Who is greater P4P Lennox Lewis or Naoya Inoue?

Naoya Inoue is No.1 p4p now, for quite some time. Inoue is undefeated, and is a champion in several categories. Although I voted "flip a coin".

 

Might be a little early to tell but in some ways I think Inoue has already accomplished more.

 

This is one of those cases where opposition really tells the truth.

Coz on paper, Inoue holds an advantage in almost every category that could be classified as an achievement. Won titles in 4 divisions, became undisputed in 2 of them, is 28-0 in title fights. Heck, he's even been on the world level for as long as Lewis, arguably longer (though he didn't consistently stay in it as much as Lewis). He'll most likely have the superior longevity by the time he's done. Plus he's undefeated.

But man, I really can't overlook the difference in opposition level. I'm not one of those "the lower divisions have less talent because xyz reason" people, because that's just a bunch of bull****. But how much denial are we in when we're pretending Inoue's beaten a historically impressive array of fighters ?

Inoue's 28-0 in title fights sounds elite as ****, until you actually search it a bit and learn a good 10 of those title fights were vs unranked opposition. And half of the ranked opposition, let's be real, aren't really worth writing anything about. We're really gonna pretend that Kono, Doheny, Butler, Payano, Moloney, Cardenas and Picasso are the lower weight equivalent to Tua, Tucker, Rahman, Ruddock, McCall, Golota and Bruno ? The latter group isn't even that great, but the former seems like a band of misfits in comparison.

Lewis' best win is a legit P4P all time great in Holyfield. Inoue's is Nakatani, who while P4P worthy in today's time, is still years away from being a great. Inoue's 2nd best win is Donaire, where to his credit, I'd argue the Donaire from the first fight was a better "old legend" win than Tyson was. Not sure I can say that about rematch Donaire though. Fulton is pretty good, but he's still got like 3 wins, and it could be argued he didn't even win most of them.

Lewis has a win over a prime Vitali as an old man, and as much of a fraud as Vitali is for a long reigning title holder, at least he isn't "my sole claim to fame is losing to Tapales" MJ. Or "my sole claim to fame is beating MJ" Tapales. You can bring up the guy MJ beat for his first title all you want, the guy won it off ****ing Doheny

It's Lewis.

Now Inoue vs Wlad P4P ? That's a great comparison. I call dibs on the rights for making that thread right now. I'll do it when this one fades with time.

 

I look forward to it

 

Lewis was never pfp 1.

 

So do I

Can't wait to see the modern day connoisseurs trying to split hairs by comparing the greatness of Jamie McDonnell with Kubrat Pulev

 

Normally I’d rather wait until both fighters are fully retired before making an assessment, especially when it’s between two fighters from two different weight classes. Inoue is most definitely a terrific ATG fighter but Lewis obviously has the better string of wins and names on his resume. Inoue’s dominance, weight jumps, and being 2x undisputed is impressive but the fighters he’s beaten aren’t as great as guys like Holyfield, Tyson, Klitschko, Mercer, Tua, Golota.

Let’s wait and see how Inoue’s career unfolds first. A win over Bam Rodriguez and perhaps winning titles at 126 could probably make his case a bit better but that remains to be seen. And even then I’m not sure if that’s enough to still compare with Lewis’ level of opposition.

A better comparison to Inoue would be HOFers around his weight class like Ricardo Lopez, Miguel Canto, Wilfredo Gomez, Eder Jofre, Fighting Harada, Carlos Zarate, Rubén Olivares, Chocolatito, etc.

 

No, but they could be.. just like any other weight class.

It depends on how much they dominate. Tyson could have been #1 P4P in his day. Certainly, many people today put Usyk at #1 P4P.

 

Usyk, Roy, and Tyson did it.

It seems rare below 126 too.