Rocky Marciano picked Patterson to beat Liston

Interesting and surprizing.

I think that Two Ton Tony saw a bit of his own former atitude in the young Cassius Clay.

 

I remember that Sports Illustrated predicted that Patterson would knock Liston out in the first round. At the time, I was absolutely certain that Sonny would beat Floyd and wagered a lot of money on Sonny to win accordingly. I had no idea that Sonny would accomplish this in the 1st round, but my bets were for him to win only...so I made a bundle on that fight. Privately, I was predicting a Liston knockout win in about 4 rounds.

 

I listened to that first Liston - Patterson fight, on the radio, sitting in a room in Philadelphia with my nephew. I remember the announcer screaming: "Sonny Patterson is down! Sonny Patterson is down! I don't think he's going to beat the count!" Then there was a bunch of static. So my nephew and I were sitting there, for about 3 minutes, in a cheap hotel room in Pennsylvania, not knowing for sure who the hell had knocked down whom!

 

He also picked his own toupe ...

 

I think a lot of people started regarding Ali higher and higher through the mid 70's to the mid-80's, and as a consequence, Liston also gained some ground.

Damn If ESB existed back then it would've been just as black-and-white as it is now.

 

Patterson was "the good guy" during the prefight build up for the fight.

Many people wanted him to win so much, that they let hope become belief.

Not saying thats what Marciano thought, but it's something to consider

 

I've come to the conclusion that Patterson was indeed one of the weakest of all the heavyweight champions.

And Cus D'amato was a ridiculous manager. I dont if that means he was "good" or "bad" at his job.
But he made a mockery of the title with some of those defences.

 

If Liston and Patterson never fought I'm sure loads here would pick Patterson over him. Some pick Dempsey over Liston after all, which is a pretty similar style

Guess what lots of people on here picked Cotto and Hatton over Pacquaio. Loads of sports writers picked Spinks over Tyson

 

I'd pick Dempsey over Liston. I think Dempsey was miles better and tougher than Patterson.

I see your point though. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

 

Makes you wonder what would've happened if he lived to guide Tyson through the pros. Maybe he would've made Tyson grab a belt from Bonecrusher and hold on to it till the mid-90's, defending against the McNeely's of the world.

 

Perhaps, but there was relly no Liston type of fighter in Tyson's era of the 80's.

Not sure there was any one worth ducking.

 

Was he only steered away from Liston, though? What about Machen, Folley and others?

That said, Floyd did fight Johansson whom they underestimated. It's very well possible that Cus would have Tyson fight Holyfield to have Tyson knock out a "name" opponent. No one gave Evander a chance back then, but we all saw what happened when they did square off.

 

That is ridiculous. Patterson had perhaps the best combination of speed, power, and technique the divison has ever seen. His Technique was so well schooled, his combinations were picture perfect, his body punching was lethal, his power was electrifying, and his speed was blazing. His jab is also underrated. Patterson would beat MANY heavyweight champions in a head to head fight. As far as resume goes..he did beat Archie Moore, Eddie Machen, Ingemar Johansson 2x, Hurricane Jackson, Oscar Bonavena, George Chuvalo, Jimmy Slade, Henry Cooper, Drew with Quarry..and robbed against Ellis. That is pretty good.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCUkqyfUjTU[/ame]
I highly doubt this guy right here is one of the 'weakest' HW champs ever.

 

The White establishment ,and show biz crowd, Sinatra etc ,certainly were rooting for Floyd .

 

Not all of those defenses though. Tom McNeeley, Ingo and Roy Harris were undefeated. Harris was actually a very dominant win over a then reputable challenger (who had recently beaten Pastrano), early knockdown against him notwithstanding. Brian London had stopped Pastrano on cuts in a rematch, and Willie may have been a bigger threat to Liston and Patterson than anybody has ever thought to speculate. (Don't forget that Ali and Pastrano were Dundee stablemates, and Willie was never decked by a head shot. Might Pastrano have been able to give the much slower Sonny some major headaches with 15 rounds of stick and move?) Floyd shut out 6'3-1/2" Tommy Jackson in their title rematch before stopping him in ten.

By the time Patterson died, Cus and Floyd were widely credited for helping to break the back of the IBC monopoly on boxing, whether true or not, by refusing to defend the title against IBC challengers.

Patterson himself made the decision to defend against Liston, just as Burns did (for a very handsome payoff though) against Johnson. As far as I'm concerned, Floyd and Tommy could have gone in the IBHOF just for choosing to make those final defenses alone.

As a former champion, Patterson did defeat Cooper (by clean knockout), Chuvalo and Machen (lopsidedly), all of whom would have made for respectable title challengers during Floyd's two reigns. To a certain extent, Cooper, Chuvalo and Machen retroactively validate Patterson's time at the top. Aside from Folley, how many top contenders from the late 1950s were there who he ultimately didn't take on?

It can be argued that he should have also been awarded decisions over Quarry and Ellis. He did get the nod over Bonavena and beat future challenger Daniels at a time when Daniels was a halfway decent up and comer.

When he retired, Patterson was hardly washed up. Of course he couldn't deal with the Fraziers Foremans and Alis of the division, but he could very well have remained a top ten contender for a few more years, and was arguably still a top five heavyweight in 1972.

Floyd's performance against Chuvalo does raise some questions about what he might have done with a more appropriate strategy against Liston, as Ali himself suggested during that broadcast. Patterson showed he was capable of the necessary lateral movement, and he could be very resilient when hurt. He had a tremendous advantage in hand speed, and there was nothing questionable about his conditioning and endurance.

One of the weakest champions? He did become the first to regain the title, and he successfully defended it more than once during both reigns. He wasn't a great active fighting champion, but he didn't sit on it for two years or more without defending it either. He was better than Dempsey after Firpo, or Frazier following the FOTC. Six total successful defenses is a reasonable sum within the context of division history, more than Corbett, Fitz, Sharkey, Schmeling, Carnera, Baer, Braddock, Liston or Foreman were able to produce. (Fitz was a triple crown winner of course, but of the other eight, only Primo has yet to be enshrined at Canastota.) Winning the series with Ingo represented a stunning reversal, and perhaps it's wildly irrational to demand he be able to repeat that with Liston. Most couldn't manage that kind of turn around even once after getting blown out like that.