I'm talking about the first fight. Don King hired Steward to prepare Oliver for that first fight against Lewis. Manny said that all throughout training camp they were rehearsing that punch over and over. Manny said he left Oliver because he saw more potential in Lewis despite Oliver being the victor in that first fight. I don't want to go too much in detail, watch ESPN Ringside best of Lennox Lewis is on youtube.
Wlad would easily KO Lewis, Rahman stopped him with a..... straight Right, McCall stopped him with a.......... straight right. Steward said Wlad has the hardest one punch power of any heavyweight he ever worked with, and as you all know his bread and butter is the straight right and left hook the moment he landed 1 shot on Lennox and it would be over.
Thanks for the suggestion, but I just rewatched the fight, instead. It was a straight right hand....nothing magical that had to taught by Yoda in order to vanquish the great lion.
Take Steward out of Oliver's conner and we not having this conversation. That right hand was a great punch from a great mind.
Lewis is not some 5'11 midget so that takes away Wladimir's hugging and leaning on his opponent to tire them out. Even his brother found Lewis very hard to push around, which explains why he was heavily breathing after the 4th round. Watch the third round of Lewis fight against Vitali. You saw the manner in which Lewis came out from the corner. Now put Wladimir with his glass jaw in that same position and you get Ukrainian glass flying all over the place.
In the very first round, Vitali caught him with a straight right that put Lewis on ***** street and forced him to have to hug. Imagine if Wlad had landed that shot.
It wasn't "just" a straight right hand, watch the video that I suggested and hear Emmanuel explain when and how he wanted Oliver to throw that right cross.
Thompson 6'5 Wach 6'8 Pulev 6'4.5 Povetkin 6'2 Piantea 6'5 Haye 6'3 Peter 6'2 Who are these 5'11 midgets you speak of.:huh
Yes. It was just a straight right. That's all. I don't mean to discredit Steward as he is a legendary trainer, but he also had a thing for making himself out to be a bit of prophet sometimes. Watch any of his commentary and he has a way of stating that " I always thought the fight would go like this" after the fact.
Funny for many years all I heard on this forum was how Vitali was the better and stronger of the two brothers. They point to his knockout ratio and "granite chin". I know that styles make fights but the only reason Vitali lasted that long was that 1.) Lewis underestimated him (perception from the Byrd quit job. 2.) Lewis was coming off a long layoff after the Tyson fight 3.) Lewis was not well warmed up and we saw what happened two round after he got adjusted to Vitali. Lewis proceeded to surgically cut him to pieces. You're assuming Wladimir would have threw the right hands that Vitali threw against Lennox in the first round. If Wladimir is afraid to throw that type of punch against these shot fat pludding no skill having heavyweights before the tires them out after leaning on them for many rounds, what makes you think he will throw it against Lewis. Dude get real.