Send in your 80s-90s contender to beat Sonny Liston

I have an empty corner here.

 

Chris Byrd. He was a contender in the 90s & never held the undisputed championship. Only held partial belts.

 

Tokyo Douglas was a contender when he won it.

 

I've seen multiple claims on this forum of Liston's superior ability to take a punch. As someone who followed his career obsessively, I have to say that he wasn't hit hard very often. This claim of invulnerability is derived largely from training footage of Willie Reddish heaving a medicine ball into Sonny's belly and from round one in his first bout with Cleveland Williams in Miami. He did absorb some punishment there. But most of Sonny's opponents adopted a defensive posture and quite a few ran from him.

Who hit him hard? We know from news accounts -- no film exists -- that Mike Dejohn and Zora Folley dared to smack the big man. Both were knocked out or stopped. Eddie Machen put up a defiant but cautious fight in which no heavy knockout-force blow landed. Patterson, who failed to connect on anything consequential in two one-round defeats, may have been the third-hardest puncher Liston ever faced, after Williams and Dejohn. Leotis Martin was never considered an unusually heavy hitter before he stiffened our hero.

I submit here that we really don't know how much punishment Liston could absorb. In a career spanning 17 years, we can probably count on one hand the number of power shots that landed on his temple or chin. Liston fought a lot of powder-puff punchers. Have a fresh look at his record. You won't find many solid sockers.

Clay wobbled him with the first hard right he threw in the first round of their first fight. What did that tell us? Tyson, Holmes, Holyfield, Marciano, Ali, to name just a few of the greats -- we have a good idea how much punishment they could endure. Liston? Another mystery that enshrouds him.

 

Witherspoon is the guy I give a slight chance of beating him.
That's about it.imo

 

I'm going with Buster Douglas or Tony Tucker here.

 

If Courage T. had any actual courage and stamina, I might pick him as a dark horse sleep. It starts with the jab and raw power...

 

All stiffs except for Holmes!

 

Literally almost none of this is true. Don't even know here to start.

 

Just out of pure curiosity I’d like to see what would happen between Sonny Liston and David Tua. Not favoring anyone or making any claims. This would be purely out of interest

 

Definitely a must see fantasy fight. For all his chin, Tua could be deterred by decent power - which Liston had of course but then David could whip out a howitzer shot himself…..I tend to feel Sonny could cope with same…but not too many in a row, mind you…..