Was Boxing Better in the 1960s?

I think if you were to ask that question to many boxing historians or even relatively casual fans with some knowledge of fought during the 60s, their knee-jerk response would be to say, "Yes! Boxing was definitely better in the 1960s than it is now."

But the deeper I look, the less I am so sure. The 60s was an interesting decade for boxing. All of the legendary fighters from the 50s - Sugar Ray Robinson, Rocky Marciano, Carmen Basilio, Joe Louis, Archie Moore, Willie Pepp, Rocky Graziano, Ezzard Charles, Jake Lamotta, Jersey Joe Wolcott, and others - would either be retired or no longer relevant by the 60s. When looking at just about anybody's Top 10 Boxers of the 1960s list, none of those people would appear on the Top 10 of the 1950s. Nor vice versa. That is somewhat uncommon when it comes to comparing other decades against each other. Never before was there such a hard line between a decennium.

This is not a knock on that era of boxing, not at all. It's just interesting. It was also a big transition for the business of boxing too as the mafia, who had largely controlled the sport for a while, was being pressured and pushed out by the US government. Color TVs were starting to replace black-and-white, which changed how people watched boxing and saw the fighters. While boxing's popularity was still very high in America, football continued to grow as the Super Bowl era was ushered in. And of course the country itself would go through a huge change throughout the 60s, with rising tensions from the Vietnam War, the cold war, the civil rights movement, and the division between counterculture and the establishment. The times, they were a-changing.

By far, the biggest thing to come out of that decade in terms of boxing was none other than Cassius Clay/Muhammad Ali. His first professional fight was in October 1960 and he would not only go on to become arguably the greatest boxer but one of the most significant sports icons of all time. He came up through the ranks quickly and talked his way into getting a title shot against the seemingly unbeatable champ, Sonny Liston, in 1964. Ali was a 7-1 underdog but showed incredible quickness and footwork for a heavyweight, which nullified a lot of Sonny's power. According to some, Liston had not trained well for the fight, was drinking the night before and came into it with a bad left shoulder. After the 6th round, Liston quit as he had apparently dislocated that shoulder earlier in the fight. Muhammad Ali became a household name after this fight as much of the world witnessed his trademarked Ali shuffle and famous lines like, "Float like a butterfly, sting like bee" before the fight and "I am the greatest."

There would be a rematch the following year in the one of the more controversial fights ever. Ali won in the first round, knocking down Liston with a punch most people at the time did not even see. Ali was going backwards and through a right hand across his body. It did not appear to land solid and even Ali was reported as asking trainers, "Did I hit him? immediately afterwards. Sonny Liston started to get up, then fell over in a way that looked phony to just about everybody, there was no count by the referee, then Liston got up, and the fight was allowed to resume for a few seconds before it was waved off and the fight called over. After reviewing the tape, with some enhancements, it was revealed that Ali's "phantom punch" did land but everyone questioned whether it would be enough to actually drop such a powerful man like Liston. The referee did not appear to count to 10 either. He was focused on getting Ali back to his corner and by the rules of boxing, the count shouldn't even start until a fighter goes to a neutral corner. The timekeeper started counting immediately after the knockdown and was the one who signaled to the ref to waive it off but again, this is not how the boxing rules should play out.

As to why Sonny Liston would take a dive on purpose, there are multiple theories with the biggest being a mafia fix. Sonny was not only connected to the mob as a boxer but even worked as a debt collector for them. He was also known to have several debts himself and taking a dive was part of the payoff. Some have said that Sonny was also afraid of the Nation of Islam, which Muhammad Ali had recently joined (why he changed his name from Cassius Clay) and there had been death threats from their side. There was also a rumor that Liston's wife and son had also been kidnapped, either by the mob or the Nation of Islam, and that he had to take that dive to save them.

We will never know what actually happened but for me, personally, I have no doubt that it was fixed, even if just by Liston himself. I believe the punch was real, the knockdown was even real, but Sonny was not hurt badly and stayed down on purpose. This doesn't mean he could have beaten Ali on that day or any other day forward. What is often lost in this controversy is Sonny Liston's age, which even itself is controversial. He was born in rural Arkansas with no birth certificate and admits to not knowing exactly how old he was. I have heard his birth estimated anywhere from 1929 to 1932. That means at the very least, he was 10 years older than Ali. Liston might have been able to get off a good punch or two but he would never catch the young Ali in the ring at that point in his life and career.

Muhammad Ali would go on to dominate the heavyweight division but by 1967, he would become banned for boxing for refusing to take part in the Vietnam draft. This was met by heavy skepticism at the time as fighters like Sugar Ray Robinson and Joe Louis and even Elvis Presley had abided by previous drafts and served in the military, in some capacity, during their careers. Ali would not fight again during the 60s and not be reinstated until 1970. Many believe those would have been the prime years for a boxer.

That's a lot to say about one man and there is certainly so much more that could be said about Ali but what about the rest of the field during the 1960s? Of course there was Sonny Liston too and despite his performances vs. Ali, was still known to be one of the most fearsome punchers of all time. Floyd Patterson was the heavyweight champ from 1960-1962 (before running into Liston and getting obliterated) and he was certainly a great fighter but I would consider him one of the greats, thought not an all-time great, personally. The late 60s brought us the rise of Joe Frazier but his best years were in the next decade. George Foreman won the gold medal in the 1968 Olympic Games and had his first pro fight in 1969 but again, better known for what he did in the 70s. And 90's! Then there were a bunch of decent guys like Ernie Terrell, Cleveland Williams, Jimmy Ellis, Ingemar Johansson, Henry Cooper, George Chuvalo, Zora Folley and others.

What about the other weight divisions? There were plenty of great, Hall of Fame fighters, though many of them are not household names to anyone outside of hardcore boxing fans. Here were the big ones:

Eder Jofre - Bantamweight and Featherweight champ for much of the decade. Best Brazilian boxer of all time, most likely.

Fighting Harada - Flyweight, Bantamweight and Featherweight champ. The only man to defeat the aforementioned Eder Jofre, and he did it twice, though towards the end of Jofre's career. He was the 2nd Japanese boxing champ ever.

Dick Tiger - Another great name. Dick was from Nigeria and fought at Middleweight and Light Heavyweight, winning belts in both weight classes

Emile Griffith - Born in the Virgin Islands, Emile Griffith is acknowledged by some to be the best boxer of the 1960s not named Muhammed Ali (or Cassius Clay). He won undisputed titles at Welterweight, Light Middleweight and Middleweight. Looking at his record alone, you will see plenty of losses but he fought everybody at 3 weight classes, at much more frequent pace than anyone fights anyone now so wins and losses don't always tell the story.

Nino Benvenuti - Italian Middleweight and Super-Welterweight champ. Won almost every one of his 84 fights in the 60s, with a loss to the aforementioned Emile Griffith and Dick Tiger, as well as Kim Ki-Soo.

Carlos Ortiz - Probably the first truly great boxer from Puerto Rico, Carlos won world titles in the Lightweight and Light Welterweight division. He still holds the record for most wins in unified Lightweight title fights, which is 10.

Pone Kingpetch - The first world champion from Thailand when we won the Flyweight title in 1960. We would lose the title 2 years later to Fighting Harada but then get it back from him in 1963.

Flash Elorde - Not the first Filipino champ ever but the first since Ceferino Garcia in the 1930s. He won the Super Featherweight lineal belt in 1960 and held that title until 1967, which is still the longest reign in that division ever.

Nicolino Locche - Did not win a title (at Lightweight) until December of 1968 but Nicolino Locche is one of the more well-known boxers of the 1960s (and early 70s) because of his extremely unique, defensive style. Long before the Mayweathers, Locce would box with his both hands down, stand right in front of his opponents, wait for them to strike, then use head movement and shoulder rolls to defend and counter. He actually made at least one person quit in a fight purely out of frustration. Check him out on YouTube some time. I would not recommend anyone try and fight like him, nor smoke cigarettes during training like he reportedly did, but he was interesting to watch. He was also, I think, the 2nd world champion ever from Argentina.

So again, unless you really follow boxing history, many of these guys are not well known or talked about these days. Something interesting about the group I list here is that they were all from different countries. Boxing has always been a worldwide sport but if you were to take just about anybody's Top 10 Boxers of any previous decade, just about every boxer on every list is American-born. The 60s was the first decade where this is pretty universally not the case. Other than Ali and Liston, most of the lists contain all fighters born on foreign soil.

Another nice thing is that many of these guys at even close to similar weight classes fought each other. Other good fighters I did not mention like Jose Torres, Ismael Laguna, Sugar Ramos, Carlos Monzon, Rubin Carter, Jose Napoles were in the mix too.

Despite that, the biggest issue I have with the 1960s as far as ranking it as a great boxing decade was the lack of classic fights. Yes, the Ali-Liston fights were huge and extremely significant but not particularly exciting to watch (certainly not the second one). I know their first fight was listed as Ring Magazine's fight of the year for 1964 and I suppose that is okay but it's not what I would consider to be a classic at all, particularly in the anticlimactic way it ended. Again, looking at all the expert's Top 10/20/etc. lists of the greatest boxing matches of all time, you are not generally going to find anything from the 60s there, other than maybe Ali-Liston I, whereas every other decade since the advent of reliable recordings has at least a few to make the list.

Just to make sure that I wasn’t missing anything big, I watched all of the other Ring Magazine fights of the year in the 60s that were available on YouTube but nothing really moved the needle for me. Best one I saw didn't even win FOTY and it was Floyd Patterson vs Ingemar Johnson III (II won FTOY for 1960 but III was much better).The only other one I hear talked about was Bob Foster vs. Dick Tiger in 1968 because it does pop up in those Greatest Knockouts of All Time lists. And it was a pretty good one. The fight itself is nothing too special. 

To compare it the modern day, as I sit here and write this now in August of 2025, I can already give you a handful of great fights that were better and more exciting than any fight of the entire 1960s - Fury Wilder III, Fury-Usyk 1, the first 2 Katy Taylor-Amanda Serrano fights, Zepeda-Baranchyk, even the Devin Haney-Ryan Garcia was super fun. There are plenty of others I personally enjoyed watching more that may not go down as classics. There are more memorable moments and exciting knockouts in the 2020s already for sure too.

One important caveat to consider is the fact that the best fighter of the 60s, Muhammad Ali, was banned from the sport in 1967. So those are 3 years we didn’t get to see him. Maybe there would have been an even better version of Ali Frazier I in the 60s?

As far as star power goes, obviously, we do not have a Muhammad Ali and no decade ever well but we have seen plenty of future hall-of-famers come through 2020s and who I believe will be all-time greats when it is all said and done. I've written plenty about Naoya Inoue and look forward to watching more of his mastery. Oleksandr Usyk may go down in very exclusive history as well. Then there are people like Terence Crawford, Canelo Alvarez, Tyson Fury, Dmitry Bivol, Artur Beterbiev, I just watched 20-year-old Moses Itauma dominate yet another opponent on Saturday night and I would be surprised if the rest of the decade will soon belong to him in the Heavyweight division. I would take any of those guys versus the rest of the field in the 60s, Ali notwithstanding. Plus, we don't just have guys. There are some truly great female boxers now like Claressa Shields and the aforementioned Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano. 

So yeah, compared to the 60s, I think there is more overall talent now and better competition. Yeah, the business of boxing was better then and all the complaints about modern boxing - too many divisions, fights not happening, people afraid to put their perfect record on the line, no cultural relevance, big fights behind a pay-per-view wall, etc. - are still very much valid but I think it’s starting to get better and the good outweighs the bad. The only thing I really wish we still had in the sport was boxers fighting more frequently. From 1960-early 1967, Muhammad Ali fought 29 times. Even after beating Liston for the 2nd time and defending his belt in 1965, he fought 8 more times before the ban in '67. With the exception of Naoya Inoue, most of the top level boxers