sonny Liston vs Riddick Bowe

Great thread being reprised from a few months back but it is always interesting. Bowe is the bigger man but I doubt he is the stronger one. Liston, to go along with his formidable offense arsenal, had moxie and trickiness that Bowe lacked. In Bowe's best effort (first Holyfield fight) he took a lot of leather against the Real Deal. This would be disasterous against Liston. The idea against Liston is to hit and take great pains not to be hit by him. Bowe's tendancy to mix it it up would be his downfall here although he would certainly have his moments.

Liston KO 9 Bowe

 

A tough one I say Bowe in a close one. Just my gut feeling.

 

bowe was prety easy to hit and I dont think he dominated a fighter near listons class. riddick won a great fight with holyfield fair and square but it was close and was never as good again.

the best heavyweights of listons era were machen, folley, ingo, floyd, doug jones, terrel and ali. of the 4 he fought liston was 4-2 against them in fights.

the best heavyweights of bowes era were holyfeild, lewis, ruddock, morrison, mercer old foreman and moorer. bowe only fought holyfeild but he lost to him too. ok bowe would stand a good chance against the others if he was at his beat each time he fought which he was not.

 

I like Bowe.

Bowe is 6'5" with an 81" reach and 235-240Lbs. in his prime.

A prime Liston is 6' 1/2" with an 84" reach and about 215Lbs.

Don't let Liston's 84" reach fool ya. Riddick would look like the man with the longer reach. Height matters. Bowe knew how to fight "big". When you punch up you take the snap off of teh punch... unless it's an uppercut or hook.

Bowe would have the leverage. He'd be able to lean on Liston when he got close. He'd also be able to sneak in uppercuts and hooks when Liston got close. They both had good hard jabs but Bowe had quicker hands and better footwork. They were both good finishers.

I'll take the bigger man by late round TKO.

 

Tunney, Marciano, and Bowe are the only lineal HW Champs who were never stopped.

Valuev (WBA), Ibragimov (WBO), and Toney (WBA before his win over Ruiz was changed to a NC) were never stopped either.

Bowe had a good chin. Sure, Golota put some hurting on Bowe but for what it's worth Golota could not finish Bowe... he couldn't even beat him, Bowe WDQ7 and Bowe WDQ9!

 

I really don't think he had an 84" reach. Even if he did, it wouldn't matter vs. a guy like Bowe who fought tall and used his reach well.

 

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"Liston had more than simple strength in this left arm. There was also the item of reach. Arms extended Parallel with the shoulders. Liston measured 84 inches from fingertip to fingertip."- Miami News March, 1 1964



"We had the whole ring between us and he still reached me with that jab"- Roy Harris

 

i don't think this tale of the tape is quite true.
liston 215 lbs had chest 44 and biceps 17 like 245 lbs lennox lewis?cmon...
he sure had long arms,but is it really 84"?
and i too think that he would be in disadvantage in reaching bowe,maybe he had longer reach but he was shorter 5" so he would loose a lot of reach punching up...

 

Well what you think doesn't matter when the concrete evidence suggests otherwise.

 

hehe well i'm not the only one
for example,i saw a photo with pac and cotto,and pac's fist is significally bigger,yet on tale of the tape cotto's fist is a inch bigger.
so yea,they can have some mistakes.

 

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Duh, no ****! I know it's listed at 84"... I just don't think it's true. I've also seen him listed at 6'1" but I've seen him listed at 6' 1/2" more times than not. I've seen his neck at 18 1/2 but above it's listed as 17 1/2.

Ali is listed at 6'2 1/2" but I've seen him listed at 6'3" (most of the time) and even 6'3 1/2" before. Don't believe everything you read!