Well, here's my two cents worth, and hopefully this will get a discussion started. He was good, but seemed very far from great, and there was not really any indication that he might be the one to dethrone Liston, at least not as quickly as he did, or in the manner with which he did it. At the time, he appeared to be more flash over substance. My supposition might have been that he'd be ready for a title shot around 1967, or even a little later. He improved about as abruptly from Cooper I to Liston I as Larry Holmes did from Arrington to Shavers I. 188 pound Doug Jones nearly dropped him with a hard right in round one the previous March, and the fact of that bout being named by Ring Magazine as Fight of the Year, certainly helped raise his profile tremendously (as did his appearance as himself opposite Anthony Quinn in the opening scene of the movie version of Requiem for a Heavyweight). In his next and final match before challenging for the title, 186 pound Henry Cooper dropped and seriously stunned him with his hook. (Both matches are on-line.) At 6'3" and just over 200 pounds, he looked rather frail and willowy, as if he could be blown over by a stiff breeze. Cooper had seriously stunned him, and Liston outweighed Cooper and Jones by over 30 pounds. Surely, he would be utterly impervious to anything that loudmouthed kid could possibly subject him to, especially after what Sonny had taken from Cleveland Williams. When viewing the matches with Jones and Cooper, and comparing them with Liston/Williams I & II, and Liston/Patterson I & II, it should become obvious why Ali was an overwhelming underdog. LaMar Clark, with his record 44 consecutive knockouts streak, had his nose broken in young Clay's fifth bout, sending Clark into retirement. But although Clark was only 28 years old, his winning streak had previously been snapped, and he was on the skids. He also only weighed 180 pounds. Billy Daniels was undefeated when getting cut led to a seventh round stoppage. (His career never recovered.) Against the aged Archie Moore, he was a 3-1 favorite, but was facing somebody who was his absolute match in verbal combat, making for an entertaining promotional buildup. Still, he justified the odds in successfully carrying out his four round prediction. It was really his personality and excellent management by the Louisville Group that seems to have been primarily responsible for manuevering him into his title shot with Liston. Sonny had essentially cleaned out the HW division during his run to the title, and Willie Pastrano had dethroned LHW champion and prospective Liston challenger Harold Johnson, so Sonny didn't exactly have a great many lucrative and viable options for defending his championship. Maybe Pastrano's stick and move style could have sold as a potentially frustrating situation for Liston to contend with, but Sonny would have been in a far stronger financial situation if he could have defended his newly won championship in a first time meeting with a Folley, Machen, Ingo or Cleveland Williams. Unfortunately for Liston, he was not a personality who could profit from his celebrity in ways other than boxing. Nor did he have much in the way of marketable competition left, as all his other potential challengers kept eliminating each other. The outcome of Ingo's match with Brian London, leading to Johansson's retirement, was a disaster for Sonny's earning potential. On the occasion of resigning the championship he'd regained from Leon Spinks, Ali was asked if he felt he saved boxing. He thoughtfully and quietly replied, "I wouldn't say I saved it. I'd say I revived it." I suspect Ali was referring to the comeback he began in 1970. However, if he had been knocked out in four rounds by either Cooper or Liston, or if Doug Jones had been awarded the decision in their bout, the heavyweight division might have been moribund for the rest of the decade, or longer. Boxing was already reeling from the aftermath of the Griffith-Paret and Ramos-Moore disasters, and if Liston had not been as shockingly dethroned as he was, I'd wager that far fewer of us would be posting here today. If it hadn't been for Ali, boxing's current exile from the cultural mainstream might have taken place nearly 45 years ago. Patterning himself after Gorgeous George was the stroke of genius which set him apart. With behaviour like Marciano's or Patterson's, he might not have achieved the notoriety required to stand above the rest of the pack. Of course there had been some flamboyant and showboating characters in boxing before. After one late round in his WW title winning fight against Basilio, Johnny Saxton raised his arms in triumph as he did a celebratory multiple shuffle before returning to his corner, several years before Ali did the same thing when Liston quit in his corner. Nonetheless, that sort of showboating and clowning was still something of a novelty, not seen at the HW championship level since the likes of Max Baer, and some colorful challengers to Louis. SRR, Gavilan and Archie Moore were also colorful in their uniquely various ways. (Now, nobody seems unique, only obnoxiously unimaginative and plagaristic.) Today, trash talking, insults and showboating have become dull and disingenuous. Ghetto lingo is the order of the day. To be noticed, be different. In Ali's era, that meant flamboyance. Today, diffidence might be more noticably refreshing than crude obnoxiousness.
Ali was a work of art and skill in progress, with enough self-mastery to peak just at the right time for his showdown with destiny. He was always learning, but his goal was the championship. A few mistakes here and there against (in his mind, certainly) inferior opposition were really no big deal. He never meant to beat anyone to death in the ring and, on the other hand, loved to showboat. Plus, he faced motivated opposition, prodded by his taunting. In a word, he gave himself the luxury of, not just seeking the win, but fooling with the time of same, all the while perfecting his unique craft, and yet still remained undefeated and earned a title shot. At 22, after 10 years in the ring, he was physically and mentally ready to make all those dreams come true.
Between the Cooper fight and the Liston fight, Ali seemed to mature physically. is arms were bigger and back muscles as well. I guess that was added to help with the physical strength department against Liston. Also he seemed to have more conficdence than usual. Many people seem to believe that Ali didn't really wasn't that confident that he could beat Liston until he hooked up with Malcolm X, and he gave him that extra push to want to "realize his destiny". And the rest is history.:good
You have no credibility since you took the computer fight as seriously as a real prime-for-prime matchup.:yep