Sonny Liston rated 48 by ring magazine in a list of the greatest fighters in the last 50 years

I'm of the opinion that the sooner Sonny got the title, the sooner he probably would've blown it. Some guys are built to become champions but not stay champions, and I think that Sonny was that kind of fighter. His work ethic fell off a cliff after winning the belt.

Keeping him away from the title kept him hungry. Those wins and performances did more for his image and legacy than if hed gotten the title (and the complacency) years earlier, though he genuinely deserved the shot sooner.

 

To me, Liston's record is just not there. Yes, I have come to accept Patterson as a minor great, but the guy was put on the canvas by guys like McNeely and Rademacher--a chinny LHW with mad speed and power.

Machon, Foley, Williams, Valdez: good fighters but nothing eye popping.

A LOT of Liston's success came because he was just a very big fighter for the day with tremendous reach beating up on guys who would not even be big cruisers today. It shocks me that a lot of the same people who badmouth Marciano, who was not much bigger than his opponents, and occasionally smaller, turn around and sing Liston's praises.

I would say Liston is a minor great as a heavyweight, and does not really deserve PfP consideration.

 

He QUIT while sitting on his stool against Cassius Clay in Miami in Feb.1964...and he took a dive against Ali up in Maine in May 1965....his biggest tests and he crapped the bed. Kinda like Duran...great career...but it always comes back to "No MAS" in November 1980. You have to judge his whole career....not just handpick his best time period to prove your point!!!

 

If you sum up both careers by No Mas and Ali you're not going to find much traction in here, or anywhere for that matter.

 

As undue attention is paid heavyweights in lists like these, his name was bound to come up. Doesn't mean it's deserved, but it's predictable.

 

Sonny Liston was a wonderful figher. That being so, taking into account his record, there are still many champions more deserving of a higher ranking.

I don’t know why Ring magazine says Sonny should have fought for the title four years earlier because in 1958 Sonnys credentials were not good enough. Sonny was just out of prison and Neither of the men he fought that year had an actual rating. Only one of them was coming off a win.

1958 He was fighting guys like Julio medeiros who had only won half his fights. Sonny laboured in two ten rounders with 22lb lighter Bert whitehurst who had won only 24 of 42 fights. It was not title challenger fare that year.

 

I think he was a very good heavyweight but I think 48 is a little to high of a ranking. On a side note, if anyone is looking for a good read on Sonny, I highly recommend a book called the Devil and Sonny Liston. One of my favorite boxing books.

 

"I don’t know why Ring magazine says Sonny should have fought for the title four years earlier because in 1958 Sonnys credentials were not good enough. Sonny was just out of prison and Neither of the men he fought that year had an actual rating. Only one of them was coming off a win."

Sonny was just inside the top 10 by the end of 1958, per Ring and the NBA. Like you say his credentials weren't good enough to merit a title shot yet; that's reflected in his ranking. By the end of '59 he was in the top 3, but he wasn't going to get his shot for a while due to the Patterson-Johansson title lockup.