is lennox lewis one of the greats?

Certainly over rated as Foreman and Holmes proved :hey

 

The 70's they were not :good

As far as Heavyweights, though the 80's and 90's are pretty close wouldn't you say?

 

Not to be an ******* but being champion in the 90's and 00's is a lot different than in the 20's.

It was literally a different world. And I consider myself a pretty big Dempsey detractor, but he gets **** on way too much.

 

I'd go as far to say the 80's was certainly more skilled, a bit more inconsistent though. You didn't see many smooth operators like Tubbs, Spoon, Thomas, Dokes in the 90's, the overall skill level at heavy was already starting to decline. A guy like Chris Byrd would never have amounted to anything in the 80's (although he was more a 00's fighter you still get my point).

Even Jesse Ferguson who was a second tier fighter in the 80's garnered some impressive wins in the 90's, Tubbs showed what he was all about in fighting Bowe to a close fight, etc the list goes on.
And Foreman and Holmes were some 20 years past their best and made fools out of more than a few of the 90's best. Briggs gets propped up as a good win for Lewis but a 48 year old Foreman busted his ass up with not much more than a jab and a knowledge of the fundamentals.
I'd say the 80's and 90's were about equal honestly. Decades don't really vary too much (until the recent decline).

 

The 90's dropped off a cliff after 92. From 92 onward the division has sucked big time. Big deal, a bunch of big punchers who were slow and had zero skills. It wasnt very impressive really.

 

Lewis fought a lot of hard hitters no doubt about it. But beating a focused Lewis (or any great heavyweight) requires much more than being just a hard hitter.
You raise one of my biggest concerns about Lewis, the fact he just didn't face good guys that could stick and move and think on their feet. Byrd-Lewis would have answered a lot of questions I have about Lennox.

 

Spoken from a man whose actually studied and was a part of the 90's scene :good

Pretty refreshing to see other people sharing my views on this topic. The 90's was getting wildly over rated for a while (and still is).

 

I think the 1990s heavyweights get overrated.

Mercer, Morrison, McCall, Seldon, Golota, Grant etc. .... not much good at all, IMO.

Holyfield and Lewis were the only good fighters who gained any sort of consistency over the decade - and Holyfield was already on the decline almost throughout.
Bowe burned out too quick, and Tyson was just the big name from the late 80s.

 

It would have been interesting to see how Lewis dealt with more mobile guys who actually boxed well behind their jabs.
Lets take a look at his comp of the 80's early 90's leftovers?

Ruddock two wars with Tyson
Biggs slowed
Bruno
Mercer
Mcall
Tucker slowed big time
Holyfield slowed

Probably his least impressive performances, except for Ruddock, and most of these guys were pretty far past it. These fighters werent even that mobile when Lewis faced them anyway.

 

NONE of those guys was murderous punchers. you also ignore the fact that Lewis got poleaxed twice by two very limited fighters who never before or after poleaxed any of their opponents the way Lewis got leveled by them. so it is not so much in that Lewis fought a bunch of Big Hitters but the fact that he fought a bunch of mediocre fighters yet got starched twice by a couple of them.. Did any other champion in history ever get leveled in the manner Lewis did (twice).. David Tua is often brought into the arguement as a huge puncher who Lewis defeated, yet Tua weighed over 300lbs when he signed to fight Lewis and had managed to get down to 250lb come fight night yet what we saw was a fat guy trudge around the ring while Lewis back-peddled all night in a "Snoozer" of a fight. we had McCall break-down in the ring and Akinwande thrown-out in another two farcical fights. Golota & Tyson both sedated before the opening bell along with Frans Botha & Shannon Briggs both juiced up and put on feeble performances. Lewis boasted he would have one brother for dinner the other for tea yet after 6rds with the weaker of the two renaged on his promise and ducked both.

 

i agree and it would have answered alot of questions for me about Lewis yet Manny Stewart advised Lewis to duck Byrd saying Lewis would most likely lose a decision to Byrd with Byrd making Lewis look terrible in a similar way to how Jimmy Young made Muhammad Ali look terrible..

 

Yeah if you stuck Lewis in against cuties like Tubbs who in spite of what some might think had so much talent and was super slick and smooth how would he fare? Page was pretty slick on his toes as well at times so he I assume would pose problems for Lewis as well. And if Rock and Mccall can tap that chin my guess is punchers like Witherpoon (maybe he's not a pure puncher but his over hand right was no joke) could take him out as well. How would he deal with the fast hands of a fighter like Dokes? The jab of Pinklon? The rough and tough style of Weaver? Its an interesting thought..... And I'm just scratching the surface with possible opponents for him from that era..

 

yes i agree... Lewis would suffer a couple of losses against those 1980s fighters no doubt about it. Throw in the Jab of Truth`Williams the size and strength of Bonecrusher, Berbick & Cooney.

 

So it's a numbers thing. Quality of competition has no bearing here. Yeah, I get it. Who is ahead of him, BTW?

 

I have my own opinion about those men (Quarry, slick?), but I never argued that Lewis fought more slick opponents then Ali. So I'll leave it at that.

Oh, I didn't put hem in order. The numbering was just to list them, my apologies. At any rate, I wouldn't classify Witherspoon and Norton as punchers. They needed a large accumulation of attacks to finish their opponents. If you want to substitute one of them for a Tiger Williams or Butterbean then that's fine, but then a guy like Botha (who is no lesser than Cobb) should be on Lewis' list as well. You have to draw the line somewhere.

Back up by their higher KO ratios.

There is no specific order.

Great, and all of that without a single argument !

(nevermind the fact that even if only Holmes had beaten more punchers, it'd still be pretty damn impressive)

Since I'm in a good mood, why don't I compare said punchers one-by-one. To give you the benefit of the doubt, I'll add Norton and Witherspoon to Holmes' list. I'll remove Mercer since he's on both lists. Remember that I'm talking about who is the bigger hitter here, not about a fantasy head-to-head matchup:

1. Shavers - Bruno
Close call, but I'll give it to Shavers.
Holmes: 1
Lewis: 0

2. Shavers II - Tua
Both hit as hard as any heavyweight, call it even.
Holmes: 2
Lewis: 1

3. Cooney - Ruddock
Both mainly left hookers, you could make an argument for both; I'll call this one even as well. There's just too little between them.
Holmes: 3
Lewis: 2

4. Roy Williams - Vitali Klitschko
Although Vitali isn't a one-punch bomber, he is extremely heavy handed. The fact that only three opponents went the distance attests to that. Roy had a fearful reputation, but this is not backed up by his record.
Holmes: 3
Lewis: 3

5. Weaver - Mason
This one is tricky. Mason was certainly very heavy-handed, as his 93 KO% shows, but he never really proved it at the highest level. Weaver had plenty of opportunities against high level opposition but didn't show that extraordinary much power, despite all the tries. But, just to show you have far Lewis is ahead in this comparison, I'll give this one to Holmes.
Holmes: 4
Lewis: 3

6. Smith - Morrison
Both huge but limited punchers. This one is very close but again, I'll give it to Holmes.
Holmes: 5
Lewis: 3

7. Snipes - Briggs
Snipes wasn't considered that big a hitter until he nearly KO'd Holmes. Be that as it may, Briggs carries more power. He stopped Liakhovic with only two blows. The same iron-jawed Liakhovic that took tremendous punishment from Brewster without being severely hurt.
Holmes: 5
Lewis: 4

8. Cobb - Rahman II
Cobb wasn't really that much of puncher. Failed to stop a shot, fragile Norton who was KO'd in 1 by Cooney and Shavers. Rahman is more impressive here.
Holmes: 5
Lewis: 5

9. The truth Williams - Tucker
Neither really stopped an impressive opponent. Williams has a KO percentage of 53, Tucker has 74%. Edge goes to Tucker.
Holmes: 5
Lewis: 6

10. Butterbean - McCall II
Not going to waste any words on the fat circus act.
Holmes: 5
Lewis: 7

11. Witherspoon - Jackson
Jackson has a far better KO rate, but he never stopped a top opponent. Neither did Witherspoon really, the only one I can think of is a young Bruno. He deserves the edge for that.
Holmes: 6
Lewis: 7

12. Norton - Golota
These men actually have nearly identical records. Calling this one even.
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 8

And that's it for Holmes' punchers. Next follows the remaining Lewis opponents who are all points in favor of Lewis by default. If you want to scrape miscellaneous opponents from Holmes list, then that's fine. But the likes of Scott Frank, Evangelista and Michael Spinks are just not bigger hitters than the following men:

13. Akinwande
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 9

14. Grant
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 10

15. Holyfield I
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 11

16. Holyfield II
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 12

17. Tyson
Holmes: 7
Lewis: 13

18. Botha
Holmes: 7
Holmes: 14

So, the final score is that even when "neutralizing" the lesser hitting opponent, Lewis is left with twice the amount of punchers.