Sonny Liston vs Earnie Shavers, prime for prime.

Takes Liston two or three rounds to set up hurting Shavers and stop him.
Hell, I see Sonny taking his shots better than Shavers could take his, and that's saying something.

 

Liston would brutalize Shavers in his prime or close to it. There's no facet of boxing
Shavers is better than Liston other than arguably power. And that can be debated
. Shavers would come out with his bombs and Liston's jab would continually stop
him in his tracks and force him to re-set.
By the 3rd rd Shavers would start to tire, and Liston's combo's would start to land.
by the 5th rd of an exciting fight, Liston's punishes Shavers forces the ref to stop
the fight, or lays Shavers out cold.
Shavers may be the hardest puncher in heavyweight history,but Liston would take
him apart.

 

Williams hit Ali a few times and Ali stressed how powerful Williams still was and allegedly ranked him as the third hardest puncher he'd ever been in the ring with (after Shavers and Frazier) but I highly doubt the authenticity to that quote. Williams power could certainly be up there with Shavers, but I lean towards Shavers being the harder puncher. However, Williams was infinitely the better fighter in just about every other way and that's all that matters at the end of the day.

 

I would only give Shavers a puncher’s chance. Aside from that, Liston is a very heavy favorite

 

This post was very well put.

 

Also very well put.

 

I actually went to Liverpool some back and asked Shavers the hardest puncher he'd been in the ring with and he replied it was Liston. He stated he never fought Liston but sparred with him (presumably an older one) and that his jabs felt like sledgehammers.

 

It looks like Shavers - Williams deserves a thread of it's own.....

 

Shavers was the hardest puncher of all time. Therefore, logically, the first punch he lands on Liston would knock him out, the way it knocked out every other opponent Shavers ever landed on. Since Liston wasn't unhittable that translates into a very early KO win for Shavers.

 

I was actually baiting a certain poster with an anti-Williams agenda who uses the same logic

 

All good mate.

I go into it a bit more in the Williams-Shavers thread if you're interested.

 

Liston was the superior fighter and would score an early KO over Shavers.

 

Would wager a KO within three in favor of Liston

 

Never knew that. Thanks for the info

 

No problem mate!