Special Factors RE Liston's Place in HW History

[johnbook]

I think Liston was a great HW.
But there are 2 factors that must be considered re him. And they may be related.

1. Heart. When faced with adversity, it appears he quit vs Ali I. His shoulder injury seems dubious as he was still throwing well, but obviously not connecting much and maybe was gassed too. And in their 2nd fight, Walcot's terrible reffing determined that one. To me it seemed like a genuine KD but that Liston could have gotten up but was afraid to as Ali was right there --when he shouldn't have been. So given both of those his heart under adversity is dubious.
2. The dirty or corrupt factor. Ali was not the only one who got the liniment in the eye treatment. Machen I recall said he was fighting even till he got blinded. And more recently IIRC it's come out that Cleveland Williams also claimed that.
Liston was in with the Mob.

These factors need to be considered in deciding Liston's place.

OTOH, his own set of problems need to be considered. He was still getting rousted by cops even after winning the HW title. Hard to have a career under those circumstances.

So there are things we may never know for sure re Liston. So not easy to decide his place, and the above factors should be considered.

[The Old LefHook]

If our lives depended on these mythical matchups there would be fewer mistakes. Everyone pretty much knows who will beat whom, the same way people automatically know right from wrong. With their lives hanging in the balance, very few pop-off artists are going to actually vote for little Marciano to beat Sonny, for instance, and so with most mythical matchups, by buggery.

[ecto55]

Here's another factor to take account of if you want to hang your hat on something - Liston's advanced age.

Even though Liston himself wasn't sure what his real age was, and was always known to be touchy about it.

There's even a theory that the Charles 'Sonny' Liston isn't even the real Charles Liston (rather one of the 'real' Charles Liston's siblings who assumed his identify and more importantly his, younger age to take the benefit of being a juvenile before the courts and / or to be signed up by boxing management who often look past aged fighters). Who knows, such is the mystery of Liston?

Liston was probably 50 in his last bout.....ancient for the 60's/70's....which makes him very old for the Clay / Ali bouts...remember, this was the era without the type of nutrition / supplements / training methodologies which our Bernard Hopkins could take advantage of recently.

Another 'live' factor was that Clay at the time was a spokesperson for the Nation of Islam....who literally killed people at that time...and were a significant force in the prisons at the time (where Liston had served).

Liston received death threats from the NoI, and was noticeably effected by these threats.

Me...I judge Liston on all the fights we have with the exception of Clay I / Ali II (before and after) - just too many extraneous factors / intangibles to gauge within those two fights.

[Dariusz]

How about: 1st fight Liston had a real contusion and 2nd one was fixed.

This is the most probable situation.

[johnbook]

Like I wrote the way Liston was throwing indicated shoulders were fine.
I don't recall any medical followup being put out.