Was Liston a "dirty" fighter?

Just on the point of how deep Liston's mob connections were--on 12-19-1960 Sports Illustrated had an article covering Senator Estes Kefauver's Subcommittee on Antitrust and Monopoly which was conducting hearings on professional boxing.

Liston's connections to the mob came up. Two St Louis personalities, Frank Mitchell and John Vitale were called as witnesses but took the fifth. Vitale is described in the article as St Louis' top hoodlum with 58 arrests and 3 convictions. The article goes on with:

"Lt Joseph A Kuda of the St Louis Police Department testified that Liston was divided up as follows: Vitale, 12%; Blinky Palermo, 12%; two others, unidentifed 12% each; Frankie Carbo 52%. He said furthermore, that Palermo, who managed former welterweight champion Johnny Saxton, is the custodian of Carbo's share while Frank is in the can and that Mitchell, who is Vitale's front, will become Liston's manager if he becomes champion. Liston's manager of record is one Joe (Pep) Barone."

Liston could not obtain a license to box in New York State because of his mob connections.

I think it is fair to say that no one was more tied to the mob than Liston.

 

It has been stated that Machen (and Folley by inference) said nothing about being blinded until after the Ali fight and this discredits them. But no one has actually posted interviews where they were asked anything about it. I have been googling, but except for brief two hundred word or so reports I can't dig up anything on the Folley fight and the quotes from Folley have been minimal. Does anyone have an extensive source?

 

Teaches me to never use superlatives. I should have posted that no one was "more tied to the mob than Liston."

 

Machen complained of having injured his right arm previous to the Liston fight. Folley said he fought Liston's fight.

 

You'd imagine they'd make a bigger commotion about being "blinded" by an illegal substance had such an incident actually taken place. It seems to me that this was simply used as an excuse for all the previous Liston victims who were still trying to compete for a title shot after Liston's loss to Ali.

 

Now that's just ridiculous. I think there's evidence, but that most of it is suspicious. But it's something I believe. You haven't understand the point of my comparisons. I still think there's more evidence that Liston or someone on his team blinded Ali than Ali making a corner mistake.

What's more likely? Ali's corner having him blinded (While he never had a cut to fix that could cause something to leak in his eye, nor was blood ever able to drip in his eye) or Liston and or his team purposely blinding Ali. A claim made by 2-3 past fighters that fought Liston. It's possible it was an accident in Liston's corner.

No it doesn't. This is just you deciding what is or isn't credible evidence. Liston had more than 1 past opponent say their eyes burned too. Who cares if we can't tell on film. We don't know how their eyes are, and we don't know their motives for saying it later. Obviously they might have had reason. Liston has an unsavory reputation to beat people up. He beat up the wrestler for saying he could lick Liston. If that's story is true, we can get a sense of Liston's maliciousness and pettiness.

And we know it happened to Ali. And it never happened before or after in that severe of a way. Lastly, there are some stories out their from Liston's corner making a confession. But that sort of dead out. We need to further investigate that.

So it is not true. Let me see the drink I mixed is just suspicion. There is absolutely no reason to believe there is something illegal within that drink. Now if you mention Panama being a crook and all I can fire back about Liston's MOB ties/involvement. You say that's irrelevant, and I say Panama's shadiness is irrelevant. Just as Liston was know to be a terror in his life... which I know you would find irrelevant. The difference here is Liston is one of your favorites, and I just don't give him the same amount of credibility.

I know LaMotta admitted it. My point was that if he hadn't admitted it then there would be no proof that he ever really took a dive.

Look. You're being ridiculous. I said there's no way it wouldn't pass in the court of law. So obviously I don't think the evidence or proof is a mountain high. I do think, that there's more evidence to suggest Liston and or his team blinded Ali than didn't. You don't, that's fine. But to suggest there's zero evidence and merely suspicion is dangerously inconsistent and slightly dishonest.

Do any announcers make note of this. Do we have those commentaries? I think if one watched Marciano vs Walcott with the sound off they would probably be unaware of the existent of the pain and blindness Marciano was going through. He always still trucked forward, and there's nothing significant besides mention of this by the commentator to verify this idea.

 

No, the people around here think that everyone was tied to the mob to the same degree. It's ludicrous. Liston did actual work for the MOB while SRR carried opponents a few more rounds. Hardly the same.

 

Fighters can have the odd ugly bout. It's the boxers who generally, and very casually, use underhanded tactics to gain an advantage who are dubbed 'dirty'. In that sense, 'Sonny' Liston could not be considered a dirty fighter. The man was under much scrutiny from the get-go and rubbed shoulders with Louis so the 'cleansing' of his image, if you will must have lingered in the conscience.

 

1. "Folley said he fought Liston's fight."

This is the quote from Sports Illustrated, 8-1-1960:

"My plan was to box him," Folley said later. "I didn't. I thought I could knock him out."

And this interesting comment--"Patterson will outspeed him," Folley said.

2. "Machen complained of having injured his right arm previous to the Liston fight."

I believe him. He hardly used it. Compare his use of his right against Liston with his use of his right against Valdes.

Sources like this don't really rebut something having been used on their eyes because they are so sketchy, the articles focusing on Liston, not the losers. There are no in-depth interviews. The Machen fight report does not even mention the low blows or the three points deducted.

This is Machen on Liston and Patterson from the 9-19-1960 SI report on the Liston-Machen fight.

"Liston will win," Machen said with certainty. "Some fighters like Ray Robinson can fight going back. But Patterson fights best coming on. So does Liston. When you get two fighters in there who fight coming on, someone has to back up, and I think it would be Floyd."

 

Yes, no one was more tied to the mob than Liston. But several were just as tied to the mob.

Liston's rise coincided with Estes Kefauver's concerted effort to "clean up boxing" (something that was probably never achieved), so he was under extreme scrutiny.

His menacing persona, his criminal record, and the fact that he was on the verge of becoming heavyweight champion compounded his "unsavoury" and "undesirable" image. He was too obvious.

If he had come along 10 or 15 years earlier it probably wouldn't have been as much of an issue.