Biggest waste of talent

I wasn't as familiar with Riddick's career as I was the Golden age guys until I joined the forum. Now I see that this is abysmally true. I honestly think Bowe would have knocked Lewis out (pre-Steward, which was prime Bowe), and slapped Tyson silly. I think to a degree it was his handlers that screwed him over, they should have just let him fight, fight, fight while he was hot. I personally believe Bowe would have been THE heavyweight champ from about 1990 to 1996 had this been the case. I think Bowe needed someone to conscientiously light a fire 'neath his arsche.

 

If the likes of McCall and Bruno troubled Lewis in the early 90s then Bowe would most likely have beaten him.

 

That's the way I see it. The post-Steward Lewis would have been a different story imo. If Holyfield knocked down Bowe, then it's hard for me to not see the Steward Lewis stopping Riddick.

And this is coming from someone whom likes Bowe overall as a fighter more than Lewis (though a fan of both of course).

 

Yeah but often boxing doesn’t work like that. I mean you could say on the other hand, Bowe had Holyfield down a couple of times badly hurt in their fights and even stopped him in the last one yet the Steward-trained Lewis didn’t even come close to stopping Holyfield in their fights or even had him really hurt at any stage.

 

Great point...it is pretty odd Lewis didn't

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hurt Holyfield.

However, iirc Holyfield in general wasn't exactly the easiest fighter to hurt, even Foreman (not as quick handed but definitely more heavy-fisted than LL) landed flush a couple of times on Holy and didn't knock him down.

All the fighters mentioned are so great their great is great

 

Kind of a loaded question, as was mentioned near the beginning of the thread, because even the biggest waste of talents we can name, we know well enough to name.

There's tons of guys who had great potential well before they ever got far enough along for us to know them. Boxing's road to greatness was built over the valley of wasted talent. There's 100 ways for a fighter to fall over the edge before they make it far enough along for us message board schmucks to know them.

 

Roberto Duran. If he had the continuous work ethic and conditioning of a Hagler or Holyfield I think now he would be considered by most as the greatest fighter of all time.

 

I think he and Sugar Ray Robinson were that anyway.