Cleveland Williams is nowhere near even Ingemar Johansson in any OBJECTIVE metric.

Great post, thanks for that!

 

I already corrected myself on the number of KOs and included Liston after forgetting him.

Miteff and Bethea were 26 and 27 at the time Williams beat them. Johnson was 27 as well, I'd hardly call them shopworn. Their performances against Johnson in particular is rather telling.

Valdez's performance in a losing effort against Johnson: https://www.newspapers.com/clip/53986735/the-ogden-standard-examiner/
Williams on the other hand seems to have done quite well against Johnson: "Cleveland (Big Cat) Williams, who did to Alonzo Johnson
what 29 other opponents couldn't do, said today he wants to fight 2nd ranked heavyweight Eddie Machen next. Johnson, 195, stepped into the ring last night without having been knocked out in his previous 29 fights. Williams, 210, took just two minutes and twenty six seconds to wipe that away. Johnson never landed a blow. Williams put him away with a flashing left hook." -United Press International

 

Excellent breakdown. Rather emphatically proves Nino was the better fighter.

 

When Alonzo Johnson beat 35 years old Nino Valdes, he was 25 years old and had only lost one fight. 9 defeats later Johnson fought Williams and suffered another humbling loss, this time by knockout.

I’m not sure Nino was really his best at age 35 when he lost to Alonzo. And I am not sure Alonzo himself could hope to be as good for Williams as he had been for Nino after losing 9 fights against good men like Muhammad Ali, Eddie Machen, Zora Folley And Alejandro Lavorante. Losing 9 times in 3 years has rather a habit of taking more than a few miles off the clock.

 

The point ,the only point is Williams hit harder than Valdes and you can't bring yourself to admit it ,so just jog on.

 

But it's meaningless if that power didn't give him better results. It's not like we're comparing his power to Tommy Loughran, Valdes was heavy hitter himself. Williams for all this power never struggled to tier opponents any more than Valdes.

 

I'm not clear what you think a "straw man argument" is, but I can promise you it isn't pointing out the factual inaccuracies in someone's post.

I can see you resent my using your own words against you. I'd suggest that it's a better approach than trying to win an argument by making stuff up and pretending the other person said it - claiming over and over again that I've been "trumpeting guys like Miteff and Daniels", for example.

Still waiting for you to list all those "spectacular" losses you feel Williams suffered in his prime.

 

Both guys hit hard. The better puncher is always the one who knocked out the better fighters.

At least we have footage of Valdes demonstrations of power over fair opposition.

Precisely. If you can’t connect or score effectively going up the levels then there is a decision to be made about the guy. Should we really continue to swoon over the way knocked out lesser men?

 

This proves Williams punched harder than Valdes to the same extent that Tami Mauriello or Lee Savold KO'ing Lou Nova twice proves Mauriello or Savold were bigger punchers than Max Baer, who failed to KO Nova in two tries, and ended up being stopped himself both times. You have to overlook that the Nova who fought Baer was not the later Nova. And the Johnson who fought Williams was not the Johnson who fought Valdes. Johnson started his career 16-1 and the last four of these victories were Jimmy Slade, Billy Hunter, Valdes, and Willie Pastrano, earning him a top ten rating. For the rest of his career he went 6-18 and fell into trial horse status. He came into the Williams fight off a loss to Rodolfo Diaz. In fairness, Williams stopping him was impressive, but he would be stopped in four subsequent bouts, and his final tally of 5 KO defeats in 41 bouts does not make him a particularly durable fighter overall.

Miteff is similar. Williams fought him in the middle of a 5-9 with 5 KO defeats end of career slide.

Bethea was not knocked out by Williams or Valdes, so I don't think he is relevant to a discussion of which man was the bigger puncher.

Nova was also fairly young in years when he was being KO'd by Mauriello and Savold, but being young in years doesn't always mean a fighter is not past it, and being old doesn't always prove he is past it.

 

certainly both Liston fights.
Williams lost quite spectacularly to Ali and Liston and Satterfield wouldn’t you say? Now you can hem and haw about if Williams was in his prime or not, but these were spectacular just the same. Certainly Highlight reel worthy...for the guys subjecting Williams to these losses. And these three were clearly the most potent fighters Williams faced in the ring.

The best guys williams fought during the run between the walloping from Satterfield and the shattering loss to Muhammad Ali were Liston, Terrell and Machen.

When it counted, Williams held his own with Machen and Terrell but then Williams was crushed twice by Sonny. Spectacularly. His record with this three is 1-3-1. The one win being over Terrell when it counted the least, before Terrell had become a leading fighter.

 

Aren't you the guy who says Liston wasn't "much past it" despite being at least in his late 30s going on 40s? But you wanna make out the 27 year old Johnson to be hopelessly washed? lol

 

No I said that Sonny hadn’t taken many beatings by the time he was old. Look at his career. Sonny had his jaw broke in that marshal fight and got beat up one time against Ali. No wars. One concussion against Martin. In a career running from 1953 up to 1970 that’s not much abuse is it?

The beatings Alonzo Johnson must have took losing to Lavorante, where he was decked twice, the losses to Pastrano (who he was previously able to beat) Muhammad Ali, Zora Foley, Eddie Machen where he flat out lost in long distance fights must surly have took a toll. 9 losses in 3 years. Imagine?

 

Choklab, I read that Cleveland Williams broke Sonny Liston's nose in 1959.

 

Interesting debate. BTW, slightly off topic but the Ring "yearly ratings" are not actually yearly ratings but at a point in time, ie the end of the year. I'm sure most are aware of this anyway.

 

Yes I knew about it.

a broken nose and nose bleeds come with the territory.

I can’t think of a fighter who didn’t get his nose broke at some point.