Lewis didn't always come into the ring in top condition mentally or physically and I could see him hardly training and scaling as high as 260lb. The opposition was so poor, including Dempsey, he'd get away with it.
Lewis was a product of his era. His natural talent is overstated. In a technical sense, he had issues with balance and underused his jab, before Steward came along to correct those mistakes. He was a rather lanky type before bulking up and becoming a "super-heavy". Under the conditions of Dempseys era, he would most likely be a tall, awkward beanpole with minor world level success. And a hundred years later, a large group of online posters would use his devastating knockout loss to Dempsey to prove how Jack would easily dismantle the current champion. :good
One thing many people forget is just how fast he could move for a big man. He slowed down over the years and essentially stocked his prey, but when he was younger he was a lot quicker than given credit for. That alone would likely render your statement inaccurate.
I am not sure that he is to be honest. The traits that made Lewis successful in his own era, are likely not the ones that you would need to navigate the division of Dempseys era. This was an era where the pit ponies often got ahead of the thoroughbreds!
I think any top 15 heavyweight is a good pick. Even picking Dempsey to take another run through is a good pick lol
I cant see it myself. He had a dozen or so early losses, before we even get to world level. He was probably always going to drop a decision to Meehan somewhere. Even if he had somehow stopped Tunney once, I cant see him doing it twice.
If you're talking about just dropping a prime 245lbs Lewis into that era, it's pretty obvious that he would dominate, too big, too skilled for that era's best. Of course he'd never be heavyweight champion as the colour line would prevent him getting a shot at Dempsey.
Lewis was KO'd by Rahman and TKO'd by McCall. Both were fairly ordinary heavyweights. So I doubt he could go 13 years undefeated in any era.
Hard to say, it's very unlikely he would have been shooting a scene in a movie than flying halfway around the world to fight at 5,200 feet or so, either.
If he takes Emmanuel Steward with him, he'd probably be the most dominant heavyweight ever. If he employed whatever ****py training methods and fighting techniques they used back then, it's much harder to say.
