On Sept 3 1963, Sonny Liston was in London trying to get a fight with Ingo.

Sonny looking thrilled with the opportunity to make a new friend.

https://sep.yimg.com/ay/yhst-131594...ondon-vintage-photograph-london-england-3.gif

 

Dread to think what would happen to London if he fought Sonny

 

Wonder what would have happened if he poured that jug of water on Sonny's head?

 

He probably refused to fight Liston out of concern for Liston's safety. Ingo was a good guy like this.

 

I guess this is when Reg Gutteridge (British boxing commentator) and his well known anecdote about freaking out Liston by stabbing his own leg occurred. Sonny not knowing Reg lost his leg in the Normandy landings.

 

Apparently Liston has more self restraint than me. If someone pulled a prank like that, I'd have to floor him, handicapped or not.

 

You would punch a handicapped man for stabbing his own fake leg?

 

Ingo pretty much lost all motivation to keep making the sacrifices a top fighter needs to make to stay on top once he won the title back in 1958. By 1963 Johannson didn’t need money and certainly wasn’t going give up all of the rich foods he was eating to get pounded on by Liston.

Even by 1961 Ingo conditioning was getting pretty bad.

Here is a quote about Ingo preparing for the final Patterson Fight. The quote reminds me of Ike Williams telling young boxers at the youth authority, who struggled with making weight to not eat like you’re going to the electric chair.
“He was, I had heard, on an eating jag: creamed chicken, strawberry shortcake, cherry cheesecake,” Mr. Liebling wrote of Johansson. “It sounded compulsive to me, the prisoner stuffing before the execution.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/01/sports/othersports/01johansson.html

 

If he knew that i didn't know it was a fake leg and did it just to freak me out, yes. I take self harm very seriously. I literally had to stop a family member from jumping out of a window once. It isn't funny.

 

Wasnt that Ali that pulled that prank on Reg not Liston ??

 

It was definitely Liston, Reg mentioned it in his book.
Can’t remember the exact details but something along the lines that Reg who was working on a London newspaper was sent to interview Liston in his hotel room.
Liston who was with a few members of his entourage possibly worse for wear from drinking was acting like a dick, and trying to intimidate Reg, ultimately he punched a hole in a door or something along those lines.
So Reg to gain his reapect picked up an ice pick which was in
a champagne bucket on a coffee table and plunged it into his false leg!
Liston not knowing Reg had a false leg which he’d lost in the Normandy landings immediately stopped his nonsense saying something along the lines of “your some mad mother****er”
That’s the general drift of the story as I remember.

 

I'm sure most of the people on here have seen these already, but for the few that haven't here are some pictures of Liston and Johansson.

https://imgur.com/7LlATPp
https://imgur.com/zjJMcBo
https://imgur.com/jCeOCld
https://imgur.com/bSJ9cQm
https://imgur.com/a5Y4Uko