Liston was 218 when he was 18

I hope his stairway to heaven is reinforced all the same.

We want John to arrive at Uptown (?) safely.

EDIT: Oops. You guys were talking Andy. Yes, he’s slightly heavier than The Quiet Man. Andy always TACOs out.

 

The title is a very roundabout way of saying Liston was 218 y/o in 1950, but I agree with you anyway.

 

It can be a bit all over the place, can’t it?

Liston’s life and career is littered with similarly questionable claims.

Aside from the official birth certificate, which Sonny registered himself in ‘52/‘53 I believe essentially to compete in the Golden Gloves, I’ve read YOBs of ‘33 and ‘34 attributed also.

Also, I’m not sure that Liston’s Mum was entirely consistent with the answers she gave to the same questions which wouldn’t have helped Liston any.

I don’t think we always literally remember our ages in their own right as at the time of certain events/experiences without calling in other reference points - not least our parents sometimes telling us at what age we did something

Certainly we can possibly remember what school year we were in as at the time of this, that or the other event.

Hmmm. Just checked and Sonny apparently quit school at age 13 - the magic number. Lol.

So there appears to be relatively close proximity between Liston being 13, leaving school and then looking for his Mum.

I thought he left at an earlier age but whatever class he was taught in might not have sufficiently defined or reflected his age.

At any rate, the gist of surrounding reference points (possibly flawed in their own right) still remains.

Liston was incarcerated in 1950, reportedly aged 22 which would equal a YOB of 1928. Not saying that age was necessarily correct but it was reported.

Just for me, 1928 is as far back as I’m willing to entertain but of course I’m not even 100 % sure that it was that far back.

 

Is there an underlying pattern/trend here that dictates that Sonny was 232 lbs when he first fought Ali?

 

When you're that overweight it might be impossible to lose all that fat without losing too much muscle at the same time. At least if you do it too quick. He might be right or it might be an excuse, he clearly isn't the most disciplined one. Certainly not after beating Joshua.

But whatever the truth of that, I don' consider him a super HW like, say, Joyce, who weighs about the same but in lean weight. Just like I don't think Toney was close to the same natural size as Peter, though he was close to the same weight. I think of them as much smaller but overweight men. As I said, fat CWs.

If Ruiz did a concentrated effort over several years to change his diet he might have gradually come down to a much leaner weight and been a real threat in the division. Because I think he had the talent. But trying to lose 30-40 lbs in camp is not going to do you any good.

I don't see any reason except poor discipline for Toney to become much heavier than he was for Jirov. He was 196 on fight night for that one. But he loved to eat too much to stay that fit.

Could Liston have eaten himself up to a fat 250 pounder? Sure. Don't know what that tells us really, though.

Liston fans say he was unmotivated and poorly prepared for Ali 1, when he weighed in at 218, his highest to that date. There is no set definition for a SHW since it isn't an actual weight class, but I don't think of someone who's 218 after a half assed training camp.

 

Here's the thing tho: whether Liston was born in 1932, 1922, or 902, surely he was smart enough to remember being roughly 13 years old? I mean it's one thing to be off by 1-2 years if you're not certain of your birthday, but there's an enormous biological/physiological difference between 13 and 17. Liston would've noticed simply by looking in the mirror, his balls, and how his body reacts to things/his voice etc. He would've also noticed something was off if all his classmates were a full 3-4 years younger and would've taken a mental note to adjust his Birthday.

I really don't think it's much of a stretch for a 13-14 year old boy to wander into a boxing gym, weigh himself, and try his hand at it then think "this ain't for me" after getting beat up. That sort of thing really sticks out in your memory, like the first time you eat a hot pepper or get a splinter. He'd have a rough idea of how old he was at the time.

 

lbs? No. Years? Yes.

 

That’s the problem.

Sonny was 33 years old when he was 13.

 

Damn, you're right. He must have had Semi-Gigantism where he rapidly grew from the age of 4 onward to reaching puberty in Pre-K and developing facial hair in the 1st grade. This is why Liston developed that intense stare, because he'd be staring in the mirror for hours at a time to make sure he plucked every hair before school to avoid being teased. By the age of 9, he already had 4 W2's filed with the IRS from various jobs he worked.

 

He tried to enlist in the Army when he was 11 but they rejected him for being too old.

 

I dont disagree except for the fact that Liston was a dirt poor african american sharecroppers son living literally in the middle of nowhere. Where Liston was raised there arent even really towns. Youd have to be there to see what im talking about. We are talking about very very rural Arkansas where its all just flat farm land. Remember, this is a guy who at 17 had to shuck a bushel of Pecans just to get bus fare to St. Louis.

Im not saying it didnt happen, Im just saying the stars would have had to align for a 13 year old Liston to find himself in a boxing gym.

As stated before, Liston wouldnt be the first boxer to embellish his story and we arent talking about George Washington “I cannot tell a lie” here. We are talking about an illiterate ex con who had been arrested over 100 times and who was actually making the film that this interview comes from in order to rehabilitate his image after yet another arrest to help get a title shot. Its called Liston: The Other Side.

It just is what it is. Maybe he misremembered his age and wandered into a gym in St Louis when he was 16/17. That makes a lot more sense.

 

I get what you're saying, but why would a proud boxer lie saying he got beat up the first time he put gloves on?

 

That and Joe Louis being 137 years old vs Rocky Marciano are the two greatest longevity feats in boxing.

 

Some people would rather walk across the street to tell a lie than stand still and tell the truth.

Who knows why Sonny would lie? Only Sonny.

But maybe as suggested he just misremembers. This is a guy talking about when he was 13 years old who also doesn’t know what year he was born, so there’s that. This is a guy who was a dirt farmer in Arkansas as a kid and there’s no account that makes him younger than 13 when he moved to St Louis (if so, Sonny was actually younger than billed, not older) and there absolutely were no boxing gyms in that dirt-poor community — nor any nearby towns where he could have wandered into a gym.

In short, all available evidence says it’s unreasonable for this to have taken place as he said it did.

As @RockyValdez suggested, it makes much more sense that this happened after he moved to St Louis when he was a few years older. So the tale of walking into a gym as a youth, getting beat up and not wanting anything to do with boxing may be true, but the timeline may be off.

 

I dont doubt he got beat up the first time he sparred. Most boxers do. I just dont think it happened when he was 13 and living in southeast Arkansas. I think its much more like that either happened when he was older in St Louis, or in Jeff City.