Where do you rank Floyd Patterson at heavyweight?

Not really. Liston beat Patterson 2x, plus he beat all of the top rated men patterson avoided/ducked because his manager was afraid patterson would lose to them.

 

Liston had a wonderful year in 1960 where he was truly great. It is one year. Tyson had about 3 prime years and that is considered a short prime.

The two patterson wins liston scored mean as much as alis rematch with sonny.

 

Liston beat Harris, folly and machen - the rest were on losing streaks anyway. Floyd also beat machen and harris, he did not fight folly but then sonny did not fight ingo, so what?

After tangling with LIston, floyd fought and fared very well against the entire 1960s elite heavyweights with only Ali beating him decisivly.

After tangling with floyd sonnys run over the same period was low key by comparison.

 

Floyd Patterson ducked prime versions of Eddie Machen and Zora Folley, both fighters whom were # 1 and # 2. Liston smashed both. Patterson beat an over the hill Eddie Machen. Cleveland Williams was a big murderous puncher whom Patterson wanted no part of, and he would have knocked patterson out early most likely. Liston demolished Williams twice early. Nino Valdes was a big hulking puncher who was rated # 2 in 1958 and Pattersons camp refused to fight him because of his size and punching power. Liston destroyed Valdes early.

All this plus Listons two easy knockouts over floyd patterson himself is why Liston's resume is easily superior to Floyd Patterson's.


Instead of taking on the Machens, Folleys, Williams, Valdes's...floyd chose to take on the white gooftroopers Radamcher, London, Harris. Patterson may have lost to all 4 of those men. Williams and Valdes may have been too big and strong for floyd, and machen/folley could nearly match floyd in skills plus they could punch too.

 

You should at least note that Patterson fought Ingo right after he demolished Machen, so ducking Eddie shouldn't bear too much weight.

 

Patterson got ****ed up by Ingo just like Machen did, so what's your point? Patterson got to rematch Ingo, Machen did not.

 

Liston smashed machen? I thought that was what ingo did?

in much the same way liston beat shell shocked machen who was coming off the ingo pounding.

Liston of 59-62 was a great h2h fighter no question. I just think his reputation after that point depleted the chances of him competing with that many mentally prepared fighters.

Do you really want to go there??

bob satterfeild was the only name on the unrated big cats record before facing liston.


Williams was a headliner who was popular in that he spectacularly knocked out journeymen. He never beat a rated fighter. but if you take away being shot by a policeman, being too inexperienced or being too far away from Texas or too close to a live opponent Cleveland big cat Williams never got beat!

when he met LIston unranked williams had only been active for about 2 years since the satterfeild fight against 12 hand picked opponents. (williams had retired for 2 years after the satterfeild pounding.)

clevlands best actual wins by then were against unrated (31-13) frankie daniels or unrated (27-16) john holman. both were on worrying losing streaks.

Liston was already considered beter than williams anyway since he knocked out 34-15 frankie daniels.

between the Liston and ali fights williams beat 18 fighters who could not win more than 2 of their last 4 fights, of those (6-4) mel turnbow knocked him down.

Valdes was eratic during floyds reign. against name fighters valdes went 1-3 in 1956, 4-1 in 1958, 1-3 in 1959.

when Liston fought valdes his record at that time was not that of a contender on the way up. at the time liston fought valdes hed lost 8 times since hed been marcianos #1 contender way back when.

valdes actualy was beaten up by a young alonzo johnson in his last bout before taking on Liston. a fight but one before poor nino was up and down like a yoyo before geting KO'd by 19-3-2 charlie powel who I think was really a football player in the NFL that took up boxing to become a journeyman.
Its still a good win for liston but valdes was prety much on the skids then.

people say "did ali fight the real liston?" They never say "did liston EVER fight the real patterson!"

The three worst efforts on record in HW title fights was the one rounders involving patterson against liston and liston against ali.

the winners beat nothing in those fights -yet Listons legend was made from two of them.

where as Liston fought the elite fighters of the 1960s after the ali fights??

 

Same thing isnt it supermac? :good

 

can you explain it to be again then? just for the 73rd time..

Look, Liston is above patterson but I think it is close. Liston looked as good as anyone for a time -amazing! For me, IMO it has to last for a longer period. It was not listons fault that he scared so many people but through lack of live competition. I think not getting enough competative rounds in from 1960-64 hurt him and I think Liston lost what ali lost in his exile. He could never get it back and IMO there is not enough prime years to rank sonny any higher.

 

Irrelevant.

Your argument was that he was "ducking" people, and Machen was among the names you mentioned.. Ingo beat Machen in a fashion that certainly would have gotten a lot of people thinking twice about fighting him, but Patterson took the challenge...

 

#22.