Don King paid Lewis $1million and gave him a new car to get him to vacate the IBF Title. How can he have ducked Byrd or, as you put it, "quit against Byrd even before stepping into the ring" when Byrd's own promoter was actively taking steps to ensure that the fight did not happen?
Unlike most posters here, who seem to hate one or the other (or both), these are my two favorite boxer's of all time. I'm also rational about them, though, also unlike many posters. While they are the two best HW's H2H in history, in terms of historical ranking, I think they are both somewhat underachievers. I'd put LL at #5 all time in legacy, and Vitali 7 or 8. The lack of a rematch really puts an asterisk on both of their careers. I don't think I could ever put anyone above Louis and Ali for legacy, but I think if everything else about their career's were identical to what has actually happened, except that they had an immediate rematch after their fight, the winner, at least if it was Lennox, should probably have been regarded as #3 all time (and the loser only a couple spots lower than where they are now, again, especially if it was Lennox). As it stands now, the best opponent they fought had an unsatisfying conclusion to it, with rational arguments on both sides as to who was the better boxer, and that hurts both their legacy's.
Lennox Lewis is an underachiever? wow, that's the first time i've seen anyone write that. in actual fact, Lewis has the best resume in history. Ali is the only one who can compete, and even then i still say it's definitely Lewis. Ali's Era is overrated to ****. outside of 4 or 5 fighters, they're barely contenders. ESPN brainwashing to the masses that the bums he fought were genuine threats in the division. they weren't. Lewis has a long list of Genuine competition that's as big as your arm. Ali can't compete with resume. Joe Louis (who i love by the way) has the biggest list of bums you can find in terms of competition. so don't go there. Vitali is a genuine underachiever because he fought mostly ****. and the thing is, he needn't have. there were some good fights to be made but he instead let his brother fight them. so for this reason, Vitali isn't a top ten fighter. nothing links Vitali and Lewis other than the fact they had a fight. their legacy have nothing to do with each other what so ever. and they can't have linked legacies anyway, based on the fact that Lennox is the only one to have one out of the two. Vitali doesn't have any sort of legacy to speak of.
Vitali's record stands on its own he doesnt need a victory over Lewis to make or break his career.He is first ballot HOFer. Lewis won the first fight barely and i think Vitali would have beat him in the rematch. Lewis probably thinks the same. Thats why he retired.
Agree with question/statement/stanza #1. But then I disagree with almost everything. To finish with what I agree on... Lewis has a great resume. Wladimir has the much superior (EDIT: to Vitali, not Lennox) resume and Vitali is nowhere close to a top 10 HW and is an underachiever relative to what I believe his talent to be. Also agree that Lennox is so far ahead of Vitali in terms of accomplishment that they shouldn't be compared in terms of greatness. Back to what I disagree with... Ali's resume is convincingly better than Lennox's. Decisive. If only 4 or 5 of Ali's opponents were legit than literally 1 or 0 of Lennox's opponents were legit. No exaggeration. If you know Joe Louis than you know he fought something like 11 Hall of Famers. So you don't want to go there. He, just like Ali, stomp on Lennox's resume but I will give you that they are the only two with clear advantages over Lennox there. Vitali and Lewis are linked. 1. They had an epic fight with a controversial result. 2. Vitali fought for the lineal title Lewis then vacated one year later against Corrie Sanders... How can they not be connected? That's direct H2H history and direct history of the Heavyweight lineage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alzu9t1CmRM http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZRtDPrRkkk By the end of Round 6 Katsidis left eye was cut even worser than Klitschko's to the point where he couldn't open it but the doctors and ringside officials let him fight for the full 12 Rounds till the end of the fight. I'm not even a fan of Klitschko but why was he not given the oppurtinity to finish the fight.