The Riddick Bowe who beat Holyfield in their first fight vs Lennox Lewis who beat

How many mandos did Holyfield make first time?

 

one against Bowe and lost. Talk about milking the title. Foreman, Holmes and Cooper in his hometown.

 

So the WBC mando was rightfully waiting, nevermind all this WBC curruption business the Rudduck/Lewis winner was due their shot. I dont think Holmes/Foreman were bad defenses

 

Agreed,

facing Larry Holmes, George Foreman, and yes even Burt Cooper as a last minute substitute beats the **** out of fighting Jesse Ferguson and Michael Dokes.

 

No difference from the IBF or WBA. Tyson was the #1 contender at that time fighting Ruddock who lost twice and then remerged as the WBC #1 contender again after Tyson went to prison, adding more fuel to the fire that the WBC was promoting the best fighter Don King had to its #1 spot. When Lewis beat Ruddock, Tucker, another Don King fighter, was his opponent for the vacant title.

 

Thats right, but in the context of this discussion it still didnt make a difference as Bowe had six guaranteed paydays from HBO, thus giving him way more options down the road, including a fight with Lewis.

 

Yes. And Lewis got the WBC title when Bowe opted out. So Lewis didn't even have to fight again to get the title.
That's the point, it was the WBC title Lewis had an immediate right to, according to agreements, not a shot at Bowe per se.

The WBC very nearly stripped Holyfield of the title before the Foreman fight, and were pressuring around the time of the Holmes fight too to get Ruddock a shot (with or without eliminator), on the same grounds that they eventually stripped Bowe.
Only their greedy eyes on the sanctioning fees (based on percentage of fight revenue!) and Holyfield's popularity and the vigilance of boxing press saved Holyfield really.

 

I don't think anyone is going to defend the moral authority of the WBC, however, it clearly states that Riddick agreed to fight the winner of Ruddock and Lewis if he beat Holyfield. The WBC certainly thinks there was a signed agreement in place, given these comments


"The Holyfield vs Bowe fight was authorized by the WBC with the condition that the winner fight Lewis. Bowe won the title, but instead of honoring his written agreement to fight Lewis, he refused to pay the WBC sanctioning fee and threw the championship belt into a London waste basket"


and the fact Bowe ditched his belt rather than undertake a legal challenge also supports it.

Seems like a pretty stong case to me, what more do you want, a copy of the contract?

 

Its not like the WBC were putting forward an unworth challenge, Rudduck and Lewis were considered top 4 fighters, both had beaten top 10 opponents. The winner is clearly the second best or best alongside Holyfield-Bowe winner. According to you the WBA were getting their mando/no1 contenders in the form of Bowe who had an easier rise to the top

Your making allot of this WBC conspiracy as it seems the WBC were in there rights. You are asking why Rudduck was moved up the WBC rankings, well he did win twice and he was considered by some the best HW in the world in 92. Your actually wrong about Tucker fighting for the vacant title, he technically didnt, Lewis was made the champ prior to the Tucker fight and Tucker was 49-1 anyway

 

Theres no question an agreement was broken, but given the actions and moral authority of the WBC in the past, it was easy to tell them to go f*ck themselves when HBO offered a far more lucrative deal, which could have ulitimately included Lewis with or without the WBC involved.

 

Actually the point Im trying to make is it had nothing to do with the opponent and everything to do with control and money. Maintaining the WBA and IBF belt as well as a major television network was far more lucrative than dealing with the WBC and Don King.
Like I said, had it only been the WBC belt things would have most likely been different and Bowe would have had to face Lewis.
Look what ulitmately happened to Lewis, he had to go through a string of Don King no name fighters for small paydays for several years, as compared to Bowe who got to face Holyfield again in his third defense.

 

The thing is they could have maintained the WBA/IBF/WBC and TV contracts by facing Lennox Lewis. And technically speaking they knew they could maintain all the belts and the TV contract (and I'm doing you a favour with this point ) because they made Lewis an offer of 5% or 10% according to Frank Maloney, supposedly Lewis said he'd take it but Maloney told him to turn it down and wait for purse bids (which would guarantee 25%). So in theory you could argue Lewis ducked Bowe

 

Chicken Bowe would never accept the fight

 

At there best Bowe beats Lewis

 

I rather doubt it.

I think that there is a reason why the fight didn’t happen, and it wasn’t Lewis!