of course it was little reward, as much as people claim otherwise, lewis wouldnt have received any extra credit for beating a man he'd already stopped. the guy cleaned out a decade of heavyweights that was very strong. his legacy is more than secure. watching the interveiw, you can see there is no doubt in his eyes. this is the man that squared upto riddick bowe and told him if they ever fought he would knock him out cold. the guy had no fear.
i agree. too many people are desperate to convince everyone vitali would have certainly knocked him out. the truth is the careers werent perfectly alligned. vitali was on the up when lewis was on the down. prime for prime had they had a trilogy, then vitali would have probably scored atleast one victory.but it didnt happen.
Excellent points. Leiwis got a chance to redeem himself when KTFO and TKOed. Two decisive loses-two chances to redeem himself..... Vitali, on the other hand, lost due to cuts, but was ahead on the cards, and still fighting aggressively when the fight was stopped.............. but Lewis didn't afford Vitali the chance to redeem himself. He was clearly not confident in his ability to win a rematch, period. That is the bottom line to this whole quandry. :blood For himself, he certianly made the correct decision.
I didn't imply or forget that Lewis "won" the fight. Let's get that straight. And Vitali did not have 3 rounds to try and get Lewis out of there as you put it, it wasn't a 6 round scheduled fight, but 12 rounds. The doc didn't warn him of a stoppage in round 3 did he? But that's neither here nor there. And no, Lewis wasn't obligated to rematch him.....UNTIL Vitali asked for one and he said yes to his face in front of cameras where everyone could see. The fight was over and he could have easily said "No Vitali you had your shot, I'm done now". But he didn't. He gave his word to a rematch, and didn't honor it.
Two points. During the fight it would have been obvious to the cutman in Vitali's corner and to his trainer that this cut could stop the fight. This would have been told to Vitali in between rounds. So Vitali had to have known that the fight could be stopped at any time. In no way shape or form could the stoppage have been a shock to him, unless the corner didn't tell him how bad it really was. So on that basis, Vitali would have known that each round could have been the last one and if he didn't, he should have fought accordingly. Now regarding Lewis' comments, I personally think that after spending out of the ring after a tough, tough fight which you just won, you're on an extreme adrenaline high..wouldn't you think? As such I don't think you're really thinking all that clearly, and you're certainly not thinking of any long term career choices. So in that vein I think he made an off the cuff remark that for some reason V.K. fans just can let go of. Hell Tyson also said he was going to eat Lewis' children, and I don't see anyone dumping on him for not following through with those comments.
**** Lewis. He can talk all he wants now about what he could've done in the rematch or his excuses for his poor performance. He had nothing left at the end of the 6th. He landed some good shots on Vitali and Vitali was still there. And then he **** talks after the fight. I thought he only retired because he was going to come out of the closet, but I guess he just wanted to spend more quality time knitting with his mum.
What failed Vitali in the Lewis fight is his punching power. He hit Lewis a lot, but could not knock him down or KO him. Vitali is more of a volume puncher, Lewis was getting better (not necessarily going to win), Vitali got cut, fight is over.
nice avatar. i am not gonna start to bash you and brits this time around. i am growing on you brits. I try hard.
its simple really, Lewis chances of repeating a TKO cut win Twice were very slim and he didnt have the confidence to win a rematch so he retired. Lewis got the W off a cut its cool it happens in boxing what pisses me off was it was a epic fight that Vitali was winning. Fights like this usually always have a rematch to answer the questions. it sucks when you see a guy fighting his heart out only to have the fight stopped because of something he couldnt control then on top of that being denied redemption. in a sense i feel Lewis stole Vitali's legacy, or more so his chance to build it.