Did Liston Get Exposed By Ali

The fact that you cite it as a ‘what if’ is you using it as an excuse. You’re to a degree invalidating the result because (you say) we didn’t get the best possible Liston.

Yet what documentation is there on his day to day training habits before and during the delay? It’s been put out as an excuse for years and repeated as if written on stone tablets. So he went out and got drunk when the heard the news … do you know that he drank every day, how much he drank over that span? Or just that he went out and had a drink (or a lot of drinks) when he got the news that he was going to have more time before the fight so why not tie one on (and do we really know that for fact)?

Same with the first fight: he had a bum shoulder. Sure. Whatever. He didn’t pull out. Fighters are rarely 100% when they step into the ring — hell, let’s ignore the fact that Ali is recovering from SURGERY (documented) going into the rematch … yet no excuses ever mentioned for him.

SMFH.

 

Invalidating the result? I think Ali beats Liston every time they fight, whether it’s two times or 22 times. Because he was the superior fighter. He was superior in Miami, he was superior in Lewiston and he’d have been superior in Boston or wherever the other fight was supposed to be. He’d have been superior if they’d fought in frickin’ Vladivostok.

SMFH at you spazzing like I’m denigrating Ali’s accomplishments or him personally because I posed a silly hypothetical like half the posts here seem to do. And again, he could have very easily dispatched an in shape, motivated Liston in 2 minutes in Boston just like he did in Lewiston.

 

First off, other than oft-repeated internet scuttlebutt how do you know Sonny wasn’t motivated and wasn’t in shape? He weighed 215 1/4 for the rematch, almost 3 pounds lighter than for the first fight. And almost exaclty what he weighed for Patterson II. He ventured into the 220s for the early part of his comeback — THAT is where you can see a Liston in half-assed shape.

Second, you’re repeating Liston excuses as rote. I’m not picking on you in particular so much as the mantra we get from his defenders:

1) Liston was 80 years old

2) His arm was about to fall off in the first Ali fight

3) He was in the best shape of his life for the rematch, but when it was postponed for 6 months later he became a hopeless, fall-down drunk and waddled to the ring because he was so out of shape

4) Both fights were fixed so Ali didn’t really beat Sonny

5) Etc, etc

My questions, since you take the excuse as fact:

1) Exactly how often, and how much, did Sonny drink in the six months that the rematch was delayed?

2) What were his training habits?

3) How did his alcoholic consumption (if we even stipulate that to be fact and not folklore) before the rematch compare to his drinking before the first fight or the two Patterson fights?

4) How was his training different after the postponement as compared to before it, before the first fight and before the two Patterson fights?

5) What are your sources for this?

You can’t say ‘well he went out for a drink when the fight was postponed, therefore he never stopped drinking til the first bell’ without citing sources. And even if he did drink, how does it compare to any version of him before the rematch?

I’m pretty sure Sonny wasn’t introduced to alcohol on the day of the postponement. He was no angel. So what makes this different?

It’s like saying Mike Tyson was having sex in Japan before the Douglas fight … but not knowing if that’s any difference than his behavior before the Spinks, Tubbs, Williams or Bruno fights — for all we know he was carrying on the same way all along. So that factor is moot in assessing his loss. Same for Sonny unless you have reliable sources and citations that specifically compare it to other fights of his.

 

Liston biographies. Perhaps they were lying? Neither you nor I were there so neither of us knows for sure what happened and I have never presumed to say otherwise. In fact, ain’t no poster here, or very few posters, me or you included, who has intimate, stand up in court knowledge of anything we prattle on about here. I don’t take it all that seriously, it’s a fun diversion.

For the record, I don’t think the shoulder injury had much to do with Miami as the fact that someone came out and popped him in the face and kept popping him in the face and didn’t fold up like a card table as Patterson did.

 

Can you be more specific? Which Liston biographies, and exactly what did they say about his training day to day before and after the postponement — I mean did they say he was running 5 miles a day, sparring 10 rounds and working the bags for another 10-15 before the postponement and only trained three days a week, doing half as much as he was before? Did they outline his drinking habits? I’d like to know because if they do I want to read those books.

 

Yes, that’s the article I’ve read previously. Thanks Solomon. Surprising that Galento was quite the fan of young Cassius Clay -!though they did have that bombastic connection as Galento himself highlighted. Lol.

The other article you mentioned, IIRC, Louis is also quoted as saying (to Liston himself) that Ali had a better reach than Liston - interesting - if I didn’t read it perhaps I saw it on a video.

 

Yeah, it now seems it might not be entirely accurate.

But for just for giggles, imagine scouring all Galento related footage, newsreels, photos etc. and happening upon just one piece of visual evidence of a reasonably adult looking Liston, together with Two Ton as a spar mate? The Holy Grail - Lol.

 

Apparently there's a story about this in the below. Might be a good read will suss it out -

Alas, Clay sustained a hernia and had to be rushed to the hospital. The fight was postponed for six months. As author David Remnick points out in his excellent 1999 book, "King of the World," the sudden postponement took all the steam out of Liston. He discontinued the training regimen for a period of time and, when he resumed again, was never able to make up the lost ground. He would never get back into that same kind of physical condition again. The combination of age and high living were taking a heavy toll on Sonny Liston.

 

The original rematch was scheduled for Nov 16 1964 in Boston. Ali had to be rushed to the emergency room on Friday, Nov 13 1964 as the result of Inguinal Hernia.

 

Muhammad Ali beat a better iteration of Liston on 10/30/1974 after his otherworldly athleticism had noticeably waned. As Foreman was all wrong for Frazier Ali was all wrong for Liston.

 

So Ali has surgery and fights six months later … but it’s Liston’s training that supposedly suffered the most, lol.

 

Very true Rich.

 

Robert Steen’s and Bob Mee’s (especially) Liston biographies also have specific information on Sonny’s training regimens for the two Ali fights but I’ve put someone on ignore and am bowing out of that particular line of conversation because someone’s taking this stuff way too seriously than I’m inclined to go here. I just want to have some fun talking about a sport I love, I have no agendas and I don’t have much patience for people who do. I think I went very far in trying to defuse things but I ain’t got time for such silliness.

 

Cheers Rich. I will heed your wise advice.

Genuinely curious here - if I typed the word out exactly - the swear filter would replace all letters with the *, correct? - and if so, would that then be okay?

 

That's fair enough mate i understand fully. What book would you declare the out and out best in Liston?