Why is Liston given credit for being a harder puncher than Joe Louis?

Sonny Liston was absolute poison for Floyd Patterson, and I think Sonny Liston hit with more power per punch than Joe Louis did. I also think Joe Louis would have beaten Floyd Patterson or Sonny Liston head to head.

 

Sure.. Patterson could win one, but Louis was caught slacking by Schmeling. So while Patterson could win, I wouldn't bank on him to win. Plus, Patterson and Schmeling had different styles. Patterson vs Schmeling would be another good fight. I think Schmeling is better than Johansson, but not quite as hard a right hand, but close.

 

Was Liston really a BETTER fighter than Patterson as opposed to more powerful and bigger? If Liston was 185 pounds with the same skills, would you say he was better?

 

Liston's punching power was for real,no way was it overrated.The damage Sonny could inflict
on his opponents was gruesome.Liston is one of the most destructive punchers in history.

 

Because he was slower, and the results were similarly frightening?

 

Because of physical size.

 

Schmeling fought a smart fight vs Louis but it doesn’t necessarily translate to success for similar type boxers.

The other significant features to Max’s performance were his tremendous courage and supporting durability - Max soaked up a lot of punishment along the way.

Sort of similar to applauding Ali’s brilliant strategy vs Foreman whilst also appreciating that the successful realisation of such a strategy was still wholly unique to Ali - courage and resilience being no mean ingredients to the whole recipe.

 

He was? That's extremely debatable. Patterson has a very decent record and beat plenty of good men in the ring over a long period of time.

 

As you yourself acknowledged, Louis's foes had poor skill, thus beating them is no big deal.
Liston would have beaten them sooner and even worse.

 

That's one win, one in which a combination of factors were involved. One could absolutely say Schmeling had the best win. Schmeling also has a better win than the likes of Holmes, Louis and Mike Tyson. Would you say that makes Schmeling better than that lot?

 

Yes true. Louis has some serious technical deficiencies going on and Maximillion just happened to be skilful enough with the right tools to take severe advantage of it. Louis shored these up quite noticeably and Max was never going to repeat the feat. There were technical weaknesses and he dogged it in training and that was actually on record via his trainer before Max hammered him. Blackburn was just as vocal the other way prior to the rematch saying Louis had trained hard and he was extremely confident he would win.

Frazier has a helluva lot more on his record than Max Schmeling and is vastly higher on ATG lists as well. We were also talking H2H i thought. At any rate i rate Patterson a little ahead of Schmeling via greatness. Patterson frequently gets underrated and cast aside.

Some do actually rate Frazier over Holmes, McGrain being one of them. Guaranteed the Ali win would be the overwhelming reason.

 

I will readily admit that my boxing knowledge is mainly from the 70s - present but from what I've seen and heard of both, is he not?

 

Openings he didn't have in the rematch, it seems.

At any rate Louis came back to destroy Schmeing and Ali avenged Frazier not once, but twice.

Louis was still 8 fights short of even holding the heavyweight title when he lost to Schmeling. He was a long way from being regarded the greatest heavyweight in history up until that point and indeed until the mid 70's Ali era. Sure Louis had been immensely impressive but he most certainly wasn't yet "there".

Schmeling was the first heavyweight ever to win the title on a foul in a fight he was getting comfortably outboxed in. To say his win was dubious and controversial would be an understatement.

The thing is these two are way too close for you to simply state "Schmeling was better than Patterson". It goes against everything you've been preaching regarding lists, ratings, accepted standings and the rest of it.

 

Pattersons biggest issue against Liston was he couldn't control his fear.
He had the skill level to at least make both those fights interesting.

 

Agreed on all counts. Ali was also still a bit rusty.

I'd say Schmeling grabbed the title at a vulnerable time too as Louis was short of his best and no way can i see any Max beating him by the time of the rematch.

We'll agree to disagree, with it being close. As was my whole point Schmeling is not remotely a lay down misere over Patterson and i'd suspect the minor majority might even go for Patterson in the greatness stakes. H2H is also close i would bet.