Peak Liston vs Peak Bowe, who wins and why?

That is a tough one. Bowe is very resilient and skilled.I think Liston would pull it out though

 

Liston would grind him down. Liston had the ability to out jab Bowe, was a better puncher, and was tougher. An all around better fighter. I give Bowe until the 5th rd and that's being generous.

 

Bowe would last 12 rnds with Liston . I see both fighters leaving the ring banged up . But I do agree Liston gets the job done and will hand Bowe a defeat .

 

Bowe was easy to hit with guys faster than Liston who were slick boxers. Liston himself relied on being the bigger man bc of his own era that consisted alot of 200 pound guys and under he fought. Bowe had a better longer jab and would be punching down on the easier to hit Liston. Liston is not going to be to elusive and come straight forward trying to over power Bowe who has him by 30 pounds. The big bear would be the small cub here,he would have to back pedal which takes him out of his comfort zone.

Listons had a bad habit of ducking under punchers while going forward with his entire chin exposed with his hands at his sides, a recipe for disaster against Bowe who threw very sharp sneaky uppercuts . The jab battle is in Bowes favorr a very good snapping jab with speed,Liston lunged with his power jabs, and followed his opponent dictating with his jab,but Bowe isnt going to run, why would he when hes the harder to move/better inside sharper puncher?

Listons jab was more stiff with a bit more behind it ,but Bowes jab would be punching over listons with better accuracy and this will be the main factor here.Looking at the Cleveland fights ,its seems liston is going to have alot of problems with the better chinned ,better skilled harder to handle Bowe bc Williams showed a same size guy with a jab could hold his ground. Listons tuck in ,up jab would have to hit Bowe who had fast reflexes after he threw his own jab ,usually picking off on coming punches which would be difficult giving the height differance.

The bigger fighter beats the former bigger fighter of his era.Unless you think liston had Holyfields chin and work rate i cant see how you pick Liston, because thats the only reason Holyfield stood in there being the much smaller guy and Liston was essentially about the same size .He would have to punish bowe and i dont see where he has the skills to do that.

Bowe by 6th rnd k.o. to big strong and polished hes going to land a big shot somewhere and throw off listons size advantage that bailed him out in some top fights

 

Bowe doesn't posses the quickness to bother Sonny, so he'd have to engage with him like he did Holyfield, and Charles Sonny Liston is waaayy more of a power hitter than Holy and had a better jab

 

To be honest imagine switch 205 pound holyfield @holy-bowe 1 with liston.

IMO liston are stronger & had better jab than holy.

 

Of course Liston was stronger than holyfield. Sonny was physically one of the most strongest HWs in history . No one ever overpowered him in the ring. He has been in the ring with men before who were bigger and had a size advantage. It made no difference.

 

The Blown up cruiser Holyfield is a Top 10 heavy ever. That first fight proved to me that Bowe could mix it up and beat anyone in history possibly. I'm one of the ones that think his size a long with his skills would be to much for Liston. Bowe was finished by the time Golota got hold of him

 

Bowe was one of the quickest super heavies of all time. Who else engaged successfully with a prime Holyfield the way Bowe did? Holy's work rate puts Liston to shame here. I'm not saying Liston couldn't pick up the tempo when needed but saying Bowe would have to engage with Liston like he did Holyfield isn't accurate.

So Liston had a better jab than Holyfield. Does that make him more dangerous? I think the only way Liston wins here is if he survives the early storm like he did with Big Cat and somehow turns the tide down the stretch of a grueling fight. He'd be hit too often against Bowe whose power ranks up there with the best.

 

Holyfield is not a top 10 Heavy when he tries to outpunch a guy who weighs 235, Holyfield was badly prepared, grieving his brother's murder, fighting angry with total disregard for defense and brawling with a much larger man. All he was trying to do was knock bowe out. The name and the fact that holy was in his prime looks great on his resumee, but holyfield would have lost to foreman, tyson, lewis and a few other people fighting that way. There is literally no better stylistic match up for riddick bowe than a much smaller man coming at him trying to knock him out, lunging in with lead right hands and eating counter uppercuts and then lingering on the inside eating more uppercuts, regardless of how tough and great that smaller man was.
What holyfield did was as if Tua started getting on his toes and trying to outjab lennox lewis from the outside, lewis would obviously win and it wouldnt say much about lewis' ability.
What bowe did however show was good stamina and the right temperament but he didnt prove much else.

 

Give Bowe some credit for coming out on top in a brutal fight man. He showed everything in that fight..

 

Both of those statements are factually incorrect. Liston had an 84" reach.. Bowe's was 81"s. And the quality of Liston's jab is rivaled only by Holmes, Wlad and Ali.

 

He showed heart and stamina and i think i mentioned that.
He shouldnt have been in a brutal fight with someone that much smaller and who playing right into his hands to begin with, doesnt matter how tough holyfield was.
If joe frazier's peak consisted of a 12 round war against Bob Foster, 2 joke title defenses and losing the rematch to foster I would be sceptical of his ability as well. And dont say "Ohhh but foster was a LHW" the weight difference between foster and frazier was actually 10 lbs less than between holyfield and bowe, plus foster was 6'3" and had a much longer reach than frazier and was a KO puncher against people his own size.
Bowe was only 25 at the time and i can understand if he didnt have the experience and seasoning yet to stay out of a war, but the problem is that he never got any better and people say that guy was some H2H monster!

 

bowe kicked prime holyfield's ass, lesser version of holyfield beat tyson and fought two close fights with prime lewis who was scared of him, putting his trunks all over to the chest, disgraceful

 

The same version Bowe beat was beaten by Moorer and within a whisker of losing to a cracksmoking cruiserweight. Evan Fields was not the picture of consistency.