston only Sonny don't freeze like Frank. Liston KO 7.

Well Lewis wasn't the finished article at that time, and remember that Bruno tended to freeze instead of falling down, which is what most guys do when Lewis bombs them.

I agree with your pick though, but I think how Liston deals with Lewis' best would be very interesting.

Robbi

12-06-2007, 09:48 AM

Well Lewis wasn't the finished article at that time, and remember that Bruno tended to freeze instead of falling down, which is what most guys do when Lewis bombs them.

And Lewis wasn't the finished article around 96-97 either, as some think. Lewis' peak was around 99-01. If you were to ask Lewis and Steward themselves they would say the same. Holyfield, Grant, Botha, Tua, Rahman I and II, maybe even Tyson.

Lewis was more athletic and slim when he fought Ruddock and Bruno, but nowhere near as seasoned or complete. Agreed.

Lewis peaked late.

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 10:43 AM

You mention Marshall. Liston also showed his great heart outside the ring, and plenty. When you hold Liston up for examination as regards heart you are left with the Ali fights - both suspect at the very least.

More because, apart from against Ali, there is just no sign,anywhere, in that Liston has quit. Once you've accepted the rightous truth into your heart as regards these fights, it all becomes clear to you.

I don't want to restart that discussion, but i will say that not many people think both of the Liston-Ali fights were fixed.

Granted. But Liston will be the best puncher Lewis has ever faced. Similairly, Lewis will be the best puncher Liston has ever faced. This is often the case when ATG fighters bump heads but HERE it is relevant, because, i'm sorry to say, it doesn't take an ATG puncher to dump Lewis on his ass.

Yes, but it is no guarantee at all.

I mean let's face it: were McCall and Rahman the best punchers (or fighters) that Lewis fought?

By far they weren't. Klitschko, Ruddock, Tua, Morrison are more dangerous punchers and Bruno, Mason, Briggs, Mercer, Tucker and Tyson were at least as dangerous. But none of them managed to knock Lewis down and only Briggs and Klitschko had hem wobbling at one point. If the best puncher Lewis faced was Briggs 2x and no one else of note except for an undersized heavyweight with no chin, then there would be no talk whatsoever about his chin as is the case with Liston.

A perfectly valid pick. But you wouldn't be laying any money here, would you Chris?

Indeed i wouldn't; between two all time greats in their primes, anything can happen.

However, i would be willing to bet something like a grand total of 10 bugs with you on this on for the rivalry and the fun. If a time machine ever gets invented, we have a deal. :good

By the way, i don't know if you interpreted it that way, but i don't think Liston is an unreasonable pick at all. Just that i think there are some overlooked points which i adressed and for those reasons, i favor Lennox.

McGrain

12-06-2007, 11:02 AM

I don't want to restart that discussion, but i will say that not many people think both of the Liston-Ali fights were fixed.

I agree, we've done that, one or two things specific to this point though - first, the Liston-Ali fight is one of the only fights where there was serious suspicion at the time which has hugely diminished over time. This is because Ali's star rose so much higher than where it rode for this fight. From weird dancer to invincible, in fact. As Ali comes to seem more and more invincible, that result seemed more and more concievable. But one, obviously, does not follow behind the other. It is perfectly plausible for that fight to have been fixed AND for Ali to have been good enough to win it. But I actually think that fight was the turning point for Ali. After it, he was different than before. The guy from the Cooper fight got in and the capable of Manilla got out.

Second - it IS interesting that hardcore boxing fans give Liston something of a pass in the heart department, isn't it?

Yes, but it is no guarantee at all.

I mean let's face it: were McCall and Rahman the best punchers (or fighters) that Lewis fought?

No; and what's more, I think it's possible (indeed, the stats prove it!) that Lewis is actually more likely that Lewis will lose to a good fighter than a really, really good fighter, and maybe even a great one...

Indeed i wouldn't; between two all time greats in their primes, anything can happen.

However, i would be willing to bet something like a grand total of 10 bugs with you on this on for the rivalry and the fun. If a time machine ever gets invented, we have a deal. :good

I know this is hard to swallow, but it will be YEARS before they get to us if they ever manage to invent one. Assuming they decide to lose it they will want to think about JFK, Ghandi and even Jesus before they get anywhere near pairing Ali-Louis (then we still have to have the argument about which versions of the men to match and deal with the fault out from what will essentially be two kidnapps). What a pisser.

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 11:13 AM

I agree, we've done that, one or two things specific to this point though - first, the Liston-Ali fight is one of the only fights where there was serious suspicion at the time which has hugely diminished over time. This is because Ali's star rose so much higher than where it rode for this fight. From weird dancer to invincible, in fact. As Ali comes to seem more and more invincible, that result seemed more and more concievable. But one, obviously, does not follow behind the other. It is perfectly plausible for that fight to have been fixed AND for Ali to have been good enough to win it.

You've gotten me interested again. I didn't know that after the first fight there was talk of a fix but later it was seen as legit, as you say. I would be interested to hear about this, perhaps newpaper articles after the first fight saying it was a fix? Make a new thread if you like.

I know this is hard to swallow, but it will be YEARS before they get to us if they ever manage to invent one. Assuming they decide to lose it they will want to think about JFK, Ghandi and even Jesus before they get anywhere near pairing Ali-Louis (then we still have to have the argument about which versions of the men to match and deal with the fault out from what will essentially be two kidnapps). What a pisser.

Yeah, asif finding out about jesus and the JFK assassination are as important as seeing Lewis and Liston taking it on. Ignorant people sometimes. :twisted:

McGrain

12-06-2007, 11:37 AM

You've gotten me interested again. I didn't know that after the first fight there was talk of a fix but later it was seen as legit, as you say. I would be interested to hear about this, perhaps newpaper articles after the first fight saying it was a fix? Make a new thread if you like.

Yeah, there was talk of witheld purses the works. I might get to it.

Yeah, asif finding out about jesus and the JFK assassination are as important as seeing Lewis and Liston taking it on. Ignorant people sometimes. :twisted:

That's just the way these people are. Can't be a politician without having your priorities all screwed up.

SuzieQ49

12-06-2007, 01:50 PM

Interesting that no on mention yet is made of Liston's heart. It seems Liston gets a free pass for quitting blatantly against a light hitting opponent right after his career best win.

Liston was very rusty, overweight and far past his prime against ali.

Yes, Liston fought and finished with a broken jaw against Marshall.
Who, in case you forgot, was a journeyman that was barely over the lightheavyweight limit but he beat that big bear.

He was actually a ranked lightheavyweight contender, not a journeyman. This was also sonny listons FIFTH pro fight, and liston was also thrown in agaisnt talented heavyweight contender johnny summerlin and twice outboxed him. not to mention liston battered and butchered marshall twice in rematches. name me a heavyweight champion who fought tougher competition in their first 10 bouts??

Why does Liston get a free pass on this department? Because he has 15" fists? Fact is that Lewis has never been intimidated and Liston would be no different. Liston was intimated like hell by Ali and folded like a cheap suit once, perhaps twice. Liston is the one without self-confidence here. He has been controlled his entire life. Just hear him speak, he has that shy-stutter despite that he can beat the shit out of 99% of the people. You cannot ignore these factors. Lewis has proven his heart beyond any doubt in the Mercer, Bruno and Klitschko fights. Liston's is a question mark.

once again liston was far past his prime, rusty, overweight against ali.

Liston more than proved his heart against williams, getting his nose broken and being pounded badly in round 1, but he didnt get intimidated and came back to butcher williams in round 3.

fighting 8 rounds with a broken jaw is ALOT OF HEART if you ask me, you know how painful a broken jaw is?

Mercer fight? the fight where a 6'1 "poor mans" liston outboxed him for 10 rounds and was robbed? the one where lennox looked beat mentally as much as physically?

Lennox never got up off the canvas to win a fight, something liston did and this is a fact that you can't spin around.

"If I had any weakness, anywhere in my body, heart, head....it would have showed in the beating I took in that first round. But I knew deep down I had him. The big cat had to keep up that punishment for 10 straight rounds and I knew he didnt have it in him."- Liston on the first cleveland williams fight, as you see liston had alot of heart.

I'll take Lewis by knockout or decision. He has a much bigger actual reach (forget that wingspan bullshit, 6'3 80" Williams clearly had a much bigger reach than Liston) and more importantly, much faster hands. After the fight, people would comment on how remarkably small Liston looked when he got in the ring with a big heavyweight for a change. The mythical picture of a 6'8 250lbs bear was in fact 6'0 200-212lbs.

Umm liston had a 84" reach just as long as lennox's. Watch the film, liston had ridiculous long arms. Liston was only 6'1 212lb, but he was so incredibly strong for his size, not to mention his physical measurements far exceeeded his body weight. He was as strong a heavyweight as any there ever was. You see him do those neck bridges in training standing upright on his head for hours?

williams had about an 82" reach, but listons arms were clearly longer. Just in case you dont know, williams was a physical speciman if i have ever seen, more so than any heavyweight from this era.

your forgetting that liston TWICE demolished williams in 2 and 3 rounds.

I don't like Liston's punching compared to Lewis. Lewis' was much more smooth. Watch for instance Liston finishing Williams in their second fight. It seems he pushes those right hands out, slowly telegraphed and one by one. Compare that to a finish like Lewis-Botha and you'll see the difference.

lewis-botha? LOL what a joke of a fight. i laughed the whole fight, botha looked like a philsbury doughboy. Now liston vs westphal finish where westphal dropped after a right hand looking like he been shot, now that was a picture perfect finish. Quick straight fast damaging right was all liston needed, a much better finish than lewis-botha.

Liston did not push his right, HE CLUBBED WITH IT. He turned it into a damaging club that he had a lot of force behind it, also listons left hook was as perfect a left hook as we have ever seen on film. he could throw it short,long, fast with great technique and people dropped like they been shot when it hit them.

Liston teleograph? I certainly didnt see that! I saw a damaging clubbing technical puncher with faster hands at his peak than lennox had.

Liston has a grand total of 2 fights against punchers. Williams' career only KO is Terrel and a long string of Texas bums. Satterfield KO'd him also. Lewis faced a ton of punchers, Ruddock, Tua, Klitschko, Tyson (still good for a few rounds), Bruno, Morrison, Grant, Mercer, Briggs, Golota, Tucker, Mason, Rahman, McCall.
Lewis is the more proven man here.

old tucker, mason, mercer, golota big punchers? :lol:

Dont ever question Cleveland Williams power. He was one of the most ferocious hard hitting heavyweights in history. I have tons of film on him, the man could hit like a truck. The reason he didnt take on a lot of contenders was because he was ducked by all of them. "no one wants to fight cleveland williams"- sonny liston in 1963. Also calling guys like alex miteff, sonny banks, alonzo johnson, billy daniels, young jack johnson, wayne bethea "texas bums" is not very intelligent.

Cleveland williams was only 20 years old and took the fight on less than 24 hour notice against a seasoned contender in bob satterfield in 1954. its quite safe to say williams was extremely green when tangeled with bob, kind of like ali was green when he was floored by sonny banks. Im 20 1/2 years old, and I am certainly not anywhere near my physical peak yet. not until at least 25 years old. Willaims was only 200lb when he fought satterfield, he filled out to a muscular 215lb frame by the time he was 25 years old.

Finally I might add, Dont forget lennox was embarrasingly knocked out by one punch from two mediocre heavyweights. This never happened to liston. Liston faced tougher competition and fought younger prime contenders whom he dominated with ease, while lennox struggled with guys his whole career(outboxed by bruno, robbed against mercer, struggled badly vs old holyfield, outboxed by clumsly vitali, knocked out twice by two mediocre heavyweights in his prime)

Liston has a grand total of 2 fights against punchers

This is untrue. ever heard of Nino Valdez? Mike Dejohn? both big punchers.

Valdez was 34, but he still had his tremendous power and physical presense at 6'4 211lb. Just a year earlier valdez knocked out 3 rated heavyweight contenders(harold carter, pat mcmurty, mike dejohn) and would knock out brian london a year after losing to liston. I dont know if you have seen valdez on film, but not only was he a big heavyweight, the man could hit like a truck. I have film of valdez vs jackson and he was a terrific puncher.

"Being hit by Liston," Valdez observed, "was like being kicked by a mule. By the time I fought Liston I was over the hill. I hit him a couple of solid shots and he did not buckle. Sonny was the strongest man I ever fought and he was very tough. When I fought him I still could hit very hard but my reflexes were not there anymore."- Nino Valdez

As you see Valdez still was a terrfic puncher when he fought liston, and liston took his best punches

Mike Dejohn though no world beater, was a 6'3 respectible contender and a very hard puncher. liston took his best punches. granite chinned george chuvalo called mike dejohn "the hardest hitter i ever faced".

Marciano gets a lot of criticism for beating small heavyweights, but how often did Liston face a 210+lbs heavyweight? One is Williams who was unranked. The other is Ali who beat the crap out of him twice.

Liston tangled with about 15 men over 210lb during his career and dominated them all outside of ali. 3 of them being contenders williams, valdez, dejohn. hell you could even throw giants wepner, G zech in their for they were ranked in the top 10 righ around the time they fought sonny.

To summarize:
Power: Even

I give sonny the edge here.

SuzieQ49

12-06-2007, 01:50 PM

Boxing ability: I never saw Liston hook off the jab like Lewis did. I never saw Liston fight off the backfoot for the full fight like Lewis did. I never saw Liston put together a 4-punch combination like Lewis did against Holyfield, Mercer, etc. Edge: Lewis.

I saw alot less flaws in listons boxing skills/technique than i did in lennox who had many flaws which explains why guys like "poor mans sonny liston" ray mercer and frank bruno outboxed him in his prime. liston outboxed master boxer eddie machen easily over 12 rounds. Liston was a lot more polished an controlled and powerful with his jab than lennox. Liston didnt have bad habits like dropped his left after jabbing like lennox did. Liston was like joe louis, he stalked his prey, slowly and surely. He would sitback at times on his backfoot and jab, but usually he was stalking his prey. He was very calm cool collective in his style. I saw liston put together 4-5 punch fight ending combinations against cleveland williams, floyd patterson, roy harris. Watch his peak fight vs wayne bethea, I see liston connect on bethea with a left right left right left hook 5 punch combination that backs him into the ropes before he floors him. Not to mention some of listons best preformances arnt on film(folley, dejohn) so we dont have full film to judge like we do with lennox. According to papers, liston finished folley with a vicious 4 punch combination.

I might add Lennox nearly lost to a old holyfield(who resembled nothing like a peak sonny liston), and he got outboxed by a "poor mans liston" in ray mercer who was only 6'1(like liston) with a good jab(like liston).

Handspeed: Lewis, easily. Despite being 35lbs and 5 inches bigger naturally. Just watch the film and see for yourself.

Disagree, I think liston at his absolute best(bethea fight) had better faster handspeed than lennox. Liston was very trim 204lb and looked fast.

Chin: I think this one is close. Liston didn't get KO'd the way Lewis got, but Liston only faced one good puncher twice. If you pick two random punchers off Lewis' resume, chances are that Lewis comes out the same way Liston does. Lewis is a lot more proven in that he took many punches from a lot of different kind of big punchers with no trouble, and it's been noted before that Lewis was ready to continue against McCall. I don't really trust that referee knowing that Don King had bet $450.000 for McCall to win. Liston got knocked out cold when he was nearly 40, Lewis when he was 35. Notice though, that Martin was the first noteworthy puncher that Liston faced since he was 32 while Lewis fought McCall, Akinwande, Golota, Briggs, Grant, Tua, Rahman 2x, Tyson and Klitschko as punchers when he was older than 32. But okay, for now i will give Liston the edge.

This easily goes to liston. He took williams, valdez, dejohns best punches without blinking. lennox was knocked out by one punch twice in his prime by medioocre heavyweights.

Footwork: Lewis. Lewis moves around the ring better, faster and can figth off the backfoot, something Liston never showed. Lewis is more versatile, faster and doesn't always chase you in a straight line like Liston did.

Liston gets the edge here. He had very suttle fluid "joe louis stalk you prey like" footwork. Liston was very balanced and moved in and out very calm and collectivley. never made a mistake. I think liston was more versatile.

More proven against big heavyweights: Lewis.

More proven against big punchers: Lewis.

lewis was more proven against big heavyweights, but then again against smaller heavyweights lennox struggled. he struggled incredibly with 36 year old ray mercer and 38 year old evander holyfield, all men around the same size as liston.

I think liston was more proven vs big punchers, he proved he could take a punch. lennox did not.

Stamina: Liston went 12 only once against Machen, but to be fair, he showed no problem there. Lewis went 12 several times. Against Tua he kept moving all the time. Lewis could have very high punch outputs despite his size. He averaged 55 punches a round against Holyfield (landed 57%). Edge: Lewis.

I would say even

Size: Lewis has 35 lbs in natural weight, 5 inches in height and despite their wingspans both being 84", i can guarantee you that Lewis has the longer reach. He is 5 inches taller and his hands look much longer, compared to Liston's hands who were less long than Williams'. Edge: Lewis.

size isnt a big factor, lennox struggled with 6'1 215lb men(38 year old holyfield, 36 year old mercer). Besides Liston had the same reach as lennox both 84" which every way you try to spin it. look at the film, whitehurst fight liston looks like his arms could reach halfway across the ring thats how long his arms look. he was a freak of nature, they do come around a couple times every 50 years(liston was one of em). Liston has same reach as lennox. Williams reach was 82" listons was 84". deal with it, the tale of the tape doesnt lie.

Experience: Lewis beat much more top ranked contenders than Liston. Liston has something like 7, Lewis something like 20. That's about three times more.

Liston IMO fought just as good if not better quality contenders than lennox did but the difference here is liston dominated them while lennox struggled/lost with many of them. Liston dominated themm all easily with no controversy, lennox had some controversial close matches and was knocked out twice.

Heart: No explanation needed here i suppose. Edge: Lewis.

I would say even

I think Lewis would using footwork, timing, speed and reach to beat Liston's jab, and come over the top with a right hand now and then, which is easy when you're inches taller. Of course it could also go the other way. But i'll take my chances with Lewis in this one.

I already said my peice, liston by early-mid round Kayo. See the ray mercer fight to realize how badly lennox would struggle in thise one.

Vanboxingfan

12-06-2007, 03:09 PM

Pointing out of Lewis's shortcomings in his worst performances (ie 2 KO's verses 40+ no getting KO'd) and only highlighting Listons best performances isn't an analysis, it's cheerleading. Nor do I think Mercer was robbed. Close fight yes, robbery no. Having said that, I do agree that the Ali fights shouldn't be used to gauge a prime Liston performance, he was well past his best by then, but neither have I seen anything to convince me that Liston has faster handspeed than Lewis.

It's a pretty even match up if you ask me. But even though I consider Lewis top 5 h2h, Liston is one of the few who I think has a reasonable chance of beating him. But having said that I see it as about a 50/50 in terms of odds. Whoever establishes their jab would have a huge edge. If Lewis does it allows him to stay on the outside, and outbox the bear if he wishes.

SuzieQ49

12-06-2007, 03:12 PM

i have the fight on Tivo, i had mercer winning at least 6 out of the 10 rounds.

Vanboxingfan

12-06-2007, 03:14 PM

i have the fight on Tivo, i had mercer winning at least 6 out of the 10 rounds.

So what I have the fight on DVD and I have Lewis winning a close decision. I'll watch it again over the next couple of days and give you a round by round breakdown if you like. And even if you are correct, a one round swing is hardly a robbery.

mr. magoo

12-06-2007, 03:19 PM

i have the fight on Tivo, i had mercer winning at least 6 out of the 10 rounds.

So did I, and in fact I remember seeing that fight live back in 95'. But I think Vanboxingfan's point is that we can't draw conclusions based on the worst performances of one fighter while focussing on the best of another. This rule applies no matter who you're comparing. Too many people read into the McCall and Rahman fights in my opinion as well. Still, I agree that Sonny would have a chance of beating Lewis, but I'm not sure if I'd favor him.

Not that its relevant, but Mercer had one of the hardest chins of all time, while Sonny had his jaw broken once. Of course Sonny only had a few fights behind him, while facing a veteran, but let's just say that chin was not invincible. He could have been really hurt by a puncher like Lewis. Nevertheless its a good mathcup.

Bummy Davis

12-06-2007, 04:11 PM

I like Liston by early Kayo. Sonny Liston reminds me of randy moss, a freak of nature for his size. incredible talent to go along with his freakish physical tools(15" fist, 84" reach).

I think Liston was the better boxer than lennox and i can see him controlling lennox with the jab like bruno did, and unlike foreman liston didnt bull rush in. liston was methodical, smart he stayed back boxed utilized his long jab...liston wouldnt be caught red handed swining widly coming in, he would slowly and surely make lennox make a mistake and he would attack lennoxs body hard. Liston suttley wait for lennox to drop that left low like he always does after a jab, and liston would come right over the top with that right hand to stun lennox then finish him off with a barrage of lethal hooks. I dont see liston getting caught in the trenches with lennox very often and liston is too strong to be manhandled in the clinches. good styles for sonny.

Lennox has to box him early but let Sonny feel his power, barring a lucky shot by Sonny, Lennox keeps Sonny at the end of his punches until the 7th round where he puts Sonny down for the count

SuzieQ49

12-06-2007, 04:28 PM

Too many people read into the McCall and Rahman fights in my opinion as well.

I dont think so, both are 1 punch knockout losses at/near his prime to two ordinary heavyweights. these losses are detrimental to his legacy. most other great heavyweight champs hadvnt suffered one punch knockout losses in there prime twice. for these 2 losses i dont rate lennox in my top 10.

McGrain

12-06-2007, 04:47 PM

I dont think so, both are 1 punch knockout losses at/near his prime to two ordinary heavyweights. these losses are detrimental to his legacy. most other great heavyweight champs hadvnt suffered one punch knockout losses in there prime twice. for these 2 losses i dont rate lennox in my top 10.

If you think the losses hurt Lewis in a legacy sense you are right. If you think they are all consuming reasons concerning Liston's chances v Lewis, you are wrong.

Drew101

12-06-2007, 05:57 PM

Lewis UD.

Don't feel like explaining my pick, right now. :D

Polymath

12-06-2007, 06:15 PM

On this whole size and reach issue; yes Liston was a genetic freak - the longest arms I've ever seen.

Weirdly, a guy who reminds me a little of Liston physically is Hasim Rahman. Rahman's also has a condor-like wingspan which he's used to outbox opponents taller than himself - say what you want about Rahman, but I think he has an almost perfect physique for a heaveyweight boxer ('cept for the chin of course :D )

Vanboxingfan

12-06-2007, 06:58 PM

If you think the losses hurt Lewis in a legacy sense you are right. If you think they are all consuming reasons concerning Liston's chances v Lewis, you are wrong.

Bingo. Besides regarding Rahman, which Lewis shows up? The one who fought him the first time, or the one who fought him in the rematch?

Personally I think it's the latter, obviously some think (you pretty much gotta be anti-Lewis to think this) the former.

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 07:04 PM

SuzieQ, what you do is wave away all negative aspects of Listons career and highlight the positives, then talk all about the bad things that happened to Lewis and ignore the good things. That's not an objective discussion.

Liston was very rusty, overweight and far past his prime against ali.

He was just as rusty and a grand total of 3 pounds heavier than when he stopped Patterson in one round in their rematch. How is coming off your career most impressive performance & win "far past your prime"?

And even so, does that mean we should just ignore it?

He was actually a ranked lightheavyweight contender, not a journeyman. This was also sonny listons FIFTH pro fight, and liston was also thrown in agaisnt talented heavyweight contender johnny summerlin and twice outboxed him. not to mention liston battered and butchered marshall twice in rematches. name me a heavyweight champion who fought tougher competition in their first 10 bouts??

Ring magazine didn't have him ranked and i'm not surprised considering the mediocrity of his record.

I know that you wish it to be true, but Summerlin wasn't a ranked contender when him and Liston fought, either. He would be ranked later briefly, but that's not how it works.

Marshall still knocked Liston down in the rematch, by the way.

Liston's early opposition was impressive (considering Liston's experience, that is), no doubt there.

once again liston was far past his prime, rusty, overweight against ali.

Liston more than proved his heart against williams, getting his nose broken and being pounded badly in round 1, but he didnt get intimidated and came back to butcher williams in round 3.

fighting 8 rounds with a broken jaw is ALOT OF HEART if you ask me, you know how painful a broken jaw is?

Interesting that Liston's blatant quitting is irrelevant because he was "far past his prime" and a grand total of 3 pounds overweight, while whatever lack of motivation Lewis had for the Rahman bout doesn't matter, nevermind that he was 3 years old than Liston was against Ali?

And what is your evidence that Liston's jaw was broken in the 1st? According to Boxrec it was probably broken in the 4th.

Liston overcoming Williams pounding him is impressive, but come on Suzie. You have to admit that Lewis is not only far more proven in this area but never quit like Liston did, either.

Mercer fight? the fight where a 6'1 "poor mans" liston outboxed him for 10 rounds and was robbed? the one where lennox looked beat mentally as much as physically?

That "outboxed him for 10 rounds" only happened in your mind, sorry. Most people agree that Lewis won the fight by a small margin. And this poor man's Liston takes a better shot than him which was very relevant in this fight. And how did Lewis look beat mentally? He fought well during the last three rounds (when he should've been beaten mentally) and he didn't keep sitting on his stool like Liston did.

Lennox never got up off the canvas to win a fight, something liston did and this is a fact that you can't spin around.

Yeah, he got off the canvas to beat an undersized journeyman, very impressive.

I can guarantee that if Lewis got knocked down by Michael Simuwelu in his 10th pro fight but still knocked him out and avenged it, you would be talking all this about how Lewis was knocked down by a journeyman etc, not about "Lewis got up to win".

What is the relevance there anyway?
Jeffries never got up to win either. Does anyone doubt Jeffries' heart? All it means is that Lewis didn't get knocked down by inferior fighters like Liston did in this case. Lewis has shown on various occasions to come back from behind and never quit, that is enough for me.

Umm liston had a 84" reach just as long as lennox's. Watch the film, liston had ridiculous long arms. Liston was only 6'1 212lb, but he was so incredibly strong for his size, not to mention his physical measurements far exceeeded his body weight. He was as strong a heavyweight as any there ever was. You see him do those neck bridges in training standing upright on his head for hours?

williams had about an 82" reach, but listons arms were clearly longer. Just in case you dont know, williams was a physical speciman if i have ever seen, more so than any heavyweight from this era.

your forgetting that liston TWICE demolished williams in 2 and 3 rounds.

Williams didn't have "about an 82" reach", he had an 80 inch reach.
And as you can see on these pictures, Liston does NOT have the longer arms:

[Only registered and activated users can see links]

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Liston in the white trunks, Williams in the black trunks. As you can see, Williams has no trouble reaching the "84 inch reach" Liston despite that his arm isn't even fully extended whereas Liston is, because he has to punch upward (and would have to even further against Lewis).

And no, i won't forget that he destroyed Williams twice, because it's just about the only point which you keep brining up. Did i mention that Williams wasn't a top 10 ranked contender at that point ?

lewis-botha? LOL what a joke of a fight. i laughed the whole fight, botha looked like a philsbury doughboy. Now liston vs westphal finish where westphal dropped after a right hand looking like he been shot, now that was a picture perfect finish. Quick straight fast damaging right was all liston needed, a much better finish than lewis-botha.

Yeah, Botha look like a philsbury doughboy and you were laughing all the time. Of course, when that monster of a journeyman, the 5'7 195lbs Albert Westphal got into the picture your jaw dropped from being impressed. Nice objective analysis again. :lol:

Liston did not push his right, HE CLUBBED WITH IT. He turned it into a damaging club that he had a lot of force behind it, also listons left hook was as perfect a left hook as we have ever seen on film. he could throw it short,long, fast with great technique and people dropped like they been shot when it hit them.

Liston teleograph? I certainly didnt see that! I saw a damaging clubbing technical puncher with faster hands at his peak than lennox had.

Liston faster hands that Lewis? I suggest you re-watch the film in an objective way.

old tucker, mason, mercer, golota big punchers? :lol:

I see you left out Tua, Klitschko, Rahman, Briggs, Bruno and Tyson.

p.s. Golota was more athletically talented than anyone Liston ever faced excluding Ali. The way he beat Bowe on the inside, outside, everywhere from pillar to post is more impressive than anyone Williams ever did.

Dont ever question Cleveland Williams power. He was one of the most ferocious hard hitting heavyweights in history. I have tons of film on him, the man could hit like a truck. The reason he didnt take on a lot of contenders was because he was ducked by all of them. "no one wants to fight cleveland williams"- sonny liston in 1963. Also calling guys like alex miteff, sonny banks, alonzo johnson, billy daniels, young jack johnson, wayne bethea "texas bums" is not very intelligent.

Yeah, okay. Too bad that despite his enormous power, he has a grand total of zero knockouts against a contender. In case you're brining up Terrel now, he wasn't ranked when Williams knocked him out (he was ranked after he beat Williams in a rematch, though).

Cleveland williams was only 20 years old and took the fight on less than 24 hour notice against a seasoned contender in bob satterfield in 1954. its quite safe to say williams was extremely green when tangeled with bob, kind of like ali was green when he was floored by sonny banks. Im 20 1/2 years old, and I am certainly not anywhere near my physical peak yet. not until at least 25 years old. Willaims was only 200lb when he fought satterfield, he filled out to a muscular 215lb frame by the time he was 25 years old.

Fact is that his record against contenders is pretty bad.

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 07:05 PM

Finally I might add, Dont forget lennox was embarrasingly knocked out by one punch from two mediocre heavyweights. This never happened to liston. Liston faced tougher competition and fought younger prime contenders whom he dominated with ease, while lennox struggled with guys his whole career(outboxed by bruno, robbed against mercer, struggled badly vs old holyfield, outboxed by clumsly vitali, knocked out twice by two mediocre heavyweights in his prime)

Liston faced better competition?
Okay - let's invest. I will list the names that Lewis beat, for every one of them you provide a name that Liston beat that is at least as good or better, alright? If you can list names in addition to that, you receive extra points. Here we go.

Lewis beat:
Weaver
Ruddock (ranked)
Mason
Tucker (ranked)
Bruno (ranked)
McCall (ranked)
Mercer (ranked)
Morrison (ranked)
Akinwande (ranked)
Golota (ranked)
Grant (ranked)
Tua (ranked)
Briggs (ranked)
Holyfield I (ranked)
Holyfield II (ranked)
Botha
Rahman (ranked)
Tyson (ranked)
V. Klitschko (ranked)

Looking forward to what names you will come up with to show Liston faced tougher opposition. Include if they were ranked in the Ring top10 when they and Liston fought, as i did with Lewis.

This is untrue. ever heard of Nino Valdez? Mike Dejohn? both big punchers.

Valdez was 34, but he still had his tremendous power and physical presense at 6'4 211lb. Just a year earlier valdez knocked out 3 rated heavyweight contenders(harold carter, pat mcmurty, mike dejohn) and would knock out brian london a year after losing to liston. I dont know if you have seen valdez on film, but not only was he a big heavyweight, the man could hit like a truck. I have film of valdez vs jackson and he was a terrific puncher.
Valdes stood with one foot in retirement. He retired 4 months after the Liston fight, doesn't that tell you something?
DeJohn was a good puncher although his KO record is little over 50%.

"Being hit by Liston," Valdez observed, "was like being kicked by a mule. By the time I fought Liston I was over the hill. I hit him a couple of solid shots and he did not buckle. Sonny was the strongest man I ever fought and he was very tough. When I fought him I still could hit very hard but my reflexes were not there anymore."- Nino Valdez

As you see Valdez still was a terrfic puncher when he fought liston, and liston took his best punches
I don't see it, sorry. Valdes was way past his prime and practically retired. A quote where he says he isn't doesn't prove shit. Actions speak louder than words. The action? He retired 4 months later. :good

Mike Dejohn though no world beater, was a 6'3 respectible contender and a very hard puncher. liston took his best punches. granite chinned george chuvalo called mike dejohn "the hardest hitter i ever faced".

Okay, so if i gift you Valdes, then you have 4 punchers on his record, one of which with a 50% ko ratio. How does that compare to the something like 12 punchers on Lewis' record?

Liston tangled with about 15 men over 210lb during his career and dominated them all outside of ali. 3 of them being contenders williams, valdez, dejohn. hell you could even throw giants wepner, G zech in their for they were ranked in the top 10 righ around the time they fought sonny.
Wepner wasn't ranked. Look up the rankings. And why should he be? Getting knocked out by a guy with 4 pro fights in your 30th isn't impressive, neither is losing to "King" Jose Roman.

I give sonny the edge here. I disagree Liston having better power, but since this is very subjective, let's go on.

I saw alot less flaws in listons boxing skills/technique than i did in lennox who had many flaws which explains why guys like "poor mans sonny liston" ray mercer and frank bruno outboxed him in his prime. liston outboxed master boxer eddie machen easily over 12 rounds. Liston was a lot more polished an controlled and powerful with his jab than lennox. Liston didnt have bad habits like dropped his left after jabbing like lennox did. Liston was like joe louis, he stalked his prey, slowly and surely. He would sitback at times on his backfoot and jab, but usually he was stalking his prey. He was very calm cool collective in his style. I saw liston put together 4-5 punch fight ending combinations against cleveland williams, floyd patterson, roy harris. Watch his peak fight vs wayne bethea, I see liston connect on bethea with a left right left right left hook 5 punch combination that backs him into the ropes before he floors him. Not to mention some of listons best preformances arnt on film(folley, dejohn) so we dont have full film to judge like we do with lennox. According to papers, liston finished folley with a vicious 4 punch combination.

I might add Lennox nearly lost to a old holyfield(who resembled nothing like a peak sonny liston), and he got outboxed by a "poor mans liston" in ray mercer who was only 6'1(like liston) with a good jab(like liston).

It's funny that you keep referring to fights that Lewis won as "being outboxed". By the way, the fight with Bruno was pretty much even, 3-3 or 4-2 at best for Bruno. Hardly mattered though, since he was knocked out a round later.
You don't need to "add" that Lewis got "outboxed" by Mercer, you've only said it like 4 times yet. Liston was 6'0, by the way.

And no, Liston didn't throw 4-5 punch combinations to end the fight with Williams. He threw one punch at a time, 4 or 5 times in a row, different thing. And why do you keep brining up fights that Liston had with journeymen like Bethea? You won't hear me about how impressive Lewis was against Calvin Jones or Tyrell Biggs.

Also interesting that these flaws in Lewis' style you see, were never exploited in 45 fights. McCall landed a blind punch during an exchange (at a time when Lewis' style was flawed) and Rahman just caught him cold with a punch. The only flaw you could point out here is that he was too arrogant at times.

In the end, the only skilled and ranked boxer that Liston outboxed was 195lbs Eddie Machen. Wow.

Disagree, I think liston at his absolute best(bethea fight) had better faster handspeed than lennox. Liston was very trim 204lb and looked fast.

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree here; i think Lewis had better handspeed, easily, even at 245lbs, not 204lbs.

This easily goes to liston. He took williams, valdez, dejohns best punches without blinking. lennox was knocked out by one punch twice in his prime by medioocre heavyweights.

Again another great performance of taking the best of one and the worst of the other and matching it up. How about Lewis took flush punches from Briggs, Tua, Klitschko, Mason, Mercer, Tyson, Bruno, Grant, Morrison and others without going down? Liston was never that proven.
How about Liston being knocked out cold by the first contender he faced since he was 32?

Liston gets the edge here. He had very suttle fluid "joe louis stalk you prey like" footwork. Liston was very balanced and moved in and out very calm and collectivley. never made a mistake. I think liston was more versatile.

Yeah, right.
Liston was slow as fuck. His footwork was nothing special. Look at how he chases Ali around like a mummy. He never showed the adaptability that Lewis did. Did he box off the backfoot for 12 rounds without being caught on the ropes on a single occasion like Lewis did against Tua? Did he fight in a totally different style in a rematch like Lewis did with Rahman and McCall?

lewis was more proven against big heavyweights, but then again against smaller heavyweights lennox struggled. he struggled incredibly with 36 year old ray mercer and 38 year old evander holyfield, all men around the same size as liston.

I think liston was more proven vs big punchers, he proved he could take a punch. lennox did not.

Lewis struggled with Holyfield? He won the first fight by domination, and the second where he fought Holyfield's fight still by a comfortable 8-4 or 7-5 decision. Sorry, but that's not struggling. And i don't see how Mercer is small at 6'1 220+lbs. By that definition, ALL of Liston's opponents were small.

Lewis proved to be able to take a punch as well and on much more occasions than Liston. Ever had statistics? Then you will know that Liston looks a lot better here only because he only faced one or two big punchers whereas Lewis faced a ton of them.

I would say even

Any arguments for why they are even in stamina?

size isnt a big factor, lennox struggled with 6'1 215lb men(38 year old holyfield, 36 year old mercer). Besides Liston had the same reach as lennox both 84" which every way you try to spin it. look at the film, whitehurst fight liston looks like his arms could reach halfway across the ring thats how long his arms look. he was a freak of nature, they do come around a couple times every 50 years(liston was one of em). Liston has same reach as lennox. Williams reach was 82" listons was 84". deal with it, the tale of the tape doesnt lie.

Again, he didn't struggle with Holyfield. Mercer profited from the fact that Lewis did all he could to knock him out as well as the fight being 10 rounds (but Lewis still won).

I already adressed the reach-point. The tale of the tape measures wing-span, not actual boxing reach which includes height, shoulder size, back size, etc.

As for size not being a factor...
Convenient position coming from someone supporting Liston, who had only a handful of wins against 210+lbs opponents that were ranked in the top ten. Did i say a hand full? I meant a grand total of ONE.

ChrisPontius

12-06-2007, 07:06 PM

Liston IMO fought just as good if not better quality contenders than lennox did but the difference here is liston dominated them while lennox struggled/lost with many of them. Liston dominated themm all easily with no controversy, lennox had some controversial close matches and was knocked out twice.
Okay - i will adress this after you've filled in the earlier thing about who faced better opposition.

I would say even

:lol: :lol: :patsch
The man quit on his stool at least once and may have given up in the rematch. Yet he is even with Lewis, who never showed anything remotely close to giving up? That's a joke. Your bias is incredible. You have a way of twisting facts for them to suit your arguments. When you want to prove Walcott is better than Charles, you count the Johnson win over Charles against him while most papers thought Charles won, but the first Walcott loss against Louis of course is a win for Walcott. No one will take you serious with this kind of reasoning.

Vanboxingfan

12-06-2007, 11:08 PM

the two fighters most resembling liston that lewis fought both had him out like a little faggot bitch, crying on the canvas.

How objective.

Woddy

12-06-2007, 11:42 PM

Okay - i will adress this after you've filled in the earlier thing about who faced better opposition.

:lol: :lol: :patsch
The man quit on his stool at least once and may have given up in the rematch. Yet he is even with Lewis, who never showed anything remotely close to giving up? That's a joke. Your bias is incredible. You have a way of twisting facts for them to suit your arguments. When you want to prove Walcott is better than Charles, you count the Johnson win over Charles against him while most papers thought Charles won, but the first Walcott loss against Louis of course is a win for Walcott. No one will take you serious with this kind of reasoning.

I have to applaud Chris here. Not taking sides, but SuzieQ certainly has to rethink the way he goes about getting his points across.

SuzieQ49

12-06-2007, 11:46 PM

No need to rethink. Anyone can nitpick Bias out of someones posts, its quite clear chris pontius is a big fan of lennox, while im a big fan of sonny and neither of us will change our minds. As Ron Burgundy said "agree to disagree"

I will respond to your points chris.

brownpimp88

12-06-2007, 11:47 PM

Lennox definetly has the better resume between the two.

Woddy

12-06-2007, 11:52 PM

[quote=SuzieQ49]I dont think so, both are 1 punch knockout losses at/near his prime to two ordinary heavyweights.

Okay so Lewis was near his prime against Rahman at age 35, and only 3 fights away from the end of his career, yet you say that Liston at age 32, and maybe 15 fights away from the end of his career was past it?

Let me make it clear that I agree Liston was past his best against Ali, but it has to work both ways.

By the way, the McCall fight was not exactly a one punch KO. Lewis lost that fight on his feet, and had his hands up ready to continue.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:05 AM

SuzieQ, what you do is wave away all negative aspects of Listons career and highlight the positives, then talk all about the bad things that happened to Lewis and ignore the good things. That's not an objective discussion.

I could say the same about you trying to focus all the attention on listons fights with Ali.

He was just as rusty and a grand total of 3 pounds heavier than when he stopped Patterson in one round in their rematch. How is coming off your career most impressive performance & win "far past your prime"?

And even so, does that mean we should just ignore it?

Yes. Liston entering the first Ali fight had fought a grand total of EIGHT rounds in the past 4 years! if thats not rust I dont know what is! 218lb is 7-15lb heavier than the average he had been weighing in in the late 1958-1960.

I think Sonny was past his prime by the 2nd patterson fight, he looked a bit soft. the fact that he flattened patterson again showed how devastating he is even not at his best.

Sonny Listons prime was 1958-1960

Ring magazine didn't have him ranked and i'm not surprised considering the mediocrity of his record.

I know that you wish it to be true, but Summerlin wasn't a ranked contender when him and Liston fought, either. He would be ranked later briefly, but that's not how it works.

Marshall still knocked Liston down in the rematch, by the way.

Liston's early opposition was impressive (considering Liston's experience, that is), no doubt there.

Quote:

- Summerlin was a terrific boxer, 22-1 I believe when he fought Sonny. He wasted a lot of potential, but at one point he really made a run and came close for a title shot, with his talent he was easily good enough.

Marshall was ranked # 9 Lightheavyweight divison when he fought sonny

- Yes a flash knockdown.

Interesting that Liston's blatant quitting is irrelevant because he was "far past his prime" and a grand total of 3 pounds overweight, while whatever lack of motivation Lewis had for the Rahman bout doesn't matter, nevermind that he was 3 years old than Liston was against Ali?

And what is your evidence that Liston's jaw was broken in the 1st? According to Boxrec it was probably broken in the 4th.

Liston overcoming Williams pounding him is impressive, but come on Suzie. You have to admit that Lewis is not only far more proven in this area but never quit like Liston did, either.

Listons best weight was 204-212lb 1958-1960

Well Liston-Ali bouts are very controversial. While I have no doubt the 2nd bout liston took a dive, I think the first fight was legit. However its clear liston was far past his prime and this was clear in listons camp by that time. He had slowed down so much that listons trainers told the sparring partners to slow down their punches try to make liston appear faster than he was to help sonnys confidence. btw i do penalize liston a bit for his quit job against ali.

Then again, Liston was knocked out cold by Hasim Rahman. Liston never suffered a loss like this to this caliber a fighter while near his prime.

Lennox may have been 35 when he fought rahman, but most liston supporters claim liston primed right around this time and that the tua preformance(a year before) was one of his best showings. or do you believe lennox was past his prime at this point?

That "outboxed him for 10 rounds" only happened in your mind, sorry. Most people agree that Lewis won the fight by a small margin. And this poor man's Liston takes a better shot than him which was very relevant in this fight. And how did Lewis look beat mentally? He fought well during the last three rounds (when he should've been beaten mentally) and he didn't keep sitting on his stool like Liston did.

I actually know quite a few who thought mercer won the fight. Mercer outjabbed him the whole fight.

takes a better shot? thats pure speculation

Lennox was frustrated the whole fight, because 36 year old mercer had a great game plan similiar to bruno's and was outjabbing and outboxing him.

Yeah, he got off the canvas to beat an undersized journeyman, very impressive.

I can guarantee that if Lewis got knocked down by Michael Simuwelu in his 10th pro fight but still knocked him out and avenged it, you would be talking all this about how Lewis was knocked down by a journeyman etc, not about "Lewis got up to win".

What is the relevance there anyway?
Jeffries never got up to win either. Does anyone doubt Jeffries' heart? All it means is that Lewis didn't get knocked down by inferior fighters like Liston did in this case. Lewis has shown on various occasions to come back from behind and never quit, that is enough for me.

I am simply stating a fact. May not hold alot of weight, but its a relevant fact in this discussion.

- Proving you can get off the canvas and win a fight is huge, its all mental toughness. When your on the floor, your dangerously close to losing....you have to fight through adversity not only to get back up but to stick to your game plan and not get frustrated about being knocked down and falling apart there.

Lewis didn't get knocked down by inferior fighters like Liston did in this case.

Liston didn't get knocked out by inferior fighters like lennox did.

Williams didn't have "about an 82" reach", he had an 80 inch reach.
And as you can see on these pictures, Liston does NOT have the longer arms:

Liston had a 84" reach. it was measured many times, tale of the tapes and papers dont lie if all of them agree listons reach was 84". New York times described williams as having an "82 reach".

Liston in the white trunks, Williams in the black trunks. As you can see, Williams has no trouble reaching the "84 inch reach" Liston despite that his arm isn't even fully extended whereas Liston is, because he has to punch upward (and would have to even further against Lewis).

And no, i won't forget that he destroyed Williams twice, because it's just about the only point which you keep brining up. Did i mention that Williams wasn't a top 10 ranked contender at that point ?

Actually listons arm isnt extended either, you can see his elbow bent. besides they both were at a different angle while throwing the punch so we arnt able to get proper judgement. so this arguement is flawed.

Fact remains liston has an 84" reach

- your right, rankings were flawed back then. they were flawed and most of the time the unchallenged overhyped white fighters got the benefit of the doubt while the proven avoided more talented black fighters were left off.

I dont think you could name me 5 heavyweights(outside of liston) that could have beat cleveland williams in 1960

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:07 AM

Okay so Lewis was near his prime against Rahman at age 35, and only 3 fights away from the end of his career, yet you say that Liston at age 32, and maybe 15 fights away from the end of his career was past it?

Let me make it clear that I agree Liston was past his best against Ali, but it has to work both ways.

By the way, the McCall fight was not exactly a one punch KO. Lewis lost that fight on his feet, and had his hands up ready to continue.

so woody, your logic is a fighters prime is all about how old they are?

Everyone primes differently. Many Lennox supporters think of him as a late bloomers whose prime was in his early-mid 30s.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:08 AM

By the way, the McCall fight was not exactly a one punch KO. Lewis lost that fight on his feet, and had his hands up ready to continue.
Top

HA! you mean the way he looked at the ref glassy eyed like he didnt know where he was with his body falling backward and forward cause his legs had turned to jelly? he was out on his feet, good call by the referee.

The mere fact lennox suffered two one punch knockout losses to rahman and mccall shows you he would at the very least be vunerable to getting knocked out by a great puncher like liston

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:21 AM

Yeah, Botha look like a philsbury doughboy and you were laughing all the time. Of course, when that monster of a journeyman, the 5'7 195lbs Albert Westphal got into the picture your jaw dropped from being impressed. Nice objective analysis again.

Westphal was not 5'7. Westphal looked like a fighter, he had muscle tone and was cut. Botha was a joke.

Liston faster hands that Lewis? I suggest you re-watch the film in an objective way.

I did. It appears you should take off those rose coloured glasses and look at the film again. This time a 1958-1960 Liston.

I see you left out Tua, Klitschko, Rahman, Briggs, Bruno and Tyson.

p.s. Golota was more athletically talented than anyone Liston ever faced excluding Ali. The way he beat Bowe on the inside, outside, everywhere from pillar to post is more impressive than anyone Williams ever did.

No I included these men. They are all big punchers. However it must be noted most of these guys did not connect on lennox, and the some that did staggered lennox badly but didnt have the finishing skills to finish him off. Lennox has very good defense, very underated in this department, he was able to survive against all these punchers because he protected his weak chin with solid defense.

p.s. Golota was more athletically talented than anyone Liston ever faced excluding Ali. The way he beat Bowe on the inside, outside, everywhere from pillar to post is more impressive than anyone Williams ever did.

More athletically talented? this is debatable, as golota looked pretty crude in the ring compared to a master stylist like zora folley and eddie machen, not to mention floyd patterson.

Bowe was shot, he looked awful. I felt so bad for bowe, he was damaged goods by the age of 27. Many heavyweights in the world would have beat him in 1996.

May I add Golota lost to bowe, so two DQ losses to a shot version of bowe is not more impressive than williams demolition of 6'6 ernie terell.

Yeah, okay. Too bad that despite his enormous power, he has a grand total of zero knockouts against a contender. In case you're brining up Terrel now, he wasn't ranked when Williams knocked him out (he was ranked after he beat Williams in a rematch, though).

If you go by the monthly ratings and not the yearly ratings, he has knockout wins over rated contenders. Terell was 23-3 when he fought williams and was in the monthly ratings, no exuses.

- Terell-Williams rematch was a good one........williams knocked him down and appeared to earn the victory, but a hotly contested split decision was awared to terell.

Fact is when Cleveland Williams stepped up in competition in his prime he looked great. He gave a peak sonny liston his two toughest fights, fought a draw against master boxer top contender eddie machen, and went 1-1 with terell in a series that should have gone 2-0 in williams favor.

Its not secret that Damato ducked williams like the plague.

Fact is that his record against contenders is pretty bad.

Look at his matches in his prime 1957-1963 and you will see he did extremley well when he stepped up in competition. that is unless you want to count post 1964 fights when he had a bullet lodged in his back?

Vanboxingfan

12-07-2007, 12:54 AM

HA! you mean the way he looked at the ref glassy eyed like he didnt know where he was with his body falling backward and forward cause his legs had turned to jelly? he was out on his feet, good call by the referee.

The mere fact lennox suffered two one punch knockout losses to rahman and mccall shows you he would at the very least be vunerable to getting knocked out by a great puncher like liston

There's an interesting field that's been around for sometime now called stats. One of the many concepts in stats is called probabilities. I would suggest that although Lewis could possibly get knocked out in a mythical match up against Liston, it's highly probable that this doesn't happen.

By way of an exercise let's take some ball park numbers. Fights, Lewis was in 44 fights. In the first Holyfield fight it was reported that Holyfield landed 130 punches, in the Tyson fight, Tyson landed 49 punches, so let's assume about 50 punches were landed each fight, which I think is ridiculously low, and we'll assume 25 of those are power punches. So we have a bear minimum of 44*25 = 1100 punches. Let's round it down to a 1,000 punches of which 2 K0'd him. That's a .2% chance that a punch is going to KO Lewis. So betting that Sonny is going to KO Lewis, doesn't look like a money maker to me. Now I know the quality of a fighter makes a difference, but Lewis fought many of his fights against ranked fighters. And even it non ranked fighters are excluded, you'd be hard pressed to break that elussive 1% mark on a punches landed basis. Now if you go a step further and say he was KO'd twice in 44 fights, that's still only a 5% probability that he'd get KO'd by Liston. And if you say what about the quality of fighter, and may the assumption that many Lewis haters do, that both McCall and Rahman are second rate, than no elite fighter ever knocked him out, so why assume Liston would be the first. So if you want to use the results of the McCall and Rahman fight to extrapolate an outcome, this is where it leads to.

Woddy

12-07-2007, 12:55 AM

[quote=SuzieQ49]so woody, your logic is a fighters prime is all about how old they are?

Well, You're logic seems to be that a man who comes off the best win of his career is past his prime, as was the case with Liston after beating Patterson.

Everyone primes differently. Many Lennox supporters think of him as a late bloomers whose prime was in his early-mid 30s.

True, but I think the general concences is that he was in his prime somewhere between 1995-1998. By the time he fought Rahman in 2001, he was 5 months away from turning 36, and only 2 years and 3 fights away from retirement. I'm not saying that he was shot by any means, but he certainly wasn't in his prime. But of course Liston who was coming off the best win of his career at age 32, and with a number of fights to go was past it. You can't have it both ways.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:55 AM

Liston faced better competition?
Okay - let's invest. I will list the names that Lewis beat, for every one of them you provide a name that Liston beat that is at least as good or better, alright? If you can list names in addition to that, you receive extra points. Here we go.

Lewis beat:
Weaver
Ruddock (ranked)
Mason
Tucker (ranked)
Bruno (ranked)
McCall (ranked)
Mercer (ranked)
Morrison (ranked)
Akinwande (ranked)
Golota (ranked)
Grant (ranked)
Tua (ranked)
Briggs (ranked)
Holyfield I (ranked)
Holyfield II (ranked)
Botha
Rahman (ranked)
Tyson (ranked)
V. Klitschko (ranked)

Looking forward to what names you will come up with to show Liston faced tougher opposition. Include if they were ranked in the Ring top10 when they and Liston fought, as i did with Lewis.

2 things.........

- rankings were flawed back then. they were flawed and most of the time the unchallenged overhyped white fighters got the benefit of the doubt while the proven avoided more talented black fighters were left off. There were some fighters that liston may have beat(that werent ranked in the top 10) yet their werent 5 heavyweights in the world at the time that could beat them. This happened alot in joe louis reign. Guys like harry bobo, Lee Q murray, turkey Thompson getting screwed. same with marcianos reign guys like bob baker and clarence henry getting screwed.

- 2ndly, It should be added liston also lost to rahman and mccall

Lewis beat:
Weaver
Ruddock (ranked)
Mason
Tucker (ranked)
Bruno (ranked)
McCall (ranked)
Mercer (ranked)
Morrison (ranked)
Akinwande (ranked)
Golota (ranked)
Grant (ranked)
Tua (ranked)
Briggs (ranked)
Holyfield I (ranked)
Holyfield II (ranked)
Botha
Rahman (ranked)
Tyson (ranked)
V. Klitschko (ranked)

Liston beat

26 year old Floyd Patterson 2x- better than any heavyweight on that list, including a 38 year old holyfield.

27 year old Eddie Machen - Better than 7/8 of that list

26 year old Zora Folley- Better than 7/8 of that list

26 year old Cleveland Williams 2x- Better than 7/8 of that list.

34 year old Nino Valdez- lets call him and 34 year old frank bruno a push. both big punchers with strong jabs.

24 year old Wayne Bethea

23 year old Johnny Summerlin 2x

27 year old Mike Dejohn

25 year old Roy Harris

all of these men were top 10 heavyweights in the world(regardless of ranking) when liston tangled with them.

others:

Henry Clark
Gerhard Zhech
Bert Whitehurst
Willie Besmanoff
Chuck Wepner
Albert Westphal

Lennox may have the edge in depth, but liston has the edge in quality.

Take note: All except 1 of these opponents liston beat were at the prime of there careers, while many of those top notch names on lennox resume were not near there primes when they tangled with lennox.

lets take a look..........

Lennox beat

38 year old evander holyfield- Many ringsiders scored the 2nd fightfor holyfield, and this series could easily be 1-1. Holyfield would lose to ruiz shortly afterward, he was defintley over the hill. coming into the lennox bout he looked dreadful against vaugn bean.

33 year old frank bruno

36 year old ray mercer

34 year old vitali klitschko

32 year old francis Botha

36 year old tony tucker

37 year old mike tyson

40 year old mike weaver

Tommy Morrison- Sick with a disease when he fought Sonny

All of the top men Sonny liston beat(outside of 34 year old nino valdez) were under the age of 30.

Domination:

Sonny Liston dominated all of the top men he beat without any controversy.

Williams 2x , patterson 2x, harris, folley, bethea, dejohn, Valdez all fell in 6 rounds or less

The decision over eddie machen, Liston won 10 out of the 12 rounds against a master boxer.

He won 2 close decisions over johnny summerlin in his closest bouts, but this was sonnys 6th and 7th pro fights.

Muhammad Ali- quit on his stool in 7th with scorecards even, but ali in command clearly.

As you see Lennox didnt have anywhere near this kind of domination against top fighters he faced

Vitali Klitschko- outboxed and Behind on scorecards. in fairness lennox was over the hill.

Frank Bruno- outboxed....I dont know if you seen the fight, but Bruno clearly won at least 4 of the first 6 rounds. thanx to lennox finally utilizing his underated left hook he finished off bruno. again a tense struggle.

evander holyfield- very close 2nd fight, holy was 38 and looked old and battle worn

oliver mccall- knocked out with one punch

hasim rahman- knocked out by one punch

ray mercer- dead even fight, huge struggle against 36 year old mercer. outboxed.

still as you see lennox clearly struggled alot more against top opponents than liston did

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:58 AM

True, but I think the general concences is that he was in his prime somewhere between 1995-1998. By the time he fought Rahman in 2001, he was 5 months away from turning 36, and only 2 years and 3 fights away from retirement. I'm not saying that he was shot by any means, but he certainly wasn't in his prime. But of course Liston who was coming off the best win of his career at age 32, and with a number of fights to go was past it. You can't have it both ways.

Classic Lennox nuthugger trying to put his prime 'inbetween' his 2 embarrasing knockout losses. you admit his prime was around the time when 36 year old ray mercer outjabbed and outboxed lennox lewis? and around the time lennox struggled vastly against 38 year old evander holyfield in a match many believe holy should have got the nod(i had it 114-114)

Sonny Listons prime was 1958-1960. not that after 1960....he fought only a total of 8 rounds until 1964! EIGHT ROUNDS IN FOUR YEARS!! if thats not rusty i dont know what is. He got older during these years, got overweight, and looked slower and less sharp in the ring by 1964.

Liston was also around 34 when he fought ali, not 32. his birth certificate was misplaced and many people misguide the year he was born.

Woddy

12-07-2007, 01:07 AM

[quote=SuzieQ49]HA! you mean the way he looked at the ref glassy eyed like he didnt know where he was with his body falling backward and forward cause his legs had turned to jelly? he was out on his feet, good call by the referee.

Yeah laugh it up. You already made a fool out of yourself by saying that it was " a one punch knockout"

The mere fact lennox suffered two one punch knockout losses to rahman and mccall shows you he would at the very least be vunerable to getting knocked out by a great puncher like liston

First of all, you keep repeating yourself like a broken record by saying that Lewis suffered a one punch knockout against McCall. Just in case you don't know the difference ( and you clearly don't ), a fight isn't ruled a knockout when a guy is standing on his feet. This is just plain nonsense. Also, Lewis was fairly close to the same age that Liston was when he was Ko'd by Leotis Martin. Now I don't count that fight for much, but I just want to point out how you constantly neglect to look at it both ways.

Secondly, you keep refering to only two of Lewis's fights with big hitters, but fail to address that he fought at least a dozen other big hitters. Tell me, have you ever heard of, Frank Bruno, Tommy Morrison, Gary Mason, Razor Ruddock, Vitali Klitschko, Shanon Briggs or David Tua? Liston never took shots from that many big hitters. No way in hell. You debate with a one way pattern of thinking. You never seem to look at the whole picture from both sides of the coin.

Woddy

12-07-2007, 01:18 AM

Classic Lennox nuthugger trying to put his prime 'inbetween' his 2 embarrasing knockout losses. you admit his prime was around the time when 36 year old ray mercer outjabbed and outboxed lennox lewis? and around the time lennox struggled vastly against 38 year old evander holyfield in a match many believe holy should have got the nod(i had it 114-114)

I'm not a Lewis nuthugger. Nice try at attempting to turn the tables here, when the real issue, is your inability to argue with unbiased reasoning. Thats the difference between you and I. I look at the whole picture, you only look at what you want to look at when it conveinences you. And oh, if you honestly saw the first Holyfield fight, I think that youd agree that that fight wasn't even close.

[QUOTE]Sonny Listons prime was 1958-1960. not that after 1960....he fought only a total of 8 rounds until 1964! EIGHT ROUNDS IN FOUR YEARS!! if thats not rusty i dont know what is. He got older during these years, got overweight, and looked slower and less sharp in the ring by 1964.

I understand that, and had you been listening, I already AGREED WITH YOU that Liston was past his prime against Ali. My only point is that you can't go around calling a guy who's nearly 36 years old, and at the end of his career prime, while calling another guy who's 32, and with 5 years left in him past it. As I already stated IT WORKS BOTH WAYS...BOTH WAYS... BOTH WAYS... BOTH WAYS....

Liston was also around 34 when he fought ali, not 32. his birth certificate was misplaced and many people misguide the year he was born.[

Believe it or not, some people even speculate that he was even older than 34 when he fought Ali. This information was inconclusive however, and never truly proven. Now I believe that he probably was older than 32, given that he came from a family if 25 children and had no real documentation of date of birth. It was common among large families of low income in those days. This is still not my point though.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 01:19 AM

It's funny that you keep referring to fights that Lewis won as "being outboxed". By the way, the fight with Bruno was pretty much even, 3-3 or 4-2 at best for Bruno. Hardly mattered though, since he was knocked out a round later.
You don't need to "add" that Lewis got "outboxed" by Mercer, you've only said it like 4 times yet. Liston was 6'0, by the way.

liston was 6'0 1/2 rounded up to 6'1. many papers had him listed as 6'1.

bruno fight pretty much even? then im guessing you simply looked at boxrec and didnt watch the fight. bruno badly outboxed lennox for 6 rounds until lennox got smart and unleashed his left hook.

Valdes stood with one foot in retirement. He retired 4 months after the Liston fight, doesn't that tell you something?
DeJohn was a good puncher although his KO record is little over 50%.

yes it tells me valdez took a horrible beating from liston and that he realized he had no shot at the heavyweight title with liston in the picture.

your dodging the fact Sonny Liston beat wayne bethea, Mike Dejohn 2x, Harold Carter, Pat Mccmutry. Since I know that you like to go by "ring rankings" mcmutry was ranked 5th when valdez knocked him out in 1 round, and dejohn was ranked 7th when valdez twice beat him, and wayne bethea was ranked 8th when valdez beat him. all this occured just one year before he fought sonny.

Nino Valdez was ranked # 2 entering 1959 the year sonny liston fought him, so whether you think valdez dramatically lost all his abilities in months, its quite clear that valdez was still a big damaging dangerous puncher when he fought liston as evidence by his victories over contenders in a year span window around the time he fought liston.

Ever think he retired after one more fight after liston(in which he knocked out brian london) because liston beat him up so bad he forced valdez into retirement?

I don't see it, sorry. Valdes was way past his prime and practically retired. A quote where he says he isn't doesn't prove shit. Actions speak louder than words. The action? He retired 4 months later.

perhaps you dont see it because the fog that wreaks of bias is clouding your vision? I explained to you that valdez was knocking out legite contenders months leading up to the sonny liston bout and entering the beginning of the year was himself ranked # 2. Valdez clearly was still a one of the best punchers in the divsion and had the size(6'3 215lb).

Okay, so if i gift you Valdes, then you have 4 punchers on his record, one of which with a 50% ko ratio. How does that compare to the something like 12 punchers on Lewis' record?

It compares favorably when you consider 2 of those times lennox was knocked out cold by one punch

Liston took williams, dejohns, valdez flush punches without blinking. Hell even hard punching floyd patterson hit liston a couple times and liston laughed.

For what its worth, in the amatuers liston faced 6'4 220lb olympic champion ed sanders and boxed ed sanders ears off for an easy decision, this was liston without world class training beating a huge powerful olympic champion with his jab and natural talent alone. pretty impressive. ed sanders would have been a great pro if not for his shortened career.

It's funny that you keep referring to fights that Lewis won as "being outboxed". By the way, the fight with Bruno was pretty much even, 3-3 or 4-2 at best for Bruno. Hardly mattered though, since he was knocked out a round later.
You don't need to "add" that Lewis got "outboxed" by Mercer, you've only said it like 4 times yet. Liston was 6'0, by the way.

And no, Liston didn't throw 4-5 punch combinations to end the fight with Williams. He threw one punch at a time, 4 or 5 times in a row, different thing. And why do you keep brining up fights that Liston had with journeymen like Bethea? You won't hear me about how impressive Lewis was against Calvin Jones or Tyrell Biggs.

Also interesting that these flaws in Lewis' style you see, were never exploited in 45 fights. McCall landed a blind punch during an exchange (at a time when Lewis' style was flawed) and Rahman just caught him cold with a punch. The only flaw you could point out here is that he was too arrogant at times.

lewis style was always flawed, just more so when he fought mccall. it wasnt blind, mccall set him up waiting for him to drop that left after he jabbed.

rahman didnt catch him with a cold punch, lennox backed up into the ropes like a clown with his hands low, he deserved it to get hit like he did.

In the end, the only skilled and ranked boxer that Liston outboxed was 195lbs Eddie Machen. Wow.

He didnt have to outbox them, he knocked them out. ranked and skilled boxers floyd patterson and zora folley fell victim in less than 4 rounds.

And no, Liston didn't throw 4-5 punch combinations to end the fight with Williams. He threw one punch at a time, 4 or 5 times in a row, different thing. And why do you keep brining up fights that Liston had with journeymen like Bethea? You won't hear me about how impressive Lewis was against Calvin Jones or Tyrell Biggs.

Liston threw a 4 punch combination that had williams head buzzing right before the the first left hook to put him down. you say one at a time, but foreman threw one a time, and he got the job done. Liston mixed it up, ive seen him throw 4-5 punch combinations a number of times while other times he threw clubbing haymaker after haymaker. He hit so damm hard it go the job done. Liston had excellent punching technique. watch the 2nd patterson fight liston puts floyd down with a 4 punch combo.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 01:20 AM

Yeah laugh it up. You already made a fool out of yourself by saying that it was " a one punch knockout"

you just made a bigger fool out of yourself. it was a one punch kayo! one punch and it ended the fight, the ref stopped the fight, with lennox out on his feet after one right hand put him down!

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 01:24 AM

Also, Lewis was fairly close to the same age that Liston was when he was Ko'd by Leotis Martin.

depending on when you believe sonny liston was born, liston was around 40-41 years old when he fought leotis. lennox was retired by age 37.

Secondly, you keep refering to only two of Lewis's fights with big hitters, but fail to address that he fought at least a dozen other big hitters. Tell me, have you ever heard of, Frank Bruno, Tommy Morrison, Gary Mason, Razor Ruddock, Vitali Klitschko, Shanon Briggs or David Tua? Liston never took shots from that many big hitters. No way in hell. You debate with a one way pattern of thinking. You never seem to look at the whole picture from both sides of the coin.
Top

Yes i have heard of those fighters. ive seen all those fights. Some of those fights lennox struggled, some of those fights those guys werent at there best when they fought lennox.

he didnt take shots, he didnt get hit flush that much and when he did he was staggered. fact is lennox had very good defense and this prevented him from getting his average chin exposed.

Lennox didnt have a glass tommy morrison type jaw, but it certainly was not a very good one. His chin was average

And oh, if you honestly saw the first Holyfield fight, I think that youd agree that that fight wasn't even close.

were not talking about the first holy fight. were talking about the 2nd holy fight.

keep up the good discussions

dmt

12-07-2007, 01:37 AM

Suzie, Liston was also stopped by Ali by the "Phantom" punch

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 01:39 AM

DMT

"Tunney beat a shot dempsey cunt!!!!"

Woddy

12-07-2007, 01:39 AM

you just made a bigger fool out of yourself. it was a one punch kayo! one punch and it ended the fight, the ref stopped the fight, with lennox out on his feet after one right hand put him down!

Below is a link to boxrec. Click on it, and you'll find Lennox Lewis's record. Search for the loss to Oliver McCall. The result in the right column is highlighted in red. It clearly says TKO, which stands for technical knockout. If the abreviation was KO, then it would be a knockout.

Send me a private message if you need any help,:good

[Only registered and activated users can see links]

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 01:42 AM

fact is one punch ended the fight which ever way you spin it. that one punch was the reason the fight ended.

dmt

12-07-2007, 01:48 AM

DMT

"Tunney beat a shot dempsey cunt!!!!":lol:

dmt

12-07-2007, 01:57 AM

though Suzie that is getting a bit old now

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 02:08 AM

yo do you know where I can find the full conversation you posed that time? i orginally had it and used to make a joke out of it, but its been 8 months since i last came on and cant find it

dmt

12-07-2007, 02:11 AM

yo do you know where I can find the full conversation you posed that time? i orginally had it and used to make a joke out of it, but its been 8 months since i last came on and cant find it:lol: it got wiped out, so did the entire site a few months ago :lol: :lol: :lol: :rofl :rofl :rofl

OLD FOGEY

12-07-2007, 02:24 AM

depending on when you believe sonny liston was born, liston was around 40-41 years old when he fought leotis. lennox was retired by age 37.

Yes i have heard of those fighters. ive seen all those fights. Some of those fights lennox struggled, some of those fights those guys werent at there best when they fought lennox.

he didnt take shots, he didnt get hit flush that much and when he did he was staggered. fact is lennox had very good defense and this prevented him from getting his average chin exposed.

Lennox didnt have a glass tommy morrison type jaw, but it certainly was not a very good one. His chin was average

were not talking about the first holy fight. were talking about the 2nd holy fight.

keep up the good discussions

On Liston's age--someone pointed out on a thread a few months ago that Liston was not on the 1930 census. I checked up on it myself and his brothers and sisters born across the 1920's are given but Charles Liston was not born yet in 1930. I used to think he might have been born as early as 1927, but 1932 now seems the most likely date. The census would be the best evidence I think.

fists of fury

12-07-2007, 03:29 AM

Interesting that no on mention yet is made of Liston's heart. It seems Liston gets a free pass for quitting blatantly against a light hitting opponent right after his career best win.
Just compare that to Mike Tyson. Tyson fought his heart out against Douglas, but showed signs of quitting mentally against Holyfield (first time), yet still took his beating like a man. The same thing seemed to happen when he fought Lennox Lewis. It was only after that that he really lost interest in winning (but no one holds that one punch cold KO against Liston at high age against him, right?) that he started quitting.

Yes, Liston fought and finished with a broken jaw against Marshall.
Who, in case you forgot, was a journeyman that was barely over the lightheavyweight limit but he beat that big bear. Tyson also showed great heart against Bruno (I), Douglas and Botha. That doesn't stop him from getting a shitload of criticism, "Tyson couldn't handle pressure", etc when these sort of discussions come up.

Why does Liston get a free pass on this department? Because he has 15" fists? Fact is that Lewis has never been intimidated and Liston would be no different. Liston was intimated like hell by Ali and folded like a cheap suit once, perhaps twice. Liston is the one without self-confidence here. He has been controlled his entire life. Just hear him speak, he has that shy-stutter despite that he can beat the shit out of 99% of the people. You cannot ignore these factors. Lewis has proven his heart beyond any doubt in the Mercer, Bruno and Klitschko fights. Liston's is a question mark.

I'll take Lewis by knockout or decision. He has a much bigger actual reach (forget that wingspan bullshit, 6'3 80" Williams clearly had a much bigger reach than Liston) and more importantly, much faster hands. After the fight, people would comment on how remarkably small Liston looked when he got in the ring with a big heavyweight for a change. The mythical picture of a 6'8 250lbs bear was in fact 6'0 200-212lbs.

I don't like Liston's punching compared to Lewis. Lewis' was much more smooth. Watch for instance Liston finishing Williams in their second fight. It seems he pushes those right hands out, slowly telegraphed and one by one. Compare that to a finish like Lewis-Botha and you'll see the difference.

Liston has a grand total of 2 fights against punchers. Williams' career only KO is Terrel and a long string of Texas bums. Satterfield KO'd him also. Lewis faced a ton of punchers, Ruddock, Tua, Klitschko, Tyson (still good for a few rounds), Bruno, Morrison, Grant, Mercer, Briggs, Golota, Tucker, Mason, Rahman, McCall.
Lewis is the more proven man here.

Marciano gets a lot of criticism for beating small heavyweights, but how often did Liston face a 210+lbs heavyweight? One is Williams who was unranked. The other is Ali who beat the crap out of him twice.

Fantastic post.
Like you, I always have questioned Sonny's heart when the going got tough. Like all bullies, he could not take what he dished out.

Liston was as you say, also as slow as molasses. That's why he could never beat Ali on the best night he ever saw.

Lewis holds the aces here. Sonny folds after a few rounds of taking a bit of a shellacking.

ChrisPontius

12-07-2007, 07:36 AM

I could say the same about you trying to focus all the attention on listons fights with Ali.

Yes, but i don't say "Lewis' KO losses DONT COUNT!! HE WAS UNPREPARED!!" as you do with Liston quitting.

Yes. Liston entering the first Ali fight had fought a grand total of EIGHT rounds in the past 4 years! if thats not rust I dont know what is! 218lb is 7-15lb heavier than the average he had been weighing in in the late 1958-1960.

being 215lbs didn't seem to matter one bit as he still destroyed Patterson in 1 second less than the first time.

By the way, did you know that boxers spar in between fights?

I think Sonny was past his prime by the 2nd patterson fight, he looked a bit soft. the fact that he flattened patterson again showed how devastating he is even not at his best.

Sonny Listons prime was 1958-1960

Yeah, he really looked like a man past his prime when he destroyed Patterson in 100 or so seconds. :patsch

- Summerlin was a terrific boxer, 22-1 I believe when he fought Sonny. He wasted a lot of potential, but at one point he really made a run and came close for a title shot, with his talent he was easily good enough.

Marshall was ranked # 9 Lightheavyweight divison when he fought sonny

- Yes a flash knockdown.

Yeah keep talking about Liston's opponents wasting potential, "would've been" etc. Ed Sanders would've been champ right? Let's go by the facts. Summerlin was ranked for an extremely short amount of time and that was not during the Liston fights.

Listons best weight was 204-212lb 1958-1960

Well Liston-Ali bouts are very controversial. While I have no doubt the 2nd bout liston took a dive, I think the first fight was legit. However its clear liston was far past his prime and this was clear in listons camp by that time. He had slowed down so much that listons trainers told the sparring partners to slow down their punches try to make liston appear faster than he was to help sonnys confidence. btw i do penalize liston a bit for his quit job against ali.

What is your evidence that Liston's trainers told the sparring partners to slow down? I've never heard that and it sounds like the last advice i'd give if i was training him.

Certainly the press didn't think so. "Liston looked his awesome self" was the comment, as he was drilling the speed and heavy bag to the tune of Night Train.

Then again, Liston was knocked out cold by Hasim Rahman. Liston never suffered a loss like this to this caliber a fighter while near his prime.

No, then again, it's hard to lose anything when a fighters prime lasts 2 years long as you're making Liston's out to be.

Lennox may have been 35 when he fought rahman, but most liston supporters claim liston primed right around this time and that the tua preformance(a year before) was one of his best showings. or do you believe lennox was past his prime at this point?

He was a bit slower against Tua than he was against, say, McCall II or Mercer. But he was definitely in his prime, yes. His prime was from 1992 to 2003.

takes a better shot? thats pure speculation

How is that speculation? Lewis beat the crap out of him for 10 rounds with all he had (needless to say, Mercer landed plenty in return, but that's not the point here). Damiani did the same. Holyfield hit him often. Mercer's defense was weak yet he was only knocked down once in his prime, on a body shot, nothing reflecting on the chin. Wlad gave him one of the worst beatings i've ever seen a heavyweight take over 6 rounds yet he was floored only once, when he was 40. Liston never took this kind of punishment, so no, i wouldn't say it's speculation.

Lennox was frustrated the whole fight, because 36 year old mercer had a great game plan similiar to bruno's and was outjabbing and outboxing him.

Totally different fights and fighters. Mercer came forward and took everything Lewis had, while Lewis was fighting aggressive. Most of this fight took place in the trenches, not so much a jabbing contest.

Bruno stalked forward robotically and indeed he did well, but here's some news for you: winning 4 of the first 6 rounds doesn't win you a fight.

I am simply stating a fact. May not hold alot of weight, but its a relevant fact in this discussion.

- Proving you can get off the canvas and win a fight is huge, its all mental toughness. When your on the floor, your dangerously close to losing....you have to fight through adversity not only to get back up but to stick to your game plan and not get frustrated about being knocked down and falling apart there.

Since you're on Liston's side, i advise you stay away from bringing up "mental toughness". Liston doesn't score very well there.

And yeah, i rather pick someone who wasn't knocked down by a journeyman lightheavyweight and proved his heart plenty than someone who was knocked down and lost to a lightheavyweight journeyman and quit on his stool later.

Liston didn't get knocked out by inferior fighters like lennox did.

Ah yes, the great heavyweight champion 180lbs Marty Marshall wasn't inferior.

Liston had a 84" reach. it was measured many times, tale of the tapes and papers dont lie if all of them agree listons reach was 84". New York times described williams as having an "82 reach".

Actually listons arm isnt extended either, you can see his elbow bent. besides they both were at a different angle while throwing the punch so we arnt able to get proper judgement. so this arguement is flawed.

Fact remains liston has an 84" reach
[/quote]

Why do you keep repeating the same points? Liston's wasn't bent, Liston is the one on the left in case you assume that the big guy is Liston (did you notice how small Liston looks when he's in with a real heavyweight for a change?).

- your right, rankings were flawed back then. they were flawed and most of the time the unchallenged overhyped white fighters got the benefit of the doubt while the proven avoided more talented black fighters were left off.

I dont think you could name me 5 heavyweights(outside of liston) that could have beat cleveland williams in 1960

Again you base your argument on speculation which is irrelevant. The ring magazine are the most objective rankings you'll get. You think they were perfect in the 90's?

ChrisPontius

12-07-2007, 07:43 AM

Westphal was not 5'7. Westphal looked like a fighter, he had muscle tone and was cut. Botha was a joke.

Herbie Hide looked like a fighter too. But he was shit (although much more accomplished than Westphal, who would've been totally unknown if not for getting knocked out by Liston).

I did. It appears you should take off those rose coloured glasses and look at the film again. This time a 1958-1960 Liston.

Alright, well we're not gonna agree here.

No I included these men. They are all big punchers. However it must be noted most of these guys did not connect on lennox, and the some that did staggered lennox badly but didnt have the finishing skills to finish him off. Lennox has very good defense, very underated in this department, he was able to survive against all these punchers because he protected his weak chin with solid defense.

They all landed on Lewis on time or another. Just watch this video:
u4SQmxIP5Bk

More athletically talented? this is debatable, as golota looked pretty crude in the ring compared to a master stylist like zora folley and eddie machen, not to mention floyd patterson.

Golota crude? :lol:
He did it all, throw combinations, duck, slip, jab, preventing Bowe from getting his uppercuts off.
And he has a full 60 pounds on undersized heavies like Patterson.

Bowe was shot, he looked awful. I felt so bad for bowe, he was damaged goods by the age of 27. Many heavyweights in the world would have beat him in 1996.

May I add Golota lost to bowe, so two DQ losses to a shot version of bowe is not more impressive than williams demolition of 6'6 ernie terell.

Bowe was the first man to stop Holyfield in his very previous fight. Is this the same way Liston was all of a sudden way past his prime when he was beat one fight after he stopped Patterson again?
Bowe was on a steady decline from the moment he won the title, Golota was the first one to really capitalize on it.

By the way, why do you mentioned Terrel was 6'6? You don't have the bigger is better disease again have you?

If you go by the monthly ratings and not the yearly ratings, he has knockout wins over rated contenders. Terell was 23-3 when he fought williams and was in the monthly ratings, no exuses.

Just the fact that you have to go by monthly ratings shows how desperate you are to pump them up. None of them could sustain a ranking for an extended period of time.

- Terell-Williams rematch was a good one........williams knocked him down and appeared to earn the victory, but a hotly contested split decision was awared to terell.

Fact is when Cleveland Williams stepped up in competition in his prime he looked great. He gave a peak sonny liston his two toughest fights, fought a draw against master boxer top contender eddie machen, and went 1-1 with terell in a series that should have gone 2-0 in williams favor.

Its not secret that Damato ducked williams like the plague.

Look at his matches in his prime 1957-1963 and you will see he did extremley well when he stepped up in competition. that is unless you want to count post 1964 fights when he had a bullet lodged in his back?
[/quote]

Fact remains that he retired with a grand total of ONE contender beat in his entire career, zero if we go by yearly rankings. You can spin it all you want, but this is not impressive at all.

ChrisPontius

12-07-2007, 08:01 AM

2 things.........

- rankings were flawed back then. they were flawed and most of the time the unchallenged overhyped white fighters got the benefit of the doubt while the proven avoided more talented black fighters were left off. There were some fighters that liston may have beat(that werent ranked in the top 10) yet their werent 5 heavyweights in the world at the time that could beat them. This happened alot in joe louis reign. Guys like harry bobo, Lee Q murray, turkey Thompson getting screwed. same with marcianos reign guys like bob baker and clarence henry getting screwed.

- 2ndly, It should be added liston also lost to rahman and mccall

Rankings have always been flawed to a small degree and always will be. They were also in the 90's. It evens out.

I wrote the names you gave for Liston behind Lewis'. To help you, i also added whether or not they were ranked in the yearly rankings. Let's compare:

Lewis beat: Liston beat:
Weaver Patterson (ranked)
Ruddock (ranked) Patterson (ranked)
Mason Machen (ranked)
Tucker (ranked) Williams
Bruno (ranked) Williams
McCall (ranked) Valdes
Mercer (ranked) Bethea
Morrison (ranked) Summerlin
Akinwande (ranked) Summerlin
Golota (ranked) Folley (ranked)
Grant (ranked) Harris
Tua (ranked) DeJohn (ranked)
Briggs (ranked) Clark
Holyfield I (ranked) Zhech
Holyfield II (ranked) Besmanoff
Botha Wepner
Rahman (ranked) Westphal
Tyson (ranked)
V. Klitschko (ranked)

A mere five of Liston's opponents were ranked compared to 17 of Lewis' opponents were. I mean, it's not even close. You can spin things all you want to by your own biased judgement that they should be in the top10, but they weren't.

Oh, and Patterson most certainly isn't better than anyone on Lewis' resume, are you kidding me? Klitschko would beat him down like he did Williams. Tua would knock him out easily. Well, i can go on, but the list is too long. If you think a 180lbs heavyweight with no chin and average power can beat those, than you are really stretching things.

Lennox may have the edge in depth, but liston has the edge in quality.

Only in your mind.

Take note: All except 1 of these opponents liston beat were at the prime of there careers, while many of those top notch names on lennox resume were not near there primes when they tangled with lennox.

lets take a look..........

Lennox beat

38 year old evander holyfield- Many ringsiders scored the 2nd fightfor holyfield, and this series could easily be 1-1. Holyfield would lose to ruiz shortly afterward, he was defintley over the hill. coming into the lennox bout he looked dreadful against vaugn bean.

33 year old frank bruno
36 year old ray mercer
34 year old vitali klitschko
32 year old francis Botha
36 year old tony tucker
37 year old mike tyson
40 year old mike weaver

Tommy Morrison- Sick with a disease when he fought Sonny

Morrison sick with a disease?:lol: Yeah, i guess it was aids that knocked him down and not those uppercuts, left hooks and right hands. I've never in my entire life heard this excuse to discredit Lewis' win over Morrison.

You listed all their ages, but this is a bad comparison. Different era's. In the 90's, fighters had much more extended amateur careers and fought less often, which is why most of them weren't worn down physically by the age of 30 and gained a good amount of experience only there, which is why most were in their primes in that age. Just look at Lewis himself.

By the way, you've only printed the names of Lewis' opponents with age over 30. I know that this list looks just as long as Liston's list, but Lewis beat a lot more guys. In psychology, this is called Selection Bias. Look it up on Wikipedia if you want.

Domination:

Sonny Liston dominated all of the top men he beat without any controversy.

Williams 2x , patterson 2x, harris, folley, bethea, dejohn, Valdez all fell in 6 rounds or less

The decision over eddie machen, Liston won 10 out of the 12 rounds against a master boxer.

He won 2 close decisions over johnny summerlin in his closest bouts, but this was sonnys 6th and 7th pro fights.

Muhammad Ali- quit on his stool in 7th with scorecards even, but ali in command clearly.

As you see Lennox didnt have anywhere near this kind of domination against top fighters he faced

That's true, although it should be noted that:
A) Lewis faced 3 times more ranked contenders than Liston, which is lot easier to be dominant over
B) Liston's dominance was in a mere 3 years and after that it ended. You can select several 3 year periods of Lewis' career and say he dominated just the same.

Vitali Klitschko- outboxed and Behind on scorecards. in fairness lennox was over the hill.

Unlike Liston, Lewis dug really deep and managed to win this one. What did Liston do when faced with a ranked contender at age 37? He got knocked out cold by one punch. And Klitschko is miles ahead of Martin.

Frank Bruno- outboxed....I dont know if you seen the fight, but Bruno clearly won at least 4 of the first 6 rounds. thanx to lennox finally utilizing his underated left hook he finished off bruno. again a tense struggle.

evander holyfield- very close 2nd fight, holy was 38 and looked old and battle worn

oliver mccall- knocked out with one punch

hasim rahman- knocked out by one punch

ray mercer- dead even fight, huge struggle against 36 year old mercer. outboxed.

still as you see lennox clearly struggled alot more against top opponents than liston did

Again a nice case of selection bias. Hey! Let's have a look at Liston's fights:

-Marshall: an undersized heavyweight that was never ranked broke the big bear's jaw and won a decision and knocked him down in a rematch.
-Summerlin: Two very close fights, look at how Liston struggled with this man who was only ranked for a very small period of time
-Ali: Liston quit on his stool after 6 rounds of light punishment. In the rematch he either quit, was knocked out or took a dive.
-Martin: The first next contender he fights after Ali knocks him out cold with a single punch.

As you can see, Liston clearly struggled a lot more against top opponents than Lewis did.

See how selection bias works?

ChrisPontius

12-07-2007, 08:16 AM

liston was 6'0 1/2 rounded up to 6'1. many papers had him listed as 6'1.

And many have him at 6'0.

bruno fight pretty much even? then im guessing you simply looked at boxrec and didnt watch the fight. bruno badly outboxed lennox for 6 rounds until lennox got smart and unleashed his left hook.

Nope, i've seen the fight. Bruno won 4 of the first 6 rounds at best. Score one round differently and it's even. How is that "badly outboxing" someone? What would you call it if he won 5 or 6 of those rounds?

yes it tells me valdez took a horrible beating from liston and that he realized he had no shot at the heavyweight title with liston in the picture.

your dodging the fact Sonny Liston beat wayne bethea, Mike Dejohn 2x, Harold Carter, Pat Mccmutry. Since I know that you like to go by "ring rankings" mcmutry was ranked 5th when valdez knocked him out in 1 round, and dejohn was ranked 7th when valdez twice beat him, and wayne bethea was ranked 8th when valdez beat him. all this occured just one year before he fought sonny.

Bethea was a journeyman and he beat DeJohn only once. Carter and McCutry were journeyman too. The type of fighters that beat up a lot of losing records fighters and lose every time when stepping up. I suggest you look at their records; it isn't pretty.

Nino Valdez was ranked # 2 entering 1959 the year sonny liston fought him, so whether you think valdez dramatically lost all his abilities in months, its quite clear that valdez was still a big damaging dangerous puncher when he fought liston as evidence by his victories over contenders in a year span window around the time he fought liston.

Ever think he retired after one more fight after liston(in which he knocked out brian london) because liston beat him up so bad he forced valdez into retirement?

Valdes was not ranked in the 1959 rankings, sorry.

And that last argument is just pathetic.
Perhaps i should go say that Lewis beat Holyfield so bad that after that he would lose to Ruiz? Clearly he was on a winning streak going in, including beating Tyson.

perhaps you dont see it because the fog that wreaks of bias is clouding your vision? I explained to you that valdez was knocking out legite contenders months leading up to the sonny liston bout and entering the beginning of the year was himself ranked # 2. Valdez clearly was still a one of the best punchers in the divsion and had the size(6'3 215lb).

You call Liston's heart even with Lewis and it's my vision that's clouded with bias? :lol:

Yeah, Valdes is one of the only guys Liston fought who was 210+lbs. He still wasn't ranked though, contrary to the 17 210+lbs ranked opponents of Lewis. No comparison.

Liston took williams, dejohns, valdez flush punches without blinking. Hell even hard punching floyd patterson hit liston a couple times and liston laughed.

Again you are making stuff up SuzieQ. Liston took Valdes' punches flush without blinking? This one is not even on film!!!
I don't know about the DeJohn one, i've never seen it, is it on film or are you making this up as well?

How about Liston being stunned on film by journeyman Whitehurst, or Listons staggering across the ring from a right hand from Howard King (another journeyman for you)?

Hard punching Patterson? :lol:
The man barely has KO's over notable opponents. Moore who was old and a lightheavyweight and Johansson who had a glass jaw to start with.
I'd like to see what happens when Lewis fights a 180lbs "hard punching" guy with no chin.

For what its worth, in the amatuers liston faced 6'4 220lb olympic champion ed sanders and boxed ed sanders ears off for an easy decision, this was liston without world class training beating a huge powerful olympic champion with his jab and natural talent alone. pretty impressive. ed sanders would have been a great pro if not for his shortened career.

Yeah, Ed Sanders would've been great if not for Liston...... sigh...

lewis style was always flawed, just more so when he fought mccall. it wasnt blind, mccall set him up waiting for him to drop that left after he jabbed.

Have you even seen the fight? Lewis threw a left hook right hand, not a jab. No left hand was ever dropped and McCall got over it. Lewis threw left hook right hand and McCall throw two punches at the same time. From what you say it's painfully obvious you don't know what you're talking about. You're making up a "flaw" based on something that didn't even happen.

rahman didnt catch him with a cold punch, lennox backed up into the ropes like a clown with his hands low, he deserved it to get hit like he did.

Agreed.

He didnt have to outbox them, he knocked them out. ranked and skilled boxers floyd patterson and zora folley fell victim in less than 4 rounds.

Zora Folley has one of the weakest jaws i've ever seen. Ali flattened him with basically the first combination that landed, and he barely sat down on that nor was a hard puncher. Folley vs Liston (or any puncher) is a KO waiting to happen. Dito with Patterson.

Liston threw a 4 punch combination that had williams head buzzing right before the the first left hook to put him down. you say one at a time, but foreman threw one a time, and he got the job done. Liston mixed it up, ive seen him throw 4-5 punch combinations a number of times while other times he threw clubbing haymaker after haymaker. He hit so damm hard it go the job done. Liston had excellent punching technique. watch the 2nd patterson fight liston puts floyd down with a 4 punch combo.

Sorry but i just never see Liston throw quick combinations like Lewis did against Mercer, Holyfield etc.

By the way, you just stated that Liston was way past his prime when he fuoght Patterson the second time. And now you bring up this great combination that he threw there. You just keep contradicting yourself whenever it suits your argument.

dmt

12-07-2007, 08:40 AM

when was Liston ko'd by Marty Marshall?

OLD FOGEY

12-07-2007, 10:53 AM

On Nino Valdes' retirement--I actually remember reading about why he retired back when he retired in 1959. After defeating Brian London, he was scheduled to fight George Chuvalo in Toronto. The routine prefight medical exam revealed that Valdes had cataracts. His boxing license was then suspended for his own protection.

janitor

12-07-2007, 10:58 AM

On Nino Valdes' retirement--I actually remember reading about why he retired back when he retired in 1959. After defeating Brian London, he was scheduled to fight George Chuvalo in Toronto. The routine medical exam revealed that Valdes had cataracts. His boxing license was then suspended.

An old Valdez vs George Chuvalo might have been interesting.

OLD FOGEY

12-07-2007, 11:04 AM

An old Valdez vs George Chuvalo might have been interesting.

True. It was a great match. Not worth risking blindness for, though.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 12:49 PM

Oh, and Patterson most certainly isn't better than anyone on Lewis' resume, are you kidding me? Klitschko would beat him down like he did Williams. Tua would knock him out easily. Well, i can go on, but the list is too long. If you think a 180lbs heavyweight with no chin and average power can beat those, than you are really stretching things.

this clearly shows your bias for 1990s fighters. patterson is an ATG heavyweight, vitali klitschko is an unproven quitter whos quit job against a cruiserweight made listons quit job against ali look like a gatti like exit.

Vitali klitschko is the most overated heavyweight of all time. how could you pick a unproven fighter like him over an ATG? the one fight he had with a man around pattersons size, he LOST. this was too a far lesser talented fighter than patterson(chris bryd).

Patterson had more boxing skill in his little finger, than vitali did in his whole body. patterson's handspeed/boxingskill would be way too much for vitali, he would outpoint vitali comfortably. vitali didnt have the punching/finishing skills and accuracy to break through pattersons peek a boo and finish him off.

david tua? the man who was outboxed easily by almost every contender he faced? cruiserweight chris bryd boxed his ears off, maskaev, raham, izon, oquendo all boxed his ears off. I give tua more of a chance than vitali in a fight vs patterson though, and patterson will have to be really careful he doesnt get caught by tua late. but patterson was alot smarter than all these fighters who allowed themselves to be caught late by tua, I see patterson outboxing him the whole fight and playing it smart in the late rounds. Patterson DID have the power to back tua up, and his combinations would throw tua off target all night.

patterson had a better chin than you think and even if he didnt, his boxing skills handspeed defense power were too much for a fighter like tua.

mr. magoo

12-07-2007, 01:07 PM

[quote=SuzieQ49]this clearly shows your bias for 1990s fighters. patterson is an ATG heavyweight, vitali klitschko is an unproven quitter whos quit job against a cruiserweight made listons quit job against ali look like a gatti like exit.

I know this little debate is between you and Chris, but I think I'll chime in on a few points here.
Vitali Klitschko had a legitimate reason for resigning. He had a torn rotator cuff. I've often heard you mention that you are a wrestler. When I wrestled in highschool, there were a few guys who suffered such an injury. It makes it very difficult to perform, given that you pretty much lose the use of that arm. I also don't think that his resigning was inspired by anything Chris Byrd did, especially because Vitali was winning that fight pretty handedly.

Vitali klitschko is the most overated heavyweight of all time. how could you pick a unproven fighter like him over an ATG? the one fight he had with a man around pattersons size, he LOST. this was too a far lesser talented fighter than patterson(chris bryd).

I don't think V. Klit, is very overrated. In fact, he has already been forgotten by most people. Anyway, I think Chris's point is that he was probably a more dangerous opponent from a head to head standpoint, given his size, power and chin.

Patterson had more boxing skill in his little finger, than vitali did in his whole body. patterson's handspeed/boxingskill would be way too much for vitali, he would outpoint vitali comfortably. vitali didnt have the punching/finishing skills and accuracy to break through pattersons peek a boo and finish him off.

This is highly speculative. patterson was a great fighter, and one of my favorites, but we can't ignore that he was knocked out in the peak of his prime by Ingemar Johansen. Ingo was a good fighter to, but I can't deem him as being a more dangerous puncher than Vitali klitschko.

david tua? the man who was outboxed easily by almost every contender he faced? cruiserweight chris bryd boxed his ears off, maskaev, raham, izon, oquendo all boxed his ears off. I give tua more of a chance than vitali in a fight vs patterson though, and patterson will have to be really careful he doesnt get caught by tua late. but patterson was alot smarter than all these fighters who allowed themselves to be caught late by tua, I see patterson outboxing him the whole fight and playing it smart in the late rounds. Patterson DID have the power to back tua up, and his combinations would throw tua off target all night.

patterson may have had better skills than some of the men you mentioned, but unfortunately, he probably didn't have the physical tools needed to compliment his abilities. As much respect as I have for Floyd Patterson, I don't think that he'd be very successful against a lot of top contenders of the 90's, due to his physical limitations. Again, I'm not questioning his boxing ability.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 02:27 PM

i think ingos bingo was alot more deadly, not to mention "tricky" than vitali's best punch.

Mr. Maghoo,

You give fair analysis regarding patterson, and its something we will just have to disagree one. Patterson filled out to a 195lb rock solid heavyweight at his peak, so he was not that small. He had a frame that could carry even more weight if he were fighting today.

mr. magoo

12-07-2007, 02:40 PM

[quote=SuzieQ49]i think ingos bingo was alot more deadly, not to mention "tricky" than vitali's best punch.

Trickier maybe. More powerful, I don't know. Ingo did a good job of polishing off an undefeated Machen in one round, I'll give him that. Kilitschko was a monster though, and he had some 33 Ko's in 34 wins or whatever. He also beat alot of bigger men, which is something we have to at least consider.

Mr. Maghoo,

You give fair analysis regarding patterson, and its something we will just have to disagree one.

Fair enough, but let me remind you that I'm not in anyway trying to berate Patterson.

Patterson filled out to a 195lb rock solid heavyweight at his peak, so he was not that small. He had a frame that could carry even more weight if he were fighting today.

No question about it. With modern weight training and nutritional guidelines, Floyd probably could have added on another 10 or 15 Lbs of muscle without any trouble. The problem here, is that we can't speculate what how different he might have been. When drawing comparisions across eras, we have to look at fighters for how they actually were. Although I rate Floyd much higher than say Riddick Bowe on an all time list, I don't think I'd pick him to beat Riddick head to head. From a very realistic standpoint, Patterson would be giving up way too much in size. It also wasn't like Floyd would be in there with a great big tomato can. Bowe was never knocked out in his career, and knocked out many of good fighters. He could also move and some decent boxing ability. When we combine these things with an enormous size advanatage, it tends to go a long way.

SuzieQ49

12-07-2007, 03:02 PM

Kilitschko was a monster though, and he had some 33 Ko's in 34 wins or whatever. He also beat alot of bigger men, which is something we have to at least consider.

lamar clark had 48 KOs out of 49 wins. doesnt mean shit when your knocking out C level fighters in the weakest era in heavyweight history like vitali was doing. perhaps my bias of anti vitali clouds my judgement some time, but you have to admit looking at his accomplishments....he is rather thin in that department compared to other contenders throughout history.

No question about it. With modern weight training and nutritional guidelines, Floyd probably could have added on another 10 or 15 Lbs of muscle without any trouble. The problem here, is that we can't speculate what how different he might have been. When drawing comparisions across eras, we have to look at fighters for how they actually were. Although I rate Floyd much higher than say Riddick Bowe on an all time list, I don't think I'd pick him to beat Riddick head to head. From a very realistic standpoint, Patterson would be giving up way too much in size. It also wasn't like Floyd would be in there with a great big tomato can. Bowe was never knocked out in his career, and knocked out many of good fighters. He could also move and some decent boxing ability. When we combine these things with an enormous size advanatage, it tends to go a long way.

I agree on this

mr. magoo

12-07-2007, 03:13 PM

lamar clark had 48 KOs out of 49 wins. doesnt mean shit when your knocking out C level fighters in the weakest era in heavyweight history like vitali was doing. perhaps my bias of anti vitali clouds my judgement some time, but you have to admit looking at his accomplishments....he is rather thin in that department compared to other contenders throughout history.

I'm not claiming that the guy had the credentials of Sam Langford or Jerry Quarry. And frankly, I agree that his body of works wasn't all that great. All I'm saying is that he could have very conceivably been a dangerous opponent for a lot of guys in a head to head sense. Let's face it Suzie, the guy was a monster who was built like a mountain. He was never dominated by anyone in his career, including Lewis and Byrd whom he was leading against. He knocked out a lot of guys who were also big heavywieghts and rated at the time. He had a solid chin, and was never TRULEY stopped by anyone, at least not by a conventional knockout. His boxing ability was by no means stellar, but it wasn't terrible either. To think that he might have given some of the smaller heavyweights of the past trouble such as Patterson, Johansen, Marciano, and Frazier, is not a proposterous claim when we look at it honestly.

round15

12-07-2007, 06:02 PM

Sonny Liston had one of the best jabs in heavyweight history. Who knows if his two fights with Ali were controlled by the mob as some boxing historians conclude. Sure, Ali beat him twice but I find it hard to believe that Liston couldn't get up from that right hand that Ali landed. IMO, Liston took a dive in the second fight because maybe his life was on the line.

I used to criticize Lennox Lewis partly because of his performances against Oliver McCall, Hasim Rahman and Vladimir Klitschko. Also, Lewis was getting his butt whupped by Frank Bruno for six rounds and Shannon Briggs didn't know how to pace himself. Lewis has only won my favour over the last part of his career because he became more of a gentleman of the sport. He called himself a "pugilistic specialist" and I appreciate the fact that he's an athletic big man that can box. Rarely does Lewis try to Foremanize his opponent by trying to blast him out early, even though his right hand should be ranked high on the power scale, next to Shavers, Foreman and Tyson. Lewis prefers to beat his opponents by making them stop punching meanwhile he gets criticized for not having the killer instinct and knockout finishing skills.

As for the fight itself, I think Liston would knock Lewis out in the middle rounds and finish him unlike Frank Bruno. If Lennox comes to fight in his best shape, I think he could probably out box Liston and keep him on the outside easy with his jab.

ChrisPontius

12-08-2007, 07:33 AM

this clearly shows your bias for 1990s fighters. patterson is an ATG heavyweight, vitali klitschko is an unproven quitter whos quit job against a cruiserweight made listons quit job against ali look like a gatti like exit.

Another piece of your ridiculous hypocrisy. "Vitali is a quitter whos quit job against a cruiserweight made Liston's quit job against Ali look like gatti like exit", right.

Liston and Vitali did exactly the same thing, quitting against a light hitting opponent. The only difference is that Vitali was dominating the fight whereas Liston was being dominated.

You now will probably say that Liston proved his toughness by going the distance in a losing effort and getting off the floor off a dangerous, 180lbs never ranked Marshall, which neutralised his quit job against Ali. While of course Vitali fighting with his eye hanging on a thread and three of the worst cuts in history against a 245lbs beast of a man didn't redeem him at all. :nut

p.s. why do you refer to Byrd as a cruiserweight? You imply that it's something negative about him. Not very smart considering Liston's entire resume is built on cruiserweights and his record against ranked heavyweights is appallingly small.

Of course the same goes for bringing up that Vitali is a quitter while Liston did the same.

Vitali klitschko is the most overated heavyweight of all time. how could you pick a unproven fighter like him over an ATG? the one fight he had with a man around pattersons size, he LOST. this was too a far lesser talented fighter than patterson(chris bryd).

Well he was 8-2 ahead against Byrd so it's not like he got outclassed. And Vitali is not unproven. He beat 4 ring ranked contenders and was winning the other two. Unlike Patterson, Byrd has a chin. If you think Patterson will beat Vitali Klitschko then you are seriously deluded. A skilled 180lbs man with no chin will beat a skilled 250lbs man with an iron chin and bone crushing power? :lol: This is a no brainer.

p.s. Ingo was every bit as unproven and he still knocked Patterson out. We would've probably seen that more often if he didn't avoid every challenger like the plague. Hell, what am i saying? When he stopped doing that he indeed got knocked out in one round, twice.

Patterson had more boxing skill in his little finger, than vitali did in his whole body. patterson's handspeed/boxingskill would be way too much for vitali, he would outpoint vitali comfortably. vitali didnt have the punching/finishing skills and accuracy to break through pattersons peek a boo and finish him off.

Just keep telling that to yourself. Make a poll and see what the consensus is on a 180lbs man with no chin against Vitali.

david tua? the man who was outboxed easily by almost every contender he faced? cruiserweight chris bryd boxed his ears off, maskaev, raham, izon, oquendo all boxed his ears off. I give tua more of a chance than vitali in a fight vs patterson though, and patterson will have to be really careful he doesnt get caught by tua late. but patterson was alot smarter than all these fighters who allowed themselves to be caught late by tua, I see patterson outboxing him the whole fight and playing it smart in the late rounds. Patterson DID have the power to back tua up, and his combinations would throw tua off target all night.

Why should Patterson be really careful not to be caught "late"? It's not like Liston and Ingo caught him "late". Tua had a short prime, the Ibeabuchi-Tua would annihilate Patterson. By the way, do you ever take styles into account? Did you think of the fact that Patterson doesn't fight like Rahman, Maskaev or Byrd?

patterson had a better chin than you think and even if he didnt, his boxing skills handspeed defense power were too much for a fighter like tua.

Tell that to Ingo, another limited but big puncher.