The Murder of Sonny Liston: A Story of Fame, Heroin, Boxing & Las Vegas. Sonny couldnt read or write because his father worked him in the fields from the time he could walk Years later, he got his wife to teach him how to sign his name just so he could give it to kids who asked him for it his autograph. There were some, however, who believed the fight was legitimate. As the years passed and Liston's financial situation worsened, he got angry and told the mob he'd go public with the story unless they gave him the money. He walks to the ring with his gloves on the shoulders of his manager, Eddie Polino. 780 46K views 8 years ago Heavyweight Champion Sonny Liston's son visits his gravesite. He's like Foreman except stronger, more powerful, and slightly smaller. There was something caustic in both eyes." After the second loss to Ali, Liston stayed out of the ring for more than a year. He then left the fighters to go over to McDonough. "He said: 'Look what they did!' He had been dead several days. He claimed the officer used racial slurs. Sonny Liston was a ferocious fighter, the heavyweight champion of the world and the man Cassius Clay beat to win the title for the first time, igniting his own legend. (, Shaun Assael. Geraldine called Liston's attorney and his doctor, but did not notify the police until two to three hours later. [35] Liston's victory was loudly booed. Boxer Sonny Liston ducks and covers up as Cassius Clay aims a right at him during their title fight. But some Vegas "bookies, mobsters, and cops" still wonder if he wasn't . Fifty years later, the mystery still remains. But by the sixth round his sight had cleared, and a clearly enraged Clay fought a blisteringly aggressive round landing numerous combination punches. $2,499.99. Gallender claimed, "A lot of officers knew Sonny was dead before Geraldine returned home on January 5, but they chose to let him rot. As the years passed and Liston's financial situation worsened, he got angry and told the mob he would go public with the story unless they gave him the money. "He would do everything to avoid taking shots." Liston has been referenced in many songs by artists such as Curtis Eller, Sun Kil Moon, the Animals, Tom Petty, Mark Knopfler, Phil Ochs, Morrissey, Freddy Blohm, Chuck E. Weiss, This Bike is a Pipe Bomb, the Roots, Wu-Tang Clan, Gone Jackals, Billy Joel, the Mountain Goats, Lil Wayne, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, and the Killers. "The timekeeper was waving both hands and saying, 'I counted him outthe fight is over,'" Walcott said after the fight. [30] Before his bout with Liston, Muhammad Ali consulted Machen and was advised that the key to survival was to make Liston lose his temper. As Liston pursued his target Clay retreated, using his foot speed to slip away into open space in the ring, largely circling to the left and away from the threat of a Liston left hook. I know!" They fought for a third time on March 6, 1956, which Liston won by a ten-round unanimous decision. and hit him with hooks and uppercuts when Frazier tried to get in. Although the opening round saw Clay largely on the defensive, it was soon established that Clay could reverse roles quickly and take to the offensive with a remarkably fast series of combinations delivered to Liston's head. Banker said, "Sheriff [Ralph] Lamb told me, 'Tell your pal Sonny to stay away from the West Side because we're going to bust the drug dealers.'" C'mon now, this is for the title, this is the big apple. It was probably Liston's best moment in the entire fight. Unfortunately for Martin, however, his career ended after that fight due to a detached retina he suffered during the bout. Was Pariah boxing legend Sonny Listons OD really a mob murder? said Liston's Philadelphia dentist, Dr. Nick Ragni. In all, 14 major contenders during his prime refused outright to fight him, the most for any boxer in history. But former Las Vegas police Sgt. "[82] Johnny Tocco, a trainer who worked with George Foreman and Mike Tyson as well as Liston, said Liston was the hardest hitter of the three. Dennis Caputo of the Clark County Sheriff's Department was one of the first officers on the scene. Patterson, a 4-1 betting underdog, was knocked down three times and counted out at 2:10 of the first round. ", ("You know what they say about big fists, sweetheart?"). Liston was the subject of a 2008 feature film based upon his life titled Phantom Punch. He also went with a new manager in 1958: Joseph "Pep" Barone, who was a front man for mobsters Frankie Carbo and Frank "Blinky" Palermo. Overall, Liston earned around $500,000 during his career. [70] There have been a number of unproven theories as to the background to the purported dive including that Liston was threatened by the Muslims, or agreed to lose in return for a share in the more marketable Ali's future purses. [64] Strict interpretation of the knockdown/count rule states it is the referee's count and not the timekeeper's that is the official count. His eyes swept the whole scene. Sonny Liston became world heavyweight champion in 1962 and fought Muhammad Ali twice In January 1971, former heavyweight champion of the world Sonny Liston was found dead at his Las Vegas. Byrne sought an injunction blocking the fight in Boston because Inter-Continental Promotions was promoting the fight without a Massachusetts license. Tocco left the house before the police did. At one point, Clay was wiping his eyes with his right hand while extending his left arm"like a drunk leaning on a lamppost" Bert Sugar wroteto keep Liston at bay. dan.liston@colorado.edu. Many in the small crowd had not even settled in their seats when the fight was stopped. After demolishing these top-ranked fighters in the heavyweight division, Liston was regarded as the top-contender champion-in-waiting. Although in the second fight, Liston appears to have taken a dive Again with the mob stuff. In his 1965 rematch with Ali, Liston suffered an unexpected first-round knockout that led to unresolved suspicions of a fix. Sonny Liston was born in Sand Slough, Arkansas to a sharecropper, Tobey Liston, who fathered 25 children, the second youngest of whom was Charles, Sonny's real name, born from Tobey's marriage to Helen Baskin, a woman nearly three decades younger than he. Also, scar tissue, possibly from needle marks, was found in the bend of Liston's left elbow. The interference of ringside reporters regarding interpretation of the rules, the fight stoppage and the controversy after the fight had not been seen since The Long Count Fight between champion Gene Tunney and challenger Jack Dempsey in 1927. "[59], Liston is ranked second in the ESPN.com list of "The Hardest Hitters in Heavyweight History. In 1950, Liston was arrested at his apartment at 1006 O'Fallon Street for robbing the Unique Cafe on 1502 Market Street in St. Louis for 37 dollars. Charles L. "Sonny" Liston ( 8. toukokuuta 1932 Arkansas (syntymaika ja tarkka paikka kiistanalaisia) - 30. joulukuuta 1970 Las Vegas, Nevada) oli yhdysvaltalainen raskaansarjan nyrkkeilij ja painoluokkansa maailmanmestari. Also in 1970, Liston appeared on an episode of the TV series Love, American Style and in a television commercial for Braniff Airlines with Andy Warhol.[12][102]. The commotion was not lost on referee Barney Felix, who was walking toward Clay's corner. Rogin called Liston's physique "awesomearms like fence posts, thighs like silos." He had the whole package. You've probably seen it a thousand times, but you may not have known who the poor bastard on the ground was until now. [20], Liston signed a contract in September 1953, proclaiming: "Whatever you tell me to do, I'll do. For those too young to remember, Sonny The Big Bear Liston was a legendary heavyweight boxer. I want to prove to the world there's dirty work afoot.' Last thing I will say about a heavyweight champ who was an ex-con and a leg-breaker for the mob He was deathly afraid of needles. Shaun Assael wrote "The Murder of Sonny Liston: Las Vegas, Heroin, and Heavyweights", published in 2016. Other than that, little is definite about his birth, but he seems to have been born in a shack on the cotton plantation where his parents worked, a little outside Forrest City, in Arkansas, which did . "The public is not with me. His defense was described as While "doing his nickel", the athletic director at Missouri State Penitentiary suggested that Liston try boxing The prison organized sparring sessions and Sonny dominated his incarcerated brethren. ", During an era when white journalists still described black athletes in stereotypes, Liston had long been a target of racially charged slurs; he was called a "gorilla" and "a jungle beast" in print. Charles "Sonny" Liston was born c.1930 into a sharecropping family that farmed the poor land of Morledge Plantation near Johnson Township, St.Francis County, Arkansas. Liston's life was marked with numerous arrests, before and after he entered boxing. On May 7, backers of the rematch ended the court battle by pulling the fight out of Boston. 9 Sports Illustrated once wrote his hands"looked like cannonballs when he made them into fists. Patterson's fatal mistake was that he "did not punch enough and frequently tried to clinch with Liston. Patterson finally agreed to meet Liston for the world title on September 25, 1962, in Comiskey Park in Chicago And everyone had Patterson. Both fights were in Summerlin's hometown of Detroit.[23]. [100] A successful racehorse which won the Irish St Leger classic race in 2021 was named Sonnyboyliston. The Devil and Sonny Liston is a biography of world heavyweight champion boxer Sonny Liston by Nick Tosches. "[42], Liston made his second title defense on February 25, 1964, in Miami Beach, Florida against Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali). Liston went down on his back. Now you know who he is Heres how he died. Many did not see the punch land, and some who did questioned that it was powerful enough to knock Liston out. Curriculum Vitae. Two of the three official scorers, or judges, awarded the round to Liston, and the other scored the round even. Sonny Liston stands over Albert Westphal in first round of bout in Philadelphia, Dec. 4, 1961. After Liston arose, Walcott wiped off his gloves. Clay countered in verse, "If you want to lose your money, then bet on Sonny! Liston was supremely confident of easily beating Clay, trained minimally for the fight and went ahead with it despite an injury to his left shoulder.[44]. Others have said he may have been murdered in some sort of mob killing. You could feel the deflation, see the look of hurt in his eyes. There are a ton of other dubious deaths and (hopefully) little-known facts about Vegas in this week's episode. Create Space Independent Publishing Platform. Ali's impressive start to his career earned him a shot at Sonny Liston for the Won WBA, WBC, The Ring, and lineal heavyweight titles in his 20th career fight in February 1964. Heavyweight champion Charles "Sonny" Liston, winner of 35 of his 36 professional bouts and one of the most intimidating athletes in any sport, was facing a lightly regarded 22-year-old from. Childhood & Early Life. Roy Harris, who had gone 13 rounds with Floyd Patterson in a title match, was crushed in one round by Liston. Police determined he died from a. Sonny Liston FBI Files. and "Nobody will believe this!"[63]. Liston won 14 consecutive bouts, 13 by knockout, before fighting third-ranked Leotis Martin, previously beaten by Clark, in December 1969. [58] Despite Liston carrying an injury and being undertrained, Clay stated in 1975 that the first fight with Liston was the toughest of his career. The year 1959 was a banner one for Liston: after knocking out contender Mike DeJohn in six rounds he faced Cleveland Williams, a fast-handed fighter who was billed as the hardest-hitting heavyweight in the world against whom he showed durability, power and skill, nullifying Williams' best work before stopping him in the third round. Maybe he was. [72], "I was an 'intimidator' until I fought Sonny Liston. Maule, Tex (March 9, 1964). [48] The challenger, his arms held high in surrender, was demanding that the fight be stopped and Dundee, fearing the fight might indeed be halted, gave his charge a one-word order: "Run! Ali initially stood over his fallen opponent, gesturing and yelling at him, "Get up and fight, sucker!" Liston believed his date of birth to be May 8, 1932, and used this for official purposes[11] but by the time he won the world title an aged appearance added credence to rumors that he was actually several years older. Some writers thought Liston brought bad press on himself by a surly and hostile attitude toward journalists. Rough N' Rowdy 20 LIVE From The Charleston Coliseum | Friday 8PM ET, Barstool Sportsbook has arrived in PA, MI, IL, IN, CO, VA, NJ, TN, AZ, IA, WV, LA, KS, MD, OH, Best Influencer Marketplace for Advertisers, Best Influencer Marketplace for Influencers & Creators, Best Influencer Marketplace for Agents & Agencies, Frank Pepe Pizzeria Naploetana - Chestnut Hill. [37] Frustrated, Liston changed his management in 1961 and applied pressure through the media by remarking that Patterson, who had faced mostly white challengers since becoming champion, was drawing the color line against his own race. Sonny was one of 25 children of a sharecropper in Arkansas. O n January 5, 1971, Sonny Liston, the former heavyweight champion of the world, was found dead in his home in Las Vegas. Rogin wrote. [15] In 1946, Helen Baskin, along with some of her children, moved to St. Louis to seek factory work. [103], Sonny Liston was featured in a novel "Girl Fighter" with a brief reference to his early life, his rise to WBC heavyweight champion and his eventual losses to Clay/Ali.[104]. Cassius Clay is embraced by his handlers after he won the world heavyweight championship on a TKO over Sonny Liston in the 7th round. It was the first time in his career that Liston had been cut. So that means his reach was practically a . Liston wins, 10 times out of 10. . Caputo, one of the investigating police officers, "The whole department knew about it." He was found dead in his Las Vegas home on January 5, 1971 Six months after the Wepner fight. [45][46] A clearly angered Liston rallied at the end of the round when Clay seemed tired, delivering punishing body shots. Paul R Gallender, 2012. Sonny Liston, once the heavyweight champ, died at the age of who-knows-what some days before Dec. 30, 1970. A sudden violent combination delivered with 30 seconds left in the round electrified the crowd. For confetti we can use torn-up arrest warrants." With the proceeds, he traveled to St. Louis to live with his mother. He was hardly leading a life of health and fitness. (. Philadelphia wanted nothing to do with him. Muhammad Ali vs Sonny Liston, 1965 Source: AFP. Three days before the fight, Ali needed emergency surgery for a strangulated hernia. Because of that, Cage may have thought Sonny was an informant and shot him with a hot dose as retribution. Liston went down at 1:44, got up at 1:56, and Walcott stopped the fight at 2:12. [19], On June 23, 1953, a team consisting of ten recent St. Louis Golden Gloves champions of all weight classes, with Liston on top as the heavyweight, was gathered to represent the United States in an International Golden Gloves (USA vs. West Europe) competition at Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis. Liston also appears in the sequel, Blood's a Rover. [52][53] It was the first time since 1919when Jack Dempsey defeated Jess Willardthat a world heavyweight champion had quit on his stool. School of Education. Sports Illustrated writer Gilbert Rogin wrote that "that final left hook crashed into Patterson's cheek like a diesel rig going downhill, no brakes." Skeptics called the knockout blow "the phantom punch." Joe Louis commenting on TV at ringside said "It's looking good for Sonny Liston". Boxing Record Young Muhammad Ali, then known as Cassius Clay, knocked out opponent Sonny Liston for his first world title in boxing on this day in history, Feb. 25, 1964. Thom Jones titled his 2000 collection of short stories Sonny Liston Was a Friend of Mine. [79][80][81] These include Muhammad Ali, who stated in a 1975 interview that he was a great admirer of Liston's talents: "Liston had a tremendous jab, could punch with either hand, was smart in the ring and as strong as any heavyweight Ive ever seen. Liston won his final fight, a tough but one-sided match against future world title challenger Chuck Wepner in June 1970. Boulder, CO 80309-0249. "The public is not with me. Liston's wife also recalled that her husband would refuse basic medical care for common colds because of his dislike of needles. Sonny knocked out Patterson at 2:06 of the first round, with that powerful left hook to the jaw It was the third-fastest knockout in a world heavyweight title fight, and the first time the defending champion had been knocked out in Round One. Liston injured his shoulder early in the 1964. A lot of his life was mysterious and messy. That got him killed. (2) Liston was murdered by drug dealers with whom he'd become involved. [89], Following an investigation, Las Vegas police concluded there were no signs of foul play and declared Liston's death a heroin overdose. Geraldine remembered her husband as "Great with me, great with the kids. Patterson wanted a chance to redeem himself, so they met again on July 22, 1963, in Las Vegas. [105] The story speculates that Liston threw the Ali match for the good of society. The opening round was fought an extra eight seconds, since both fighters and referee Barney Felix apparently did not hear the bell. "[94], A bronze copy of a marble statue of Liston sculpted by Alfred Hrdlicka in 1964 was erected in 2008 between Old Castle and Karlsplatz in Stuttgart, Germany. He said he could not hear McDonough, who did not have a microphone. His defense was described as "the gate-crossing of arms la Archie Moore. The second fight lasted only four seconds longer than Part I's first-round KO, but Liston's victory was still loudly booed. This was his first visit. He said that Liston was not quick with his hand or footwork, that he relied too much on his ability to take a punch, and that he could be vulnerable to an opponent with more hand speed. In The Greatest, the 1977 film about the life of boxer Muhammad Ali in which Ali played himself, Liston was portrayed by Roger E. Mosley. ", Chuck Wepner on Liston's intimidating appearance. (4) Liston was supposed to take a dive when he fought Chuck Wepner six months earlier, and killing him was payback for his failure to do so. Liston returned to the United States and won seven fights, all by knockout, in 1968, increasing his string to eleven. In the sixth round, he carried it at belt level so that it was of no help in warding off the right crosses with which Clay probed at the cut under his left eye." "[78] While much has been written about the effectiveness of his left jab, others have commented favorably on Liston's wide range of boxing skills. I forgot about the rules." "[75], Future world heavyweight champion George Foreman, who sparred with Liston after Foreman's amateur career, assessed Liston's jab as the most formidable he faced and Liston as the strongest man he encountered in the ring, describing Liston as having the most natural talent and skill. McDonough, however, claimed Walcott was looking at the crowd and never at him. Liston angrily responded by questioning whether Dempsey's failure to serve in World War I qualified him to moralize. A few years before Tocco died, he allegedly told one of his good friends, Tony Davi, that he went to Liston's house and found the door locked and his car in the driveway. [citation needed], The fight turned out to be a mismatch. There is no official record of his date of birth but a writer claimed that he was born on July 22, 1930. And yet, outside of boxing, L Elizabeth Bear wrote the short story "Sonny Liston Takes the Fall", published in The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy in 2008. "He had a deadly fear of needles," said Davey Pearl, a boxing referee and friend of Liston's. And the Muslims were coming up. Machen's mobility enabled him to go the distance but he was clearly outpointed despite Liston being penalised for a low blow in the 11th round. The NAACP had urged Patterson not to fight Liston, fearing that a Liston victory would hurt the civil rights movement. And for music fans, a wax model of Liston appears in the front row of the cover of the Beatles' Sgt. Liston, one of 25 children by his father, is reputed to have been born in May 1932, yet prison records show various birth dates, among them 1928. On April 21, 1955, he defeated Marshall in a rematch, dropping him four times en route to a sixth-round knockout. In The Devil and Sonny Liston by Nick Tosches, published in 2000, when many of Liston's former acquaintances were still alive, Tosches posits that Liston's idol Joe Louis introduced him to heroin, and that he ultimately overdosed. His baleful, obsidian stare intimidates fighters, sportswriters and. January 5, 2017. [101], Liston played a fist fighter in the 1965 film Harlow, made a cameo appearance in the 1968 film Head, which starred The Monkees, and played the part of The Farmer in the 1970 film Moonfire, which starred Richard Egan and Charles Napier. In these feckless clinches he only managed to tie up one of Liston's arms. Midway through the first round, Liston threw a left jab and Ali went over it with a fast right, knocking the former champion down. Top contender Zora Folley was stopped in three rounds. The coroner said he died from natural causes. After he won the title, Liston relocated to Denver permanently, saying, "I'd rather be a lamppost in Denver than the mayor of Philadelphia. He had been deliberately snubbed. Sit down!' [32] Ironically, Patterson's manager, Cus D'Amato, associated with racketeers and had his manager's license revoked by the New York State Athletic Commission for alleged misconduct in connection with the Floyd PattersonIngemar Johansson title fight in June 1959. "There is power in both his left and his right, even though the fists move with the languor of motoring royalty or as if passing through a gaseous envelope more dense than air." He inflicted whippings so severe on Sonny that the scars were still visible in the ring decades later as an adult. interview with Alex Haley in Muhammad Ali by Thomas Hauser. What are you doing? I didn't want anything to do with him. [35] There are several theories as to why: (1) publicist Harold Conrad and others believed Liston had been deeply involved as a bill collector of a loansharking ring in Las Vegas. The bout was stopped after the ninth round due to cuts over both of Wepner's eyes. "A blues song just for fighters: The legend of Sonny Liston. In fact, Sonny Liston had not been right for a long time, and not only for the strangely dual life he had been leadingspells of choirboy abstinence squeezed between binges of drinking and. At that point, the fight was scored as even on the official scorecards. 249 UCB. 2023 Barstool Sports. 15 months earlier, they'd accused him of pulling over a woman around 3 a.m. and impersonating a police officer. He threw 99. . 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