Lennox Lewis v. Vitali Klitschko - does anyone think this was a good fight ?

My personal opinion, one of the worst displays of heavyweight championship boxing I've ever seen.

But to a large number of the generation of boxing fans who populate these forums it seems to be seen as something so great that even now some are calling for a repeat ! :shock:

I dont want to denigrate the fighters, they showed heart and they traded heavy blows.
But that's it. Skill, stamina, sustained action, footwork, cleverness, defense - forget about it. Awful.

And I think Lennox Lewis would agree. That was his worst. I respect the guy for walking away from the rematch. He's remembered as a good fighter, but a two or three fight series at that level would have been done him no good. Even another win, why risk looking like **** again ?
By trying to always go out on an impressive win aging fighters often did themselves into a hole where they just end up fighting several bad fights or losing several at the end of their careers. Like Holyfield, who's been trying to get it back for about 10 years now.

 

Fair enough.
I'm not going to argue with you guys over whether you enjoy it. I didn't.
All I can do is explain why I think it was awful.

If you have time, checked out these two videos.

[YT]l2XlGWhY_5I&feature=related[/YT]

[YT]XqWX-rRhLRY&feature=related[/YT]

1990 Cooney-Foreman was a fight between two big, big-punching guys. And at the time it was rightfully considered a bit of a sideshow big fight event, a novelty. Cooney was no longer a contender, and coming off a layoff on top off layoffs and losses. Foreman was serious about his comeback, but had been fighting mostly no-hopers. These guys were over-the-hill, Foreman about 41, and unranked in the heavyweight picture, certainly not ranked highly anyway. And neither guys has ever been famed for his skill.

Yet if I compare the videos of the opening round between Foreman and Cooney and the opening round of Lewis-klitschko, it's Foreman and Cooney who show more sharp punching and clean blocking, dont get tangled up at every opportunity, dont lean on each other in a clinch waiting for referee to seperate, and simply put on a more tidy and more presentable fight WITH PLENTY OF HARD PUNCHING.
Klitschko and Lewis in comparison come across as the old guys only fit for hugging and puffing, loving the clinch, flailing away and getting tangled up all the time. I find that messy nonsense frustrating to watch and cannot enjoy it.

Foreman-Cooney was just a random example plucked from the air. To illustrate how two big strong-punching heavyweights can go at each other without looking like a couple of stumble bums.
But that's just my personal taste, and personal opinion. I guess I'm missing the nuances of Lewis and Klitschko.

 

Some fights are better than others.
Some fights are great.
Some fights are crap.
Without these distinctions we wouldn't be able to appreciate the sport.
And if we all had the same tastes and opinions we'd have nothing to discuss.

As I explained, I dont think Lewis-Klitschko was even a good slugging match.

If you tell me "I enjoy every fight and am always pleased, and never disappointed" I'd say you were lying. All boxing fans have fights they like and dont like.

I asked the question "does anyone think this was a good fight?" and lots of people told me they enjoyed it. That's good. I have no problem with that. It's not my type of fight. As I said, without apology, that was one of the worst heavyweight championship fights I watched.

 

Yeah, for a couple of "over-the-hill" "unskilled sluggers" they did okay. I read Cooney interview where he reckons he was in better shape for this one than the Mike Spinks fight.
Against this modest standard of two fringe-ranked has-been sluggers, I think Lewis and Klitschko look a bit clumsy and amateurish in their fight. Of course it's due to how styles mesh together, that's what makes fights, so I'm not here telling people Lewis and Klitschko were inferior to Foreman and Cooney. But their fight was messier and looked crapper, IMO.

 

None of them were classics.

But it is the fact that people go on about Lewis-Klitschko and still talk about it and want a return match that started me off on this thread. And all the controversy often clouds any talk about whether or not people really thought it was a good fight. That's why I asked. I'd heard a lot about all the other crap but didn't really know whether people thought these guys put up a good fight. And it turns most of you say you enjoyed it, so mine is only a minority opinion.
Which is fine by me.
:good