Sonny Listons opposition vs Jack Dempseys opposition

We will cross Ali and Tunney off the list because they both beat the fighters we are comparing.

Beyond that the comparison gets interesting.

At the lineal champion grade, Liston has two wins over Patterson, while Dempsey has Willard and Sharkey. Make what you will of that.

After than, the list starts to shift in Dempseys favour. If you start ballancing out the contenders they beat, and using them to cancel each other out, then Liston runs out first leaving Dempsey with the edge in depth.

 

Anyway, Dempsey does probably get sold a bit short in these debates. Pretty even imo I'd have to think about it before saying one way or the other.

 

Not to be politically incorrect but Sonny Liston either gets lynched or deported for what he does to Dempsey's lilly-white, weak ass opposition.

Billy Miske was great when healthy, Gibbons was decent LHW when younger, Brennan owned a fine bar.

 

i think you need to be more specific in this one jan. i don't see the balance you do personally and a side by side comparison of contenders may help the debate. fulton and firpo are among the best and i don't rate them that highly, historically or based on the little film we have. gibbons and miske are other very good/great scalps

compared to liston, machen and williams, i don't think it's clear for dempsey at all. the saving grace is the extremely talented sharkey, who was leading until losing under extremely dubious circumstances

 

"Lineal grade" is a term used by role playing nerds with 12-sided dice and what it has to do with quality of opposition is only coincidental.

How about focussing on the fact that after John Lester Johnson, Dempsey couldn't steel himself to enter the ring with another Negro (and sometime jumped out of the ring when they entered) and chose chumps like a sick Miske (who was damned good when healthy), fragile Carpentier, Bill Brennan (who never beat a godamned fighter of note) and the skill-less, witless Firpo.

Dempsey's best victim was the credulity of so called boxing experts.

 

Albert Westphal,,,

May have been a Top 5 Heavyweight in Jack's Heavyweight Era.

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God damn ESB ate my post. I'll try to summarize. I'd disagree that it's Ali best unless you considering the fact he overcame the obstacles of being blinded (Whether done by Liston or not). From a purist take, I'd take Ali-Terrel over it but Ali-Liston I was the breakout performance for Ali. Great timing to do so too.

I think Liston looked rather timid and underwhelming despite him being such a spectacular name. The bully shtick gets instantly dismissed by his fans but the notion he was ancient or shot is equally amusing. The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle.

 

How come Tyson gets kudos for beating up on his inactive Holmes?

Listons dominting wins over the sensitive patterson were over a psyched out fighter who froze both times.

Patterson was greater fighter than he looked against Liston but sharkey was also unreliable.

The best champions win "great fights".

Liston needed to prove he could win a "great fight" and he never did at world level.

 

Where Dempsey takes it IMHO, is that once you have pulled the best half a dozen names off their respective resumes, Liston is going to start to run out of name fighters while Dempsey can still put them forward.

In terms of lineals:
Dempsey has Willard and Sharkey while Liston has two wins over Patterson. We should give Liston the edge here because Patterson was in his prime for both fights and both wins were verry emphatic. Even so, betaing Patterson twice might be a less complicated undertaking than beating Willard and Sharkey once apeice.

Best of the rest:
By far the best win that either of them has after that, is Dempseys win over Fred Fulton. This is a 23 second demolition of a guy who had been the seen as the number 1 challenger for years.

In general terms, it is probably fair to say that Miske and Gibbons are on a par with Folley and Machen. They occupy verry much the same niches in their respective ecosystems.

Beyond this, I think that Dempseys name fighters were perhaps a bit closer to the top of their respective divisions than Listons. Williams is a nice win, but he was not ranked at the time. I can't rate this much higher than Dempseys two wins over Brennan.

Firpo gets a lot of stick on this site, but he was seen as being the outstanding challenger by many.

Once you start getting to names like Harris Westphal and Bethea, then even guys like Carpintier, Morris, Levinsky and an older Smith start to look prety good.

 

Nothing more than disingenuous spin for your favourite here

Liston fought every contender in his era who would fight him, Dempsey avoided the best 2 of his era (Wills/Greb - his fault or not).

Fulton did not do more than Folley/Machen and he turned out to be inferior to Wills and Miske, the only reason he was the number 1 challenger was largely down to the colour line of the time

Firpo was never the 'outstanding challenger', Wills was and Greb was, Firpo's 1 decent win was a shot to bits Willard. You might argue that Cleveland wasn't ranked, but he was clearly 1 of the best of the era and avoided himself. You can't rate Firpo yet lambaste Williams

Brennan lost every round to Greb pretty much, so did Miske. Miske was on a losing run coming into the Dempsey rematch

The only contender Liston missed was Johansson, who Patterson twice beat.

 

Liston's opponents were probably better in head-to-head contests. He also deserves credit for not avoiding anybody.

In Dempsey's defense, his opponents were recognized as top quality fighters back then and he could not exactly use a time machine to go and face Liston's opposition. I do criticize him for not facing several top contenders, such as Harry Wills. A win over Wills would likely put him over Liston. As it is, his record just isn't as great as his reputation and estimated fighting abilities. The same could be argued for Sonny.

 

u can't b posting it , u can't ! , Jess Willard was tough as nails , big , strong and as game as they come , my dad used 2 tell me that he once watched ole' Jess carrying his horse when he got tired during their common jogging . U C ? BIG ole' Jess was a gentleman among gentlemen as well , and had a firm sweaty hairy handshake .
U just can't b posting this in here .
Also , Jack Sharkey was as slick as any1 could have strived 2b , and could give Chris Byrd a lesson in this subject and then some .
Dempsey was d elite of d true golden era of d sport , a great whom only d likes of Harry Greb and Walker Smith Jr. could b claimed 2 reside at d same class of .

U just can't b posting this .
U really think Joe Louis' division was stronger than Dempsey's or Liston's ? I don't .