What would it take to make 1.44 lbs-ft per cid ?

As per Darin Morgan; velocity, velocity, velocity.
In addition, any porting should also involve increasing swirl. This is mixture motion. A tight quench like 0.025" is another aid. Combine that with Somender Singh grooves to direct compression air/fuel coming out of the quench to aid swirl and toward the spark plug. Brian Salter described this in a Live with David Vizard and Andy Woods. Building as high compression in as possible and use water injection to control detonation. Distilled water with 2% water soluble oil. Methanol is to prevent freezing.
You build an engine with .025" quench you'll be RE-building it sooner than you think. You've exposed yourself as someone who has never practiced what you preach with the Somender Singh groove bullshit. I've actually done it and it killed performance like you wouldn't believe. Why? Crevice Volume. It kills power and efficiency, which Vizard acknowledges. Distilled water? Most guys use windshield washer fluid. Can you point us to any of your builds as examples of your theories to provide proof of concept? J.Rob