The arguments over the greatest fighters and fights go on and on. Strong cases can almost always be made for a number of candidates. And passionate boxing fans don’t hesitate to make them.
One thing that generally isn’t debated? The most iconic photo in the history of the sport.
That distinction goes to Sports Illustrated photographer Neil Leifer’s image of a young Muhammad Ali standing over a beaten Sonny Liston in their rematch on this date — May 25 — in 1965 at the Central Maine Youth Center in Lewiston, Maine.
Liston, who had lost the heavyweight title to Ali 15 months earlier, went down from the mysterious “phantom punch,” a hard-to-see right to the jaw only 1 minute, 42 seconds into the fight that spawned the unproven notion that Liston took a dive.
Ali, only 23 at the time, looked down at Liston and yelled, “Get up and fight, sucker!”
On this date in 1965.
Most iconic sports photograph ever? (Taken by Neil Leifer). 📸 pic.twitter.com/ytNllfeiWK
— Timeless Sports (@timelesssports_) May 25, 2020
Leifer snapped his shot at that moment in what might be described as a perfect photographic storm: great photographer in the exact right place at the exact right time. The result is arguably the greatest sports photo ever.
Liston did get up amid confusion over the count, which referee and former champ Jersey Joe Walcott had bungled. However, after the timekeeper and The Ring Magazine Editor Nat Fleischer waved their arms to signal that the count had reached 10, Walcott declared Ali the winner.
The fight lasted all of 2 minutes, 12 seconds, but it was enough time to produce one of Ali’s most important victories, conspiracy theories that persist to this day and an image that is seared in our minds.