Does Sonny Liston divide opinion more than any other heavyweight?

Apparently, Primo Carnera seems to do so around here as much as anyone.

 

No way. Tyson and Dempsey 1&2 on this site odd enough.

 

Tyson for mine and Marciano gets things shaking too.

 

I would agree with this or he is close to it ... With the heavies it seems #3 -12 can be argued well and is so up in the air as we see the battles here of posters fighting for their guy.. But I would say overall Liston is harder to place than guys like Ali, Louis, Foreman, Lewis, Holmes, Marciano, Dempsey, Tyson, etc .. But I have Liston I think around 7 or 8, and maybe a better spot for him is 9 to 11 .. who knows

 

Folks always talk about Liston before he became the champ in 1962. When you mention the fact that he QUIT...as Champion...while SITTING on his stool in 1964...and then how he took a DIVE in his second 'fight" with Cassius Clay in Maine in May 1965....the Liston supporters seem to gloss over the fact. It's like Duran...great fighter...but the "No Mas" in November 1980 is always brought up....the quitting with Liston in '64 & '65...and the "No Mas" is all part of the story...you can't pick & choose...Sonny had a bit of the "dog" in him...

 

It would be easier to rank him if Sonny hadn't been frozen out of the title for years by D'Amato and Patterson. All those contenders he beat before winning the title, would have been title defenses and an impressive reign. Sonny got screwed for a long time. He deserves to be ranked highly.

 

Maybe not the most divisive in terms of resume, but definitely when it comes to his controversial episode inside and outside the ring (ali, his actual age, the mob, his death, etc). I think in all of boxing history liston generates the most wide variety of theories and arguments about what actually happened in some moments of his life.

 

Liston in particular, attracted one poster to sign up to this forum just so he could degrade the man

 

A certain person bashing Williams every now and then? This had to be before my time as a reader too. I think he didn´t respond to any one of my two Liston-Threads.

 

Huge misconception. Liston became the outstanding contender in 1960. He was put on ice until the champion completed a contracted rematch clause. Patterson fought him once the rematches were out of the way. They signed to fight on a double header where they each fought a tune up in the same ring on the same night. Liston fought Westphal and Floyd fought Mcneeley.

All those Contenders? Machen, Foley and Harris. That’s really it. All the other guys lost their last fight or were unranked.

Sonny was fast tracked to the title. He came out of prison in 1958, by 1959 he was beginning to fight contenders. By 1960 he was ready for a title fight. He got all the right guys into the ring at the right time. Harris, Foley Machen and Patterson. Nobody screwed with him. If anything he screwed himself. Not only did Sonny halt the progress of his first career in 1956 by getting sent to prison just as he could have got his first big fight. He later got himself suspended whilst number one contender for attempting to pick up a woman whilst impersonating a policeman.

 

Here we go ....I might sit this one out. Mcgrain wanna take over?




In the other thread, he's trying to claim cockell was as deserving a title shot vs Marciano as Nino Valdes

 

There has always been quite a lot of common ground on Liston.

You can't say that about some fighters.