Would Ali’s Rope A Dope Work On Sonny Liston?

I'm a real risk taker, dude!!! Sometimes, at night, i even sleep with the lights out.

 

Are you kidding? Lights on for me always and I still check every night to see if Sonny Liston is hiding under my bed!

 

No shot. Ali would need his pre-exile footspeed to beat a prime Liston.

 

Pre title, or post title?

 

Pre title, post title…always.

Sonny never saw a time when he could ever be described as “post” scary.

 

The Ali that beat Foreman would stop Liston - a slightly different strategy possibly but the Ali that beat Foreman was physically stronger than the one that stopped Liston X2

 

Maybe against that injured fading version of Liston, dude was gassing hard by r6

 

bad taste

 

No for one Ali was young and basically in his prime when he fought Liston so sticking and moving for 15 rounds wouldn't be an issue.

 

The "Rumble in the Jungle" is IMHO the greatest display of improvisational genius in ring history--what Ali pulled off that night will forever be immortalized!!

 

Thank you all for your responses and discussion.

 

Very good, except Ali did plan out the rope a dope, at the very least as an alternate strategy.
In "When We Were Kings" & elsewhere they recount how Ali would train by absorbing a lot of punishment, to Dundee's dismay.
The sportswriter George Plimpton described his style as a man leaning out of a window to see something on a higher floor!

Ali was ready to deploy the ropes & conditions were perfect for it.
I never heard Ali's leg's were near "gone" but rather Ali explicitly said that he was surprised by Foreman's speed.
And that he was great at cutting of the ring.
And he would have to take twice as many steps as George to try & evade him.
The small & soft ring made it almost pugilistic suicide to try & dance~> he was nowhere near burnt out early, but knew he would be without adjusting his strategy.

He had a Tremendous Plan B.

 

Liston was ponderous and Ali’s defense very good. Ropeadope would “work” in that its use would allow Ali to rest. It would be what Ali does inbetween his time on the ropes that Liston needs to worry about.

 

For a certain window of time, Ali could make anything work in that ring.

He was so tough, for starters. He wouldn't let Liston get over on him.

 

Liston actually had good stamina so I’ll say no