Billy Conn vs. Sonny Liston

Is he fighting an outside fight or an inside fight ?

 

I discount Liston's loss to Marty Marshall because it happened when he was stepping up from preliminaries. He had never faced a slippery and unconventional guy like Marshall. But he beat Marty up twice after that. Some of these guys (Whitehurst especially), were fighting to survive, not win.

No doubt, Conn has a chance against Sonny. One look at Conn's record tells you he fought plenty of tough guys who outweighed him, although nobody nearly Liston's size, strength and power. He carries a Hall of Fame record that demonstrates his all-time greatness. I believe the 1960 Liston was more than capable of roughing up and body punching 1941 Billy. Could he slow Billy down? That's the question for me. I see this as a great match.

 

It’s a little facetious to say but he could hardly be less effective than Patterson.

 

There isn’t a reasonable argument honestly… he had plodding footwork, wasn’t great inside but always tried to get there and was perhaps the slowest? HW champ? He's in the discussion NO DOUBT…. he can punch a bit but he’s not Louis he was a very basic and not an overly impressive champion…. whilst on the over end Conn has the chin for the job and is overqualified in skills here Sonny couldn’t do anything with Billy.

 

Floyd Patterson was not “pretty good” at inside fighting at that level, you can’t be with how he fought and stood - inside fighting is the Achilles heel of the whole system Cus made.

 

You’re more confident than I am about Conn’s chances. Would you wager on it though? He lacks the punch to command Liston’s respect is, I would say, his biggest problem here (though obviously the reach would also pose issues potentially).

 

Saying Liston could '' punch a bit '' is like saying Usain Bolt could '' run a bit '' or Luciano Pavarotti could ''sing a bit ''.
Liston is generally considered one the greatest boxer-punchers in heavyweight history.Hardly fair to call him
'' very basic ''.
Given the clear victories Liston enjoyed over men like Eddie Machen and Zora Folley one can only conclude
that Sonny would beat Conn.The only question is how long Conn would last.

 

He doesn’t need to splatter Liston he only needs to get him to think about being hit and I think if you look at his KO’s there’s enough at LHW - HW to suggest he’s more then what’s written on the tin. I’d wager some very important assets on such a bout and trust my loved ones to do the same if Liston was the favourite, physicality wouldn’t bail him out, Machen survived Liston with one arm people saying this would be a KO for Sonny are silly he’d barely be able to touch Conn… not the same at all but it’d be like Toney vs Holyfield the difference in class would be stupid wide.

 

He can run but he can't hide..

 

He can punch no doubt… and so can nearly every decent sized heavyweight? Liston isn’t special as a puncher, no, in the whole history of the sports heavyweight division he’s another one… he gets the most mileage out of beating up much smaller fighters to get people going “ooooh aaaah” when his best win was over just a couple decent heavyweights… respect to Patterson I really admire him but he wouldn’t be hanging around with hopes of being the champ in the 80s or so onwards and neither would anyone good Sonny beat lol they’d be at 190lbs. I respect Liston but he should generally be regarded as one of the most replaceable champions in history, tons of guys his size could beat who he beat plenty could do his best 5 wins it in a calendar year. I won’t go into his skills it’s uphill when it’s all based on everything but film for most people, I also won’t dignify using Machen and Folley wins as a reason for KOing Billy Conn you’d need to try very, VERY hard to convince me how that works.

 

Liston would overpower Conn inside 8 rounds. Virtually all Conn's hopes are built on, but he gave Joe Louis a hard fight before getting pole axed. Well Mike Weaver gave Holmes a good fight too, and he has lots more behind him at heavyweight. Buster Douglas beat Tyson one night. McCall beat Lewis one night. Shavers almost stopped Holmes one night. One night happens. Louis cops no end of criticism for that performance, which is perceived by many to be limp. Liston surprisingly easy.

 

Liston's punching power was absolutely nuclear.Dislodging seven of Wayne Bethea's teeth with one punch or
a comparatively ancient Liston breaking Chuck Wepner's nose and cheekbone is empirical evidence of Sonny's
brutal punching power.Also Wepner needed a staggering seventy-two stitches after this old version of Liston
had finished with him.There is absolutely no doubt that Sonny Liston was an elite puncher.
Obviously Conn was an excellent technician but what evidence is there to suggest that his skills were
vastly superior to those of somebody like Eddie Machen ?

 

Agreed.As a fan of Joe Louis I hate his first fight with Conn.It was absolutely Joe's worst performance during
his prime and it was strictly a ''one-off ''.

 

Nuclear? no I don't think so, about what you'd expect for a hard hitting (small today) heavyweight? he fought a load of 190lber's a couple "bad" fighters his own size. If you threw Chisora in with the guys Liston fought like Williams etc we'd be talking about Achillies on classic lol and if the film can't demonstrate that Conn was on another planet compared to a one armed (Not that great anyway) Machen then I couldn't not ever.