How would sonny liston do in today's division

[TBear]

In a time devoid of true punchers and exceptional talent such as the present he would be great. I would give him a good chance against Wladimir but I admit that fight would not happen. Vitali would be a tougher fight but still winnable.

[K-DOGG]

Are you sure about that,,,, can you give the measurements for each please,,

I didnt realize that,,, I still think that klits jab would neutralize liston,

How do you think a fight would go down between them.....

Forgive me for interjecting; but I'll take a stab at this.

Vitali would have the best chance of the two. The thing I like about Dr Ironfist is his heart and determination. Also, he's a dyed in the wool killer. You can see it written all over him. There is no quit in the man....despite that unfortunate episode with Chris Byrd. (Personally, I think that was a cultural thing at the time....or, he let his brain beat his heart.) Either way, a moot point if we're going to look at who he's become.

The thing I don't like about Vitali is the thing that would give Liston problems; that awkward-ass style of his. He moves like a piece of construction equipment. However, I feel that Liston's bodywork would wear him down and his jab would bust him up. Liston's jab was like a battering ram; harder than most heavy's right hands. Klitschko, despite his record, is not what I would call a knock-out puncher. He clubs people to death with his brute force. Wlad's got much more pop behind his shots than Vitali does. And that would be another weakness against Liston. Liston was beaten with billy clubs by cops and stayed on his feet. Pure determination, stubbornness, will, or just plain meaness kept him up. In his only loss before Clay, he fought 8 rounds with a broken jaw. Tough S.O.B. Vitali's size and strength would be to no avail, IMO. And his skin would betray him. Liston, I think, would stop Vitali on cuts late in the fight.

Wladimir is easier to predict....or guess, if I'm going to be fair. You can tell a lot more about Dr. Steelhammer by his losses than that one "No Mas" by Vitali. Wlad, if pressured significantly, whether physically or mentally, has the impending potential to crack. I do feel he would be psychologically intimidated by Sonny before the bell ever rang. This would either cause him to over exert himself as he did in the first Brewster fight, or cause an inward panic attack should Liston decide to go right after him. Either way, this fight's ending in a clean K.O., T.K.O. or K.T.F.O. Wlad was never even in the same zip code despite his excellent physical abilities. Boxing is 90% mental....and that is where Liston would have the edge over the younger Klitschko.

On the "reach" thing I read some of you posting. Reach does mean something if you have the timing to go with it....Liston did. Clay's arms were shorter by a hair; but his speed over the aging strike-buster was too much for the old man to overcome in '64. If you want to view Liston at his best, check out the first Cleveland Williams fight or his destruction of Zora Folley....the beating he gave Machen wasn't too bad either, even though he probably cheated with that same eye-burning crap he pulled on Clay in round 4 of fight one. He was a complicated dude, not really all bad, definitely not all good; but a fighter any heavyweight in any era should respect and fear.

[rightsideup]

I think a prime sonny would do well.

[Cardinal Buck]

Loses to Wlad. Haye would be live. Beats old Vitali and probably the rest.

[Sugarj]

I agree. 78" is what BoxRec lists it right now but I've seen them list it as 80" in the past. Maybe they mean his reach is 78" NOW as hunched over geriatric :hahahaha9:

Poet

Lets hope they don't start fiddling with his height in that case too. I can't knock Boxrec too much, with the wealth of statistical information they have there are bound to be errors and ommissions.

[Tommo1]

He would be UD'd by any decent HW and KO'd by any HW with a decent punch.

He would probably have been trained better today but as he was I can't think of any HW today off the top of my head he would be able to beat.

[kendom]

He would be UD'd by any decent HW and KO'd by any HW with a decent punch.

He would probably have been trained better today but as he was I can't think of any HW today off the top of my head he would be able to beat.

C'mon man you've brought this trolling to Boxingscene?

[LacedUp]

Truthfully, he would make both of the Klitschko's feel as though they'd been thrown in prison on child-molestation charges. Not pretty for fans of the brothers, who are, no doubt, the best in a sorry excuse for a division.

Skill is one thing, power is another. Sonny had both; and while he was not as big as the giants ruling the division these days, the kind of pressure he'd put on them is something neither has ever encountered successfully. He was nearly 36 when he fought Clay the first time, regardless of what his "official" age was; and had destroyed everybody for the 6 years previous.

As far as the rest of division is concerned.....did I miss something??? Is there a heavyweight division right now???? Seriously! Who, in there right mind would call this group of football rejects a heavyweight division??

I'm not even going to give credence to the suggestion that Liston would do anything but send each and every so called contender out there back to the locker room with pee stains in their jock straps. Please.

Have to agree with this. Liston was one tough mofo with heavyweight KO power in his jab alone. One would only have to take a look at how he demolished pretty much everyone he faced up until the first Clay fight, where he 1) was getting older and 2) openly said BEFORE the fight that he hadn't been training hard and expected Clay to last no longer than a couple of rounds.

First time anyone in this current division would feel his monster jab, and it was a monster jab, they would crumble. I remember Albert Westphal, who had never previously in his career been hurt or KD, saying that it felt like Liston had bricks in his gloves.

Great fighter, and underestimated a lot by "new-age" boxing fans.

[Tommo1]

Great fighter, and underestimated a lot by "new-age" boxing fans.

The same tripe I hear from all nostalgists...

Tell me something. When you sit down to watch a great fight do YOU choose to watch a Liston fight? Of course not!

I think I've given him an accurate assessment! New age, you mean REAL age!

[LacedUp]

The same tripe I hear from all nostalgists...

Tell me something. When you sit down to watch a great fight do YOU choose to watch a Liston fight? Of course not!

I think I've given him an accurate assessment! New age, you mean REAL age!

Why wouldn't I? Liston was a boxing enigma with no equal. He threw some of the most devastating right hands in history, and had probably the best jab in heavyweight history.

Look at his fights vs Floyd Patterson for example. Floyd had been ducking Sonny for a couple of years, his trainer Cus Damato knew he was all wrong for Floyd who had a suspect chin.

There was so much interest in this fight, and Sonny just squashed him like a fly. And Sonny finally got the recognition as the champ, even though most people considered him the best already.He beat up the the champion of the world like Mike Tyson used to do when he was coming through. And you know Mike Tyson was a big Liston fan, and the way he used to intimidate his opponents was directly down to Liston's style. Very interesting.

That same type punch that just turned Floyd's head and made him fall to the canvas, was something Tyson mastered as well.

So yes, I do indeed watch a lot of Liston's fights and they were quite spectacular and far exceeds anything we have these days.

But I guess the question is, have you watched Liston fight?