I rewatched Ali vs Liston today and im a little torn. Liston honestly did get hit with some nasty combos but he did fire back. It was pretty even to be honest, no one had taken the lead thus far but if I had to give it to someone it would be Ali. But Never mind that, the part we all care about when regarding this fight is the “phantom punch”(puked in my mouth just from having typed that.) Is Ali amazing? Yes. Is Ali extremely powerful? Also Yes. Is Ali strong enough to force Liston to a 10 count with a single punch while he was against the ropes? P-probably not? Now iv heard a lot about the ref and I will agree that ref was horrible, hell he wasn’t even a ref he was a boxer who was doing a cameo. Its strange to see that Liston instantly jumps up after having been “knocked out” and I simply cant believe someone who just had their nervous system forcefully shut down by a Muhammed Ali punch was able to spring up like that. Now there a few theory’s I have heard. 1:“Its over? What? - Cus damado himself ascribed to this theory and claimed Liston was unaware of the count. This is mainly propagated by immediate reaction and jumping up from the canvas after the fight was finished. Another main component is the fact that refs don’t typically count unless the opponent is in a neutral corner. Liston himself made this claim. This definitely seems possible and if evidence came out tomorrow that this was undoubtedly true I wouldn’t be surprised but gun to my head I wouldn’t say I agree. 2:”yea, I’m not doing this.”- This mainly stems from the opinion that Liston was being massively outperformed. This theory basically claims that Liston, fed up with his circumstances gave up. main propagator of this theory is an episode of the Joe Rogan Experience in which someone shares their theory of how Liston got upset and no longer needed to fight due to him having “enough money to air condition hell.” theres a few things wrong with this theory. First of all, Liston really wasn’t as wealthy as he should’ve been. The mob took most of his money and even after his retirement he still worked in an attempt to make more cash, although he was still well off with a good amount of savings. Secondly is the mental state in which this is framed, im no mind reader but its easy to see that Liston had the intention of rectifying his previous loss in this bout. The press alone was absurd, I doubt he would throw away this fight and destroy his reputation. Finally the audiences themselves disagreed with this. Accounts of the fight have the crowd screaming “scam!”, “Give us back our money!”,“Rigged!” And other things such as those. This isn’t exactly evidence, just something I felt I should mention. 3-“cant let my family get killed!”/Paul Gallander theory- Ill start this off by saying, I may misrepresent some points of pauls but im watching an interview of his while writing this, nonetheless please watch his original interview(down below.) To begin, we must first set the stage. Muhammed Ali had just changed his name from Cassius clay to Muhammed Ali and aligned himself with the “black muslims” the black muslims was a group who was heavily involved with Malcom X and a man named Iljah Muhammed. After the assassination of Malcom, Muhammed Ali had sided with Ilijah. The very night of Malcoms assassination there was a fire in the apartment building of Muhammed Ali. This caused his wife to believe this was a clear sign, a warning shot if you will to send a message to Ali. Something along the lines of “don’t get out of line.” This allegedly prompted Muslims who were loyal to malcom and apart of the Black Muslims group to go to Lewiston in an attempt to assassinate Ali. Sonny and Ali both believed this rumor, in fact Sonny said in an interview “Well whats there for me to worry about? They’re coming to get him.” Followed by “They’re coming to get him? Not me… right?” Due to this the rematch which was scheduled for November 16 1964 in Boston was changed. The interviewer after this setting of the stage, asks Paul “How are you so sure that your version of what happened in that second fight is true? That- that Liston did that because he wanted- was in fear for the lives of his family how are you so sure?” Paul goes on to explain that he had spoken to a friend of both the Louis and the Liston family. This lady had attempted to find Geraldine(Listons wife) who she was great friends with on the day of the fight, she failed to get in touch which worried her. She then reached out to Martha Louis(Joes wife) and explains her distress. Martha explains to the woman named Maryland that the Black Muslims had kidnapped Geraldine and their son and that Liston must lose the fight to retrieve them. Paul says that he’s Certain that Liston told joe, who told Martha, who told Maryland. This content is protected ANYWAYS! Those are the main theory’s I have heard, hope you enjoyed my post and give me your opinion.
Ultimately I think Sonny knew he had no chance and was going to get an even worse beatdown then he did in the first fight against Ali! Why not take a quick dive--get your cash--and get the hell out of there in one piece!!
This. Instead of trying to regain his title & salvage his legacy, he cashed out & fled to Sweden until Ali was indicted, then returned to campaign for a shot at whoever the next champ would be.
Jersey Joe Walcott had no control over what happened there, Nat Fleischer influenced him and it turned out to be a clusterf*ck to the highest order. If it was a dive or a fix, Sonny wouldn't gotten up, plain and simple. His side of a story seems legit and is consistent with what happened.
Jerry Izenberg who was there said Liston told him that he lost simply because "the timekeeper couldn't count".
It was very common back then for boxers to also work as referrees from time to time. Louis, Sharkey, Tunney , Max Baer, to name a few, they did it for years. Liston referreed several matches, you can find his record here: https://boxrec.com/en/referee/009031 Dempsey is a notable example, his career as a referee spanned 45 years during which he referred over 400 matches. There was nothing wrong with Walcott being assigned to referee the Lewiston fight, he had already referreed 15 other matches before that. The situation simply got out of hand. You had one guy flopping like a fish on the canvas and the other guy standing over him or running around the ring. By the time Walcott got Ali back to the corner, Liston had risen, so he let them get back to it. The problem was that Nat Fleischer asked Walcott to stop the fight because he had counted Liston out, but a timekeeper can't stop the fight. Walcott could have ignored him and let the fighters get back to it but the situation was such a mess that I don't entirely fault Walcott for messing it up though I would have liked to see how a professional referee like Arthur Donovan, Jack Dempsey or Ruby Goldstein would have handled the affair. But what I do see is Liston going down and then giving the worst acting performance of 1965. The man hadn't been properly knocked out before and it showed. There's a good chance that even if Ali got back to the corner and Liston had been given a proper count, he'd have stuck his tongue out and played dead for the whole ten.
1. The punch wasn't phantom. 2. The whole thing ... and I mean the whole thing ... was a cluster frick of ginormous proportions, down to where the fight was held and the National Anthem. 3. I think Gallender is cuckoo, he cannot conceive of the fact that Ali was a superior prize fighter to Liston and keeps dying on the hill that there was no way Ali could beat Liston in a fair fight.
His book seemed like written by a Liston fanboy. He had some good insight regarding the first fight, good investigation into Liston's real age (without conclusion, cause noboy would believe he was born in 1919) but he turns David Icke when he speaks about the rematch.
He got up b/c more than 10 seconds had elapsed since he'd initially flopped, & he saw Ali run past him in what would normally look like an obvious victory pose, so he presumed that he'd been either counted out or TKO'd. Notice how Ali runs past him at the 12-minute mark below: This content is protected
