Is there any scenario in which Patterson beats any prime version of Liston?

Not prime Liston, no. Prime Patterson versus Liston at the very end of his career, perhaps.

 

I feel that Liston might’ve still overcome Patterson even at that late stage of Sonny’s career.

Just one of those, singularly fated for all time, stylistic match ups.

I hear/read anecdotally that Patterson was up for a 3rd match vs Liston. Is that correct?

Do we have any primary sources indicating Floyd making any noises in old Liston’s direction - and, if so, what was Liston’s response, if any?

Seems to me that Liston could’ve gained some nice mileage fighting and beating Patterson again, particularly within the context of Floyd’s excellent post title resume and performances.

Whether he was at greater risk against Floyd in a rubber match, I tend to think that Liston himself wouldn’t think so - and Sonny would also be riding on the likely psychological damage (to Floyd) caused by his previous 1st round destructions of Patterson and, tbh, Floyd was already psychologically damaged at the mere prospect of facing Sonny.

While Sonny boxed well in those two fights against Patterson, he also thug beat Floyd - a manner of victory that would still be within his later 60s capabilities I would think.

I guess Floyd’s best hope would be that Liston’s resilience was seriously downgraded since they last fought - but I still don’t think it was downgraded enough - Sonny’s post title tank was the main problem - so Floyd would have to try and take him into deep waters.

Old Sonny was only good for 7-8 rounds, pretty much exactly, and you can see that in every fight he had that came close to that mark.

Even by the time they stopped the Scrap Iron Johnson fight, Liston appeared to be heading toward exhaustion from merely pounding on poor old Scraps.

Another 2 rounds or so was a long way for an already well beaten Scraps, but hypothetically, if he had been able to hang that bit longer, the fight might’ve turned somewhat due to Liston’s fast emptying tank.

 

Patterson actually wanted a 3rd fight against Liston i believe in the late 60s ? Patterson despite losing some fights to Quarry, Ellis, Ali 2nd time, during latter stages of his career. Patterson was still in pretty good form around this time both Quarry fights were close in which Patterson could've won a decision in both fights. The Ellis fight is considered highly controversial in which many thought Patterson won, and Patterson was actually more competitive vs Ali compared to their 1st fight, infact the fight was pretty much even at the time of the stoppage.

It would've been interesting to see if Patterson could've done better in a 3rd fight, especially since Liston was quite faded by this point and Patterson was in pretty good form despite being at the latter stages of his career.

But against a prime Liston ? Patterson never stands a chance he'd be lucky to ever get out of the first round if they fought 100 times.

 

Floyd is my favorite champion but Sonny was his kryptonite, I think it would be tough even in 1970. Maybe if he could get out of the first round but Floyd needed that extra 12 to 16 pounds Ali carried against Liston, he didn’t have the muscle to keep Liston off him and Sonny knew it so he had no reason to approach Patterson with any feeling that Floyd had anything for him.

 

Agree 100%, excellent post!

Patterson had amazing competitive spirit and certainly would have tried his best I'm sure.

 

Cheers bro.

 

Yeah, Floyd got robbed against Ellis - Floyd busted Jimmy up badly.

I love Patterson’s performance in the Ali rematch. Very fit and still insanely fast in absolute terms and especially so for a man of 37 years of age.

He stung Ali several times and it was as if Floyd was starting to smoke like old mate Frazier - I think that alerted Ali to get super serious -

Unlucky that Floyd got cut but he didn’t go down to Ali’s badly intended barrages - a very courageous last stand.

Despite ultimately being stopped, a very nice performance to go out on.

 

Some style matchups just don't favor certain fighters. This is one of them.

 

Floyd connected with the last punch in the second Ali fight. He did himself proud that night.

 

I very rarely use the term robbery, as I feel it's laughably overused. Their are some fights, which I think the wrong person got the decision but it was at least close enough to justify.

Only three fights off the top of my head where the decisions were so bad as to constitute a robbery, Holmes-Spinks II, Foreman-Briggs and of course Ellis-Patterson

Regarding Holmes-Spinks, something I always found interesting is the UPI scored the first bout for Holmes by quite a wide margin (146-141), yet had Spinks the winner in the rematch (143-142)!

 

There are no indicators which point to where he would

 

The scope for scoring in boxing allows for far too much subjectivity even if the judges honestly apply themselves.

On the other side of the coin, that accepted scope could see judges deliberately “work” their scores to tip it toward the pre favoured fighter.

I suppose you could use two terms - 1) worst decision ever or 2) robbery, the latter term clearly implying impropriety also.

Then again, if a decision is so wildly out of step with reality, in our eyes, we may instantly assume impropriety anyway - us being unable to reconcile such decisions without factoring some dodgy stuff going on behind the scenes.

Btw, you left Ali-Norton III out from your listed robberies. Kidding, I know you have Ali the winner. Me?....nah.

 

Amazing also that Floyd was dropping virtually 30 lbs to Ali in the rematch - Patto at 188 1/2 lbs being about 10 lbs < than today’s CW limit.

A great P4P’er, Floyd could punch well above his own weight and do so in a blur of 5-6 punches in combination over just 2 or so seconds.

 

Sonny was illiterate but not stupid. I think he had enough self-awareness to know by 1966 that his skills had eroded significantly. If we accept the notion -- and I do now -- that he avoided tough opponents during his attempted comeback, he might have okayed a third fight with Patterson, but only if the money was enough to retire on. That wouldn't have been possible. As you say, the public wasn't interested.

 

After Liston's death Patterson said that there'd been an offer on the table to fight Liston a third time and he was considering it but wanted to deal with Oscar Bonavena first (at the time the Patterson-Bonavena fight was planned for Feb 1971). As he put it:

When I fought Liston I made the same mistake twice. I fought his fight. I wouldn't make the same mistake again.