Lennox Lewis 1997 vs Joe Frazier 1971

Check his stamina vs McCall, Rahman, Vitali Klitschko.

 

Joe Frazier would weather some early leather, possibly a knockdown early on, but he will keep the pressure on, and stop the lacking the balls-to-the wall nerve that is Lennox Lewis in 12 to 13 rounds.The more it lasts, the worse Lennox gets it.

 

The only version of Frazier that Lewis would stop is the one who showed up to defend against Foreman in 73. Lewis probably stops him in 5 or 6 rounds.

FOTC Frazier has too much pressure and head movement for Lewis to deal with. I wouldn't doubt Lennox could put FOTC Joe on the canvas once or twice early, but Frazier would smile, get up, go back to work, pound his body and stop him around the
9th or 10th round. If Rahman and McCall can stop Lewis, certainly Frazier is more than capable with his punch output and body work.

 

Lennox Lewis by late stoppage obviously.

He would completely nulify Joe's big left hook and break him down with the jab.

 

Stamina had nothing to do with his losses to McCall and Rahaman and you know it.

He still beat Vitali also, and the fact that Lewis was 38, about 10 pounds over his normal fighting weight, and had to fight Vitali on short notice are obviously the reasons his stamina was poor against Klitschko.

 

I picked Frazier by ko/tko. Lewis isn't Big George but Lewis has the size
strenght reach advantage. However I agree this version of Frazier will
trouble Lewis with his head movement and pressure. Frazier will hit the
Ground more than once, but it will take one frazier left hook to knockout
Lewis or at least put him on ***** street. Frazier has the advantage in
willingness to go to war. Lewis has the tools to get the job done though
especially if he goes for broke early.

 

People seem to be giving Frazier more of a chance than they gave Dempsey.

I would have thought that it would be uncontested, that Dempsey was better adapted to handel a fighter of this type than Frazier.

 

Me too.

Personally I'd give Dempsey about a 35-40% chance of beating Lewis and Frazier about a 30-35% chance. (Obviously others will have their own probabilities)

I think people get caught up in the fact Frazier beat Ali and then extrapolate from there. So if Frazier could beat Ali how could he possibly loose to Lewis. But it really is a style issue more than anything else and Lewis is a terrible style match up for Frazier, outside of Foreman it's hard to imagine a worse style for Frazier to have to face.

 

Interestingly, we seem to think in the same way, and might not be that far apart in our positions.

 

Fraizer is simply too small for Lewis.

 

Frazier was too small for Lewis!

Would anybody here pick Ramhan over Frazier?

 

I would pick that Frazier against many fighters as he was quite simply a beast that night. His aggression, workrate, pressure and sheer tenacity were quite simply breath taking, one of the finest performances of any heavyweight ever.

But Lewis has all the attributes to defeat Frazier. He's an excellent boxer with a great jab, who knows how to out box and smother smaller opponents like Frazier. He also has the size, power and the uppercut to over power Frazier. Basically Lewis has similar attributes to the 2 fighters that gave Frazier his toughest fights in Ali and Foreman.

Lewis has always tended to do well against shorter, squat hookers like Morrison, Tua and Tyson. He knows how to control the range, smother them on the inside and punish them with upper cuts as they come in. If Frazier can some how take the fight into the later rounds his pressure maybe enough to stop Lewis but I highly doubt he would last long enough to do so, Lewis by KO in the middle rounds.

 

Again, I think the Foreman fight is used way too much against Frazier in H2H matchups. FOTC Joe was a different kind of animal that Lewis never really faced in his career. Yes, Lennox might be able to wear Joe down by leaning on him, and throwing the uppercuts underneath like he did to Michael Grant, but let's get real here. This isn't the Frazier who partied too much in Jamaica and underestimated his opponent's size and strength. How about using the Frazier that was the dominant champion from 69 who was fast on his own feet in his own right and made arguably one of the fastest heavyweights ever miss a lot of shots and would surely give Lennox a lot of problems. Foreman himself said he wouldn't have had an easy time with the Frazier of 71 or slightly earlier. One more thing 1997 Lennox was an excellent fighter, but he was also very careless too. He did enough of the clowning and leaving his hands low that Frazier would take advantage of with hooks on top. Lennox would face a body attack that he's never faced before. The key in this matchup is the mystique of Frazier being a slow starter. Again, I say every fighter is a slow starter when compared to Ali. Frazier was notorious for starting slow and this is Lewis' only window to take him out, and he's not stopping a prime Frazier early. Unless the fight's a ten rounder that Lewis could build an huge lead from the early rounds and win a points decision, he's not going to outwork Joe. He might have him on the canvas once in the 2nd, 3rd or 4th rounds, but I'd bet on the best version of Joe to take Lewis into deeper water and drown him late with his pressure. Frazier is also capable of putting Lennox on the canvas too. Let`s not forget, Joe was actually a heavyweight fighter. A smallish heavyweight by todays standards, but prime Joe had a thick torso, strong legs and strong shoulders. Boxing is not powerlifting and those who discredit him like to point to his performance in the battle of the superstars.

 

Glad to hear that, truth is we're probably not.