Floyd Patterson vs Muhammad Ali Prime for Prime

I always felt floyd SHOULD have been beter against ali anyway! Of all the heavyweights active in the 1960s floyd still SHOULD have been best equiped to trouble ali. I just think ali got under his skin and prevented floyd from bringing his best fight into the ring with him when they fought. Floyd did not perform and he always SHOULD have done. when you think in the 60's floyd recorded some great polished wins against chuvalo, cooper, bonavena and machen within the period. floyd had none of this form against ali in vegas. in 1972 he did beter in their belated rematch but floyd had to have been over the top by then. it showed what floyd COULD have done.

 

I think that a prime Floyd could have given him some problems.

 

I agree with you guys.

A prime Floyd would have been a bit problematic for Ali.

 

I think Ali outpoints him over 15, POSSIBLY stopping him in the last two rounds.

Ali's own strengths negate Patterson's imo.

 

I think we got as close to a prime for prime match-up as you are likely to get in real life more or less. Floyd had passed his peak by a bit and Ali still was to reach his, but they're both in their primes I'd say.

So, what we had in 1965. TKO in rd 12 it is.

 

Patterson looked terrible against Ali the first time, like an old man with his back problems, although Ali to his credit did perform brilliantly in one of his peak performances. I don't see why anyone would claim that this wasn't the best of Ali.

The best Patterson, say of the second Johansson fight, would be more competitive en route to a late round TKO or decision loss.

 

Ali by wide UD

 

There's two things to the back problems, though.

First is that fighters always have an injury excuse when losing. Ali had several himself.

The second is that Dundee said that Ali's jab was so sharp it had been giving sparring partners similar problems before the fight. It often landed high up in the face or on the forehead and therefore the spine bore the brunt. This would especially be true for someone with Floyd's forward leaning stance. And he had long standing back problems. So Ali's jab might just have made already existing problems worse.

That a guy who always had been faster than his opponents, and relied upon it, looked **** against a master ring general who were both faster and much bigger isn't really that schocking.

 

Floyd was basically incapable of fighting in this bout once his back crippled up as bad as it did, his corner tried to stretch out his spine and I can't recall off hand if it was later found to be a slipped disc or otherwise. We don't know how this bout would have played out with an able to fight Patterson, at least not based on the unable to fight one. In their second go, against a not very in shape older Ali, Floyd showed the skills he couldn't perform in their first bout and I had him winning when he was cut. Floyd had already lost some of his speed by the time their first bout took place but even at his peak he may not have been able to get close enough to unleash his combinations.

 

Ali would probably thrash him still.

A peak Patterson was fighting the likes of Roy Harris and Brian London and Peter Rademacher and not 100% impressively. His win over Archie Moore was very good but Moore looked stale and creaky, and the rematch win over Johansson might be Floyd's best ..... but nothing in there good enough to fancy him to give Ali a tough time.

 

I would do a large paragraph of complaining but as in most Floyd Patterson H2H threads, I figure it's no use. Then I hope Bodhi will come in and say something decent about The Gentleman.

 

Ali beats Patterson 100/100 times, just a higher level of fighter with every advantage possible.