Sometimes when you're scrolling through fighter's records, you see how close we were to some very interesting matchups. Briggs fought Lewis immediately after beating old George via a very controversial decision. If the judges hadn't of robbed George, would we have seen old Foreman vs close to Prime Lennox? Old Foreman really didn't defend his title against anyone notable during his second reign, and wasn't very active. He would have been 49 years old for a potential Lewis fight. Seems like the only question is if Lewis would have been able to stop him or not. He was never stopped during the his comeback, which is impressive. I think Lewis was probably the guy who could have retired him without the help of any judges. KO9 Or maybe he would have retired before it manifested?
George Foreman said he wanted absolutely nothing to do with Lennox. He actually said that on a number of HBO boxing telecasts.
Supposedly close. Briggs was apparently on a list of opponents Foreman chose from for his chance at an eliminator to face Lewis. Buster Douglas was also on that list.
The fight was seen much more as Briggs fighting Lewis, than Lewis fighting Briggs. Briggs walked out first and was very much recognised as a challenger.
The point is Lennox fought Briggs straight away to get his hands on the lineal belt because said title very clearly had value.
Lewis didn't even know Briggs was lineal champ lol. He was just defending his WBC title against the winner of an elimination fight. He actually tried to fight Holyfield instead before agreeing to make his mandatory defence.
I actually think George had a decent shot at scoring the upset against lewis. Especially with the nasty and deceptively fast jab Foreman had. Let’s face it, lewis was far from Vitali Klitschko in the chin department and Foreman had very good timing and thudding power. I think George would’ve had to survive a couple of the worst storms he ever had to go through but he would’ve stayed upright against lewis and eventually gotten through with a nasty step in uppercut to hurt lewis, get him angry and smiling while dropping his hands (Often did that after getting caught) then a huge 1-2 to break through a weary guard to pull off the big KO shot in 7 or 8. George would’ve most likely looked like he did after the Stewart fight. MAYBE actually have had to pick himself up off the deck for the only time in his second career. Definitely would’ve also been a “I’m too old for this ****” moment for him and he would’ve bowed out at the post fight presser. I know George said (Half jokingly imo) he wanted nothing to do with lewis. But I think 2nd career George could very well have pulled off the upset.
Lewis put a great value on the lineal championship. When retiring he said: "I am particularly pleased to be stepping down while still the reigning lineal heavyweight champion. Only two other men, Gene Tunney and Rocky Marciano, have retired as champion and stayed retired. I promise you, I will be the third."
