Sonny Liston vs James J Jefferies

Liston would kill him with the jab, Sonny would win

 

I was speaking more towards Sharkey being a Marciano equivalent. I have seen the xray.

 

Actually, I'm asking you to believe more what your eyes can see that the flowery language you read about. Next, have you ever played the game telephone... if you have... you'd see how things can get adopted, enhanced and perpetuated further. Lastly, I didn't say everyone was bias or got it wrong, but they are in the business of selling papers and creating heroes. You don't create heroes by saying "The champion struggled a bit, took some blows, but eventually overcame his foe over the course of a long fight".. You create them with language like "The strongest champion there ever was, once again toyed with his foe and let him hit him knowing no man could hurt him. After he was done playing with his prey, all it took was a few blows that would've felled an Elephant to dispatch his overmatched foe".

If the quotes were more the former, you might have a point and they are more believable. When you want me to view the later as evidence over the videos I see, and them not meshing, that I can't agree with.

 

The problem with this is, that whatever they said, they said it 120 years ago! So people who had no idea of what was to come, thought Jeffries was fantastic. Which shouldn't surprise anyone... but also shouldn't be taken too seriously.

 

Fair enough, but you at least listen to their descriptions of what kind of fighter he was, and how he compared to his contemporaries.

As for the rest, you keep an open mind.

 

These descriptions were not written in a vacuum.

Multiple papers had reporters at ring side for his fights, and you can cross reference their accounts, as indeed people could at the time.

I would imagine that they tried to describe the fight as accurately as possible.

Yes they disagreed on certain points, as eye witness observers always do, but you can get a pretty good idea what happened by comparing them.

 

Again though, you're skirting around the issue. You don't think they exaggerated what they saw with the usage of the flowery language at all? The language itself isn't very believable and clearly exaggerated, yet you think it's to be taken at face value, and more so than the videos I can see? I have no issue with some of the write ups, but many of them are really not all that believable then, and certainly not now. It's like when people first saw Red Grange, they talked about him like he was the second coming of Jesus, but really, by today's standards... was he really that good when looking at the total picture?

 

No, I am not asking you to take these accounts at face value.

I would suggest reading multiple contemporary accounts, and seeing what points they agree upon.

This is essential, if you are going to attempt to understand what sort of fighter Jeffries was.

 

Jeffries would employ his Whitehurst like semi crouch and eventually drive listo n back in the infighting in route to a stoppage

 

Yes, I believe it. People who saw 50 years of boxing say this. You have seen maybe .05% of Sharkey's
career on a badly faded film. Sharkey KO'd Kid McCoy, and Joe Choysnki. Check out who they beat. He also bettered Jim Corbett.

In the mean time Liston lost to Marty Marshall of all people whom he had 25 pounds on. Liston's resume outside of a scared Patterson is pretty thin. He could not finish Machen, and had to low blow him...twice. He beat Williams who busted him up in short order, but since Williams had the chin of a light heavy, and traded of course he would not last. Williams by the way has one win over a top ten opponent when he fought him. I'm still not sure how durable Sonny really was. Leotis Martin Ko'd Liston cold, out on the ring floor for a minute. Ali who quickly shook Liston up. When guys landed on Sonny they quickly marked him up, or worse, didn't they? Yep.

 

Who are Sharkey's five best opponents, and what are their weights?

Who are Marciano's five best opponents, and what are their weights?

 

IMO, estimated weights without looking them up

Jeffries 215-220
Ruhlin 190-200
Corbett 190
McCoy 175
Goddard 190
Fitz 165-170

But remember they fought with very light gloves and no mouth gear.

 

Lis ton had a good chin and good enough for most mortals.....but iron it wasnt

 

Corbett was a skilled boxer. If you use news read on who was the better, he's something close to 59-0-3 before losing to Fitzsimmons. Fitz a deadly skilled puncher. Sharkey a quick brawler compared to Rocky Marciano. McCoy a pound for pound type for skills and with his punch.

Jeffries beat several hall of fame opponents. Liston? Only one in Patterson.