Feb. 24, 1964 - If tomorrow night’s heavyweight championship fight ends quickly, as almost all the experts are predicting, it merely will be following a pattern. The knockout, especially the early knockout, has been the rule in this division for 30 years.
Not since June 17, 1954 (pictured), when Ezzard Charles lasted 15 rounds in losing to Rocky Marciano, has a heavyweight title fight gone the scheduled limit. Marciano defended his title three times after that and knocked out Charles, Don Cockell, and Archie Moore before retiring. Then Floyd Patterson became champion by knocking out Moore in the fifth round on Nov. 30, 1956. Every title fight involving Patterson ended in a knockout, seven inflicted and three suffered.
The pattern, however, was set by Joe Louis in 1937 when he won the championship by knocking out Jim Braddock. Joe put his crown on the line 26 times and knocked out his opponent 22 times. The average length of Louis’s first 24 title bouts was six rounds. In 1938, he scored three one-round knockouts in succession (Max Schmeling, John Henry Lewis, and Jack Roper), a record Liston can match tomorrow night.
The average length of the last 10 heavyweight title fights, since Patterson became involved, is 5.3 rounds. Liston clobbered Patterson in 2:06 to win the title and in 2:10 to keep it. Patterson had taken out Tom McNeeley in four, Ingemar Johansson in six, Johansson in five, Brian London in 11, Roy Harris in 12, Pete Rademacher in six, and Tommy Jackson in 10. Before his two victories over Johansson, he had been flattened by the Swede in the third round. A 15-round fight between Liston and Clay would therefore be most surprising. In fact, a seven-rounder would be better than average.
Today, Liston was asked if he would like to hit Clay as hard he could. “No,” said Liston calmly, almost indifferently. “Just hard enough to put him to sleep.”
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