Sonny Liston 'I Will Manage Floyd Patterson as Light-Heavyweight'

In the world of boxing Liston was savvy...and I might venture that he'd be even savvier as a manager than he was about himself.

 

"Highly intelligent" ?? Who rated him highly intelligent? Ive heard his associates say he wasnt as ignorant as he was made out to be by the press but I also remember plenty of interviews and press conferences with him and the guy was exactly what he was: a poor illiterate sharecroppers with a grade school education at best.

Its pure comedy to suggest he would have been anything but completely out of his depth in negotiations with well schooled businessmen. The thought itself of Sonny sitting across the table from some of the greatest minds in boxing is rather funny.

Nevermind that the fact that his criminal record and ties to organized crime would have prevented him from being licensed as such and would have prevented him from doing business in several states. He was already banned in New York and several of the states that New York had a relationship as a boxer, he would have never gotten licensed as a manager.

Floyd signing with Liston would have been career suicide. Besides, like I said, he made more money as a heavyweight than he ever would have as a light heavyweight.

 

Intelligence and education are two different things.
Liston was an illiterate. He couldn't read or write. His wife had to teach him how to sign an autograph.

Intelligence is a physiological trait and has nothing to do with education.


I agree with you that Liston was not equipped to be a manager, because of his questionable background and illiteracy. He may have had a vast knowledge of the ins and outs of the fight business. He may have been a good adviser.

 

Jose Torres said :
"I have never met an athlete in baseball, basketball, or football who is smarter, more intelligent than Sonny Liston. And the funny thing is that Sonny Liston was so smart it wasn't even funny. What people, what sportswriters specifically don't understand is that Sonny Liston was a man who could not articulate his ideas. If you spoke to him long enough you'd know he had brilliant ideas, that he had all those senses which take intelligence to perform"

I don't know what you're talking about. Boxing promoters and managers certainly - and even entrepreneurs in general - are not necessarily highly-schooled in the education department.

You'd probably say the same things about Don King, who was just a small-time hood off the street and out of jail not long before he was known as the shrewdest promoter in boxing.

I doubt Jack "Doc" Kearns and Tex Rickard had much formal education. They were cowboys and gamblers.

Guys like Yank Durham did fine negotiating for guys like Joe Frazier.

Most of the boxing managers were guys from the street and hustlers so I don't understand where you're coming from at all.

A good point, but Patterson was considered almost squeaky clean so perhaps his willingness in the partnership would have helped rehabilitate Liston's image.

 

Would have been a very interesting scenario, but could Floyd have made that weight and if so, for how long? He had been fighting over 180 lbs for quite sometime, and was now pushing 30.

 

Would n't it just ?

 

Too funny. I could care less what Jose Torres had to say. If you spend enough time with a dog you will see he has intelligence. That doesnt mean he is intelligent enough to be a businessman.

You mention self made men like Rickard and Kearns but they made their fortunes in business. Liston didnt. They gave an indication that they had business acumen by actually succeeding in business. In addition to that they were from a completely different era when the majority of people, including those involved in business had little formal education.

Don King is the exception to the rule in the current era and has ben called almost universally by those he deals with, including Ivy League grads the smartest man they ever met. Even before he got into boxing he was a numbers runner with his own business and had already fostered connections with powerful underworld figures that would help him for the next 20 years.

On the other hand Liston was a petty thug. Never used for anything more than his muscle. He was taken advantage of and used because of his brawn. How many of those mobsters he came in contact with like Vitale, and Carbo do you think said to themselves: "This guys talents are wasted in the ring, hes really smart, we need to set him up running these fighters for us." Im laughing as I write that.


What did Liston ever do to give any indication he had any acumen at all in business, promotion, matchmaking, training, or any other aspect of handling boxers?

You talk of him being intelligent but inarticulate. You state he was brilliant and yet couldnt read or articulate an idea. Thats a pretty damning compliment. Would you want him drawing up your will, even if he could write? No? I didnt think so. So why would you allow him to plot your career course or negotiate contracts totalling hundreds of thousands of dollars? How would he even know what he was agreeing to? "Oh hold on, let me have my lawyer read this and then tell me what it says in third grade language..." Any bets on how long it takes Patterson to realize Liston is in so far over his head its comical?

Patterson was ten times sharper than Liston why wouldnt he just manage himself?

I sat through too many television interviews, five o'clock news press conferences, and the like while Liston sat there with a blank, stupified look on his face letting more intelligent men speak for him and fumbling for what to say when he actually decided to answer a question. I remember more than once he got so frustrated with his inability to answer a question he verbally attacked the reporter. Was he dumb as a mule? Probably not. But he wasnt what any one of us would call smart either.

He would have been a disaster on the business end of any fighter.

 

Well, you asked ""Highly intelligent" ?? Who rated him highly intelligent?" ..... now you say "I could care less what Jose Torres had to say."

So,
What you're saying is :
1. Self-made entrepeneurs with no formal education exist.
2. They prove their business acumen by succeeding in business.

YES, and who is saying Liston is a sure-thing to succeed in business ?
I'm not. I'm open-minded about the possibility, because it's impossible to say who can and who can't be a successful entrepreneur.
Even some of the most successful businessmen were very UNsuccessful businessmen at time, or to start with. Some even ended up that way.
Success is business isn't written in their genes.
Who knows how a Liston-Patterson partnership would have made out ?
None one except YOU is proclaiming to know anything about that.

Why would they say that ? To Carbo et al. boxing managers were not that much valuable than the fighters. They were just pawns. Liston was obviously an exceptionally good fighter.

Liston, reasonably, remarked that Patterson should be steered into the light-heavy division, and, reasonably, believed that Patterson could be better managed and advised than the men who let him Patterson manage himself into fighting Sonny Liston twice !

Nothing in Liston's comments suggest that he is professing to be a genius-manager, or was going to handle a whole stable of boxers. He just thought he could guide Patterson better than throwing him in with fighters such as himself (Sonny) when he has ZERO CHANCE of winning.

Everyone starts somewhere.

I didn't state anything, I said he was regarded by people who knew him as intelligent.
You say he was "not too bright". Did you know him ?

Well, this is exactly how the boxing business operated. Yes, of course, a manager can employ a lawyer or a few to check the actual contracts.
Yes, men who can't read and write well have been shrewd negotiators.

Patterson DID manage himself. And got trounced by Liston twice, and humiliated, he looked like a child in there. That's precisely what inspired Liston's comment/offer.

 

Lets leave it at this: You think Liston was some sort of renaissance man possessed of both brains and brawn, who would have been another Don King, or Tex Rickard.

I, like most people at the time, think Liston was a thug with below average intelligence whose only outlet in life was every going to be beating people up.

I will just close by saying its awfully naive to think that any bumpkin with a third grade education can waltz in off the street and do what these guys can do.

I would ask if you think it was poor managerial acumen that led Patterson to Liston? I would disagree. In reality at least part of the reason Patterson was acting on his own behalf was expressly because he wanted to fight Liston. He was a man of integrity and did the right thing when most wanted him to duck Liston even while admitting Liston was his outstanding challenger. In the process he also made more money than he would have against anyone else. What would you have him do differently? Abdicate and instead of getting over one million to fight Liston drop down and fight a light heavyweight championship for one tenth that? If thats the case no wonder you admire Liston's "intellect." Patterson made the right decision both morally and in a business sense.