Cleveland Williams is nowhere near even Ingemar Johansson in any OBJECTIVE metric.

So was Mickey Walker and so would Langford have been given the chance what was James Toney just a middleweight?
You are absolutely full of it!

 

Bit of both.

Sure, but he was past prime. And what was asked was when Satterfield lost to a MW. I gave one.

 

That's fine I accept that, but you don't split a pair of decs with Moore and beat Wade when you
are very past prime .Forget it anyway I'm just pissed off with Choc Drop, Mr Devious.

 

Back to Cleveland Williams

I just re-watched the two Liston-Williams fights. Two things stood out to me. One, Williams was so well proportioned that Liston looks sort of dumpy next to him. Williams was one of the most physically imposing fighters ever.

The other thing which stands out is how overblown some of the descriptions of Williams' performance are. I had just read an article on Sonny Liston in Sport's Illustrated in which it was said that "Williams all but KO'd Liston." Well, I didn't see anything like that. Williams gave Liston a bad bloody nose (and possibly broken) and carried the fight to him, but Liston never seemed to me to be in any real trouble and once he went on the offensive dominated Williams. At least that is how I saw it. I would note that an old and slipping Valdes had about the same level of performance against Liston. Valdes closed Liston's eye which might be a more severe injury for a boxer than a nose injury, and seemed possibly on the way to a victory after two rounds before Liston turned up the juice and KO'd Nino in the third round. I have never seen a film of the fight anywhere, so it isn't nearly as famous. I did see the fight on TV back in 1959.

As for this debate, I think both sides make points. Williams had a fantastic stat record. But if one lists the best fighters he fought I think the list would be Satterfield, Liston, Terrell, Machen, Ali, Cleroux, Foster, and Chuvalo. He went 1-9-1 against this group. His defenders make a fair point that only Liston, Terrell, and Machen were fought between 1956 and 1964. He fought on even terms with the young Terrell and with Machen. In fairness, this is impressive to a degree. His critics ask I think the valid question of why didn't Williams fight more top men. I find it a hard sell that everyone was afraid of him, but were willing to jump into the ring with Liston or DeJohn or Valdes or some of the other imposing punchers of the era.

So Williams is an enigma to me. A fighter in his era who never fought at Madison Square Garden or the Chicago Stadium? Who spent most of his career in backwater fights which were not televised? Hard to explain. He had real money behind him in Benbow and Adams and that usually opens doors.

Williams was shot in late 1964, but his three fights earlier in that year had him plodding to two decisions out of the three outings. This could point to him actually starting to slip before the shooting, as he was in his thirties.

 

This is a reasonable and unbiased post.

 

Yes I like this post. Very good. And fair.
I am glad you got to see Liston vs Valdes television broadcast, I know it is a long time ago, but from memory, was it comparable to the Liston Williams fights?

 

Yes, it was. Valdes hit Liston hard and often enough to close his eye. My memory is of Jack Drees saying that Liston might be in danger. But in the third Liston hit Valdes with a flurry which dropped him into a sitting position. Nino got up but just after ten.

 

I always felt that Valdes was comparable to Williams in terms of overall abilites. It's strange that one of them is praised so much more than the other one.

 

Valdes could not hit as hard as Williams.

 

Maybe, I don't know that and you don't know either. Besides, raw power is extremely overrated. I find them comparable in terms of skillset, physical gifts and limitations (altough they were a bit different in a few aspects).

 

It's pretty hard to make a case for Williams as this top contender being avoided by Patterson when you look at the NBA ratings from this period. Williams periodically crept into the top 10 in the 1950s (never higher than #8, as far as I can tell) and sometimes didn't make the top 10 at all. Ironically, had Patterson fought Williams ahead of the (at least) 7 or 8 men typically rated above him, it would have been called another cherrypick.

Even when you get into the 60s, he was often rated lower than the likes of Alejandro Lavorante and Henry Cooper, yet no one ever claims Patterson was ducking them. I don't think he was ever rated higher than #5 while Patterson was champion. But by then Liston was clearly the top contender anyway. You can make the case that certain fighters should not have been given a title shot by Patterson, but I don't see any case for Williams deserving one in their place.

 

Anyone have Valdes in their list of greatest punchers? Williams has ringing endorsements for his power fromTerrell,Liston,and Foreman .Ever seen any for Valdes? I mean what do you require, a signed certificate FFS!

 

I don't think Patterson avoided anyone but his manager did and he used his feud with the IBF to enable him to do so. Nearly all of Pattersons challengers had him down,and none hit like Wiliams.Maybe Floyd's fast hands would allow him to get his left hook onto Cleve's chin and get him out early,and maybe Williams might land his own left hook on Floyd's mandible? Had Floyd defended against Williams at least nobody would be able to say he dodged punchers and no, I don't think they would have thought he was taking a soft touch.

 

Him, and Klompton! So blatantly dishonest, disingenuous and ****ing cowards! Absolutely despicable individuals.

 

He defended against the two most dangerous punchers of that time, so I can't see why anybody would say that as it is.