Why doesn't Lennox have universal approval ?

It's pretty obvious that this was a bad decision on Bowe's part. Just imagine if Bowe would have fought Lewis and won. He'd then have a win over a prime Holyfield and a win a prime Lewis. Instead he faded into oblivion. And as for paydays, I'm pretty sure it would have vastly exceed the money he made on the Ferguson fight, which I recall reading that the place was 1/2 empty.

 

But that conflicts with your previous argument that Lewis would be stupid to take an extra 800 large on the 10 mill that was offered.

Some guys will do anything and bend to any demand in order to get a shot. If Lewis was so sure he would have went along with their demands and made him pay in the ring but he was acting like the diva and being unscrupulous

He did the exact same years later with HBO to Tyson.

 

Yes I believe Tucker was his mandatory and Newman offered Lewis $2.5 million to fight an interim fight and then $9 million or a percentage to be negotiated to face Bowe.

When you consider Lewis made $9.15 million against Tucker it's clear why he initially refused this. He then did accept the $3 million offer to fight Bowe immediately but then Bowe changed his mind which suggests the 2nd offer for Lewis to fight on a Bowe undercard was just a delaying tactic.

http://www.nytimes.com/1992/12/15/sports/boxing-bowe-trashes-his-wbc-title-belt.html

When the supposed $10 million offer was made which Duva and Maloney say didn't exist, Bowe had already fought Dokes and had been set to fight Mercer only for Mercer to lose. They mention this during the Dokes fight so even if Lewis had agreed terms any fight with Bowe would not have happened any earlier than late 93.

Newman did actually back track on his requirement for Lewis to give up the WBC belt when they made the $12 million offer for a fight in Nov 93. The issue this time was Duva's options on Bowe which Newman agreed to get the Holyfield fight. Newman was unwilling to basically pay Duva out of his share of the pot and that's why Newman said the fight wasn't made. Duva called his bluff and agreed to his terms and gave up the 28% share they were owed but the fight still wasn't made, Duva says the $12 million offer was bogus as Bowe had a rematch clause with Holyfield that he still had to honour.

http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1993-05-15/sports/1993135109_1_dan-duva-bowe-newman

 

No it doesn't the situation was completely different. The ****ty $3 million offer was when Bowe still had all the belts. Lewis then didn't have a belt to leverage a larger share so called his bluff and accepted the $3 million.

The supposed $10 million offer was only offered after Lewis/Tucker went to purse bids and Lewis was guaranteed $9.15 million. Lewis was already a champion when this offer came in. No way would Lewis take a ****ty $3 million offer then when he had so much already guaranteed. This is the only reasons Newman offered so much and Duva and Maloney dispute the $10 million offer was even made in the first place.

Fact is when Bowe had all the belts he could have squeezed Lewis for a smaller purse but when he gave his belt to Lewis he lost much of his ability to call the shots against Lewis.

Bending over and being ****d financially isn't acting as a diva or being unscrupulous. Was Lewis being unscrupulous when he offered Bowe a 40% cut when Bowe was barely making a million for a fight after losing the titles?

Bowe and Newman flat out ducked Lewis. Even when Lewis didn't play the diva as you put it, he still ducked Lewis. Lewis could have offered to fight him for a dollar and Bowe would still have ducked him, fact is he didn't want the fight straight after beating Evander as he had contractually agreed to which is why he only offered him 10% and then withdrew his offer when Lewis accepted 10%, nothing you say can change that simple fact.

 

You see well but you don't understand.
This is the difference between Tyson and Lewis.
Tyson destroyed Ruddock the rematch was 100% unimportant.
(Maybe Ruddock won only one round before the 7. and he was down
two times.The referee's decision was 100% good in the 7. because
Ruddock couldn't defend himself after Tyson's combination.)
Lots of loser can't accept the result.Funny these losers can't find
a good lawyer for change the official result.Why? Because the
decision was absolute ok.


Lewis was lucky against Vitali Klitschko the lame cut ko saved
him. Tyson was much more better against Ruddock than
Lewis against Klitschko but Tyson gave a (unimportant) rematch.
this proves Lewis is a coward.

 

Logic isn't your strong suite, that much is apparent.

If Tyson's rematch was unimportant then (a) why did he have it, and (b) why are you giving him any kind of credit for having it?

And I guess the lame cut saved Ali when he fought Cooper too. Cuts happen, Vitali had 3 rounds to knock Lewis out and he couldn't do it.

As for Lewis being a coward for retiring, what was Tyson doing at 36 or 37, oh yeah he was getting the **** kicked out of him by Lewis.

BTW, did you see the way Lewis destroyed Tyson, now that was total and complete destruction. And when Tyson wanted a rematch against Ruddock, Ruddock said yes, but when Lewis wanted a rematch against Tyson, Tyson wanted no part of him.

Those are the facts.

 

Bowe was supposed to fight Ray Mercer. The Ferguson fight happened only after Ferguson upset Mercer in a fight everyone thought Mercer would win.

 

Mercer vs Bowe would if been some match.

 

Ummm ... Tyson wanted a rematch against Ruddock?


I thought it was the other way around: Ruddock wanted a rematch against Tyson because he felt the stoppage in their first fight was premature.

 

And Rahman destroyed and vitali klitschko (a Byrd victim)
humiliated the 100% prime Lennox.
But i think McCall also destroyed a 100% prime Lewis( in
the second round).
Tyson won a 1 round against the prime Lewis.
But where was Lewis in Tyson's prime era ?
The Tyson-Lewis had zero sport value.

 

For You ! Lewis the big puncher 1.
1990 Lewis vs. the bum Ocasio(22-9-1) wpts8
1979 Holmes-Ocasio wtko7
1980 Dokes-Ocasio wtko1
and Holyfield-Ocasio wtko11
Where was your Lewis' incredible power against Ocasio ?
I think you can find some good excuses (considering you have
problem with Tyson's punching power.)

 

Are you having fun?

Because I know well that no single person could be this stupid.

 

It wasn't a nice try.

 

How is accepting 3 million calling his bluff?

In 1996 , he was happy to walk away from Tyson to fight Macall for 2 million. If he was happy to fight Macall who had just one belt for 2 million , why was he playing hardball with the undisputed champ in what would be the best victory of his career?

As its been already mentioned , King was swaying Lewis in his direction with crazy purses to fight Tony Tucker. To get the vacant belt on the line , they sent Newman un meetable demands and options on Bowe.

Its simply out of the question that Bowe ducked Lewis. They offered , offered , offered year in -year out.

Lewis proved his manipulation tactics all thorough out his career . Bowe dumped the WBC with the over lord King attached says nothing about Bowe's intent , if you knew about Kings shady business model.

Lewis went on to be stripped twice and relinquish a belt once , but thats never brought up.

Not to mention Bowe was a vastly superior and more talented fighter at the time than Lewis was.
Lewis was flawed , made lots of mistakes and soon paid for it with a second round stoppage loss.
Lewis wasn't no modern great at the time, he was just a flawed up and comer and that why he chose to go with King to fight past it Tucker .

 

Have you ever played poker, you do know what bluffing is right?

Bowe and Newman made a $3 million offer, never for one minute thinking Lewis would accept 10% when the WBC mandated Lewis as mandatory should get at least 25%. When Lewis agreed and called Newman's bluff, the $3 million offer was exposed as never being a serious offer. If it was a serious offer then the fight would have happened. Bowe would have made by far his biggest purse with $27 million while Lewis got $3 million, a 90/10 split. Bowe wouldn't fight Lewis even for $27 million back then, that says it all, huge, giant, blotting out the sun, duck, pure and simple.

Lewis didn't walk away from Tyson, you can twist things all you want, you are being more deluded than a Klit**** if you think that. Tyson vacated the WBC title so he didn't have to fight Lewis. Lewis then fought for the vacant title as Tyson and King then didn't want Lewis.

You are giving King far too much influence on Lewis' choices. Yes King did try and turn things his way by making Lewis fight his fighter under his card by winning the purse bid. But that was one fight and Bowe had already ducked Lewis at that point by refusing the 90/10 split his team offered in the first place. If Bowe had honoured his own offer to Lewis he would have not needed to dump the WBC title and allowed King any influence on Lewis' next fight. It was Newman and Bowe that forced Lewis to fight someone else by vacating, it was their choice to allow King influence over the direction of the WBC title. King was frozen out of the titles until Bowe vacated.

Klit****'s bring up Lewis being stripped of the IBF title and vacating the WBA title all the time. I know you are not a Klit**** but you are bordering on their levels of delusion with all your talk of conspiracy and coercion on King's and Lewis' part.

Duva already had options on Bowe they were not apart of the negotiations with Lewis. Bowe got his title shot at Holyfield under the agreement Duva would make 28% on his following fights. Newman tried to back track on this by making Lewis pay out of his purse, something that is quite frankly unheard of. Even then Duva called Newman's bluff once again and agreed to forfeit the 28% if Bowe fought Lewis. But once again when the obstacles Newman had placed to block the fight were removed, he changed his mind and withdrew their offers.

Fact is all of Newman's offers to Lewis have to be seen as dubious. The one offer Lewis did agree to, the $3 million was quickly withdrawn which means you have to treat every following offer with skepticism. The $10 million offer in Feb 94, the $12 million offer in April 93 all came with the caveat that the 28% option's held by Duva on Bowe should be paid out of Lewis' purse. So in reality the $10 million offer was really $7.2 million offer with the 28% cut for Duva and the $12 million offer was $9.36 offer with the 28% cut for Duva. I have never heard of a contract negotiation where one fighter had to pay out on the options for another fighter, that in itself was diabolical on Newman's part and even when Duva agreed to forfeit the options on Bowe, they still refused on their own offers, because their offers were not genuine they were just a PR exercise to hide the fact Bowe was ducking Lewis.

Bowe was vastly over rated at the time. Yes he had the best inside skills of any heavyweight we have ever seen, on the inside he was clearly superior to Lewis. But Bowe was inferior in other ways. His jab was over rated, he struggled to throw a straight right hand, always looping it, he had terrible footwork and was very easy to hit.

Both Lewis and Bowe fought Biggs in 91 and their performances highlighted the difference in quality between Bowe and Lewis.

Bowe struggled with Briggs, eating jabs, rocked twice and only 1 round up on 2 judges scorecards going into the 8th round. Lewis crushed Biggs, slipped his jabs, walked him down and blew him away in 3 rounds. Lewis was far stronger, better defensively, hit harder and had a far better jab even before he got with Steward.

Bowe was a very exciting fighter because he fought well inside and was easy to hit. But being entertaining and being good are 2 different things. People hyped Bowe because he was exciting and fun to watch and ignored his flaws. I remember the first time I watched Bowe on the BBC when he fought Mathis Jr and I was shocked had slow he looked, his feet looked like they were in cement, this was meant to be the best heavyweight in the world, yet he was an out of shape, slow, plodder. Bowe was lucky he never fought Lewis, Lewis would have always walked right through him like he did in the Olympics as Lewis was just too physically strong and powerful for Bowe.