Luis Ortiz vs Sonny Liston

Oh yeah I forgot the the #9 ranked Williams who'd go on to become the #3 ring rated contender, and the number 2 ring rated contender were mediocre.

"I was actually setting a trap for you to walk into". So you don't believe Liston folded under the first signs of adversity?

 

Skill,heart,power,decent chin,and stamina.Ah yes,qualities possessed by Sonny Liston.Look at the footage
of Sonny Liston at his peak,you'll see that he had those assets in abundance.Remember that in Sonny
Liston's day heavyweights boiled down to their absolute minimum weight.Nowadays Liston would be
comfortable fighting at 230/235 lbs.Do you really think that Ruiz would be campaigning at 260 lbs in the
1950s/60s ?
You like to dismiss the quality of Cleveland Williams but the man still punched like a nuclear bomb
(just ask George Foreman who sparred with Williams ).Why on earth should anybody assume that Liston
would quit against the so-called '' big guys '' ?

 

One of the worst h2h heavyweight eras ever. As a champion, he folded 100% of the time when faced with adversity, or 2/3rds of his fights.

 

You can watch Ortiz against Kayode if you want to see how he performed against small heavyweights for cross reference.

There’s more to boxing than power. That’s why Lionel Butler isn’t in the hof.

 

Oh dear ! You are now reduced to posting the same old garbage that featured your entry
into this thread.Exactly the same old garbage.
I,and others,have provided empirical evidence that your views on Liston's moral fibre
are total nonsense.
Give it up man.

 

Your reference to Lionel Butler is somewhat facetious,but ok let's skip that.Of course
there is more to boxing than power.Skill plays a major part.
You can watch Liston vs Williams to witness Liston's superb head movement for
cross reference.

 

This is the definition of intellectual dishonesty.

 

Thr Lionel Butler reference was in comparison to Williams, who was similarly strong in power and weak in skill.

Liston looked great on film. He had me fooled for years until I realized that the best guys he beat might not even crack The Ring's top 10, particularly if the current incarnation Dillian Whyte didn't fight them.

 

Yep,sorry if I was a bit salty about the Lionel Butler reference.Yes,I guess you're focusing on the
greater size of today's heavyweights,and in a lot of cases when discussing past ATGs this might
have some validity.
However there have been more than a few descriptions of Sonny Liston as being a super-heavyweight in
a 6' l'' frame.He had the same physical dimensions of a typical super-heavyweight and it would have been
possible for Sonny to comfortably campaign around the 235 lb range in today's conditions.
Liston has also been described as one of the two greatest boxer-punchers in heavyweight history,
the other being the great Joe Louis.
I am aware that there tends to be florid,exaggerated stories of what the past ATGS could do but in
Liston's case he really was an extraordinary fighter of skill and freakish punching power.
Sonny was just so unfortunate to have his championship-reign broken by the GOAT.

 

I take them as is, no weight or training adjustments.

 

Fair enough NoNeck,that's your prerogative and it's a reasonable stance to take.However,such was the incredible raw power of Liston plus his exceptional skill I think he is an outlier in
the '' old heavyweights vs superheavyweights '' debate.
Unlike some of my fellow old wrinklies I do acknowledge that weight makes a difference.Still Liston,even at what's now regarded as a modest 212/220 lbs would have more than enough
power and savvy to handle the super-heavies we have today.

 

Sounds interesting: two men born in different countries the same year, finally facing off in a fantasy fight.

 

Ortiz might be the only heavyweight in history older than Liston.

 

He wasn’t on steroids for Wilder. He was on HTN meds including a beta blocker, which would’ve screwed up athletic performance. He got cleared and the fight got rescheduled.

He did use them early in his career. I think he stopped after getting caught with the possible exception of the layoff around late 2019/early 2020.

 

It’s a nonissue if we’re taking him at face value for in ring performance.

Interestingly, the only bloodwork I’m aware of from Liston had illicit substances present.