We give the 1990s heavyweight greats so much respect...but

I think Bowe benefits the most from this arrangement. Still, it might have been the overall richest period for the heavyweights. Definitely better than the 2000's and better than during Holmes reign as well. It's this or the seventies.

 

bowe would have beat lewis around 1992,1993,and tyson post jail

 

Bowe defends with his face.

 

You can sort of do this with allot of eras though, ie 60s

Liston didn't face Terrell or Frazier

Frazier didn't face Patterson or Liston

Patterson didn't face Terrell or Frazier

 

liston vs terrel? horrible fight who cares.... frazier was in his prime when liston was past his prime and shot, frazier would have destroyed him so who cares?
patterson vs terrel is probably the most interesting , frazier would have killed patterson.

i would say ron lyle vs norton(eddie futch ran from lyle like from the pest)
ron lyle vs frazier in 74-75, i pick lyle in these years
shavers vs foreman, shavers vs frazier, shavers would get destroyed in both fights,
quarry vs a green foreman would have been interesting.
cleveland williams vs patterson...
jimmy young vs a green holmes, ron lyle vs holmes in 1975-76(lyle was a sparring partner of holmes and larry said that he was a hell of rival for him because stylistical motives)

 

We know how good Lewis was by the sheer amount of good fighters he beat up.

He only had 2 great wins.. but the high amount of good wins he had made up for it.


Here are some stats that you might find interesting:

Lennox Lewis is 11-0 against fighters 6'4+
Lennox Lewis has fought more punchers than every single heavyweight in history bar Ali and even that's debatable.

 

Devil's advocate. How strong was the era when looking at the success an old Holmes and Foreman had?

 

the motive was that the 90s was very good, but the 70s was the golden era

 

They didn't fight the true champs and when they did.. they got ktfo or beaten to a pulp.

Let's not kid ourselves.
The 90's era had Lewis-Holyfield
than early 90's Tyson and Bowe.

That's it.

Behind that were a bunch of good fighters of higher quality than the tier 2 fighters today. That's it.

If you didn't beat Elite Tyson. Elite Bowe or Lewis-Holyfield. you weren't the champ of ****.

Foreman and Holmes lost to Holyfield and Tyson. If they had fought Lewis they would have lost to Lewis.

Technically Holyfield was 'champ' in this era because he got robbed against Valeuv.... but even if he was given the fair decision he wasn't the true champ. K2 is the true champ.

If Holyfield had fought Povektin in 2011 and UD him.. and gotten that title.. is he a 'champ of this era'?

No he's not.

 

A lot of these fights were very close to happening, bad circumstances and Don King got in the way of a lot of them.

 

This seem like a klittard nut hugging thread in disguise tbh.

I'm ashamed it's in the classics. take this garbage to the general.
I come to this section to read intelligent debate regarding past heavyweights. I don't come here to read a klittard thread in disguise.

 

Holmes beat Mercer, and Foreman beat Moorer, both guys who were second league fighters in theirs era's. Both gave Holyfield a fair decent fight fair enough. Think their success is a bit overstated. Foreman's win in particular was very much a one in a million type victory.

I might be a bit biased though, because I really do believe the 90's was a stronger era than the late 60's/70's.

 

Tyson went to prison. Bowe got fat, and quickly declined. However Holy fought them all, and including Morrer. Lewis fought most of them... and picked the best time for him.

Guys like Morrison, Mercer, Ruddock, and Foreman added depth.

 

Lewis fought most of his comp when they were past his best.