February 7, 1997 Lennox Lewis 29-1 24 KO vs Oliver McCall 28-6 20 KO Vacant WBC Heavyweight Championship Lennox Lewis vs Oliver McCall This content is protected The undercard: Corrie Sanders vs Arthur Weathers This content is protected Oleg Maskaev vs Rodney Blount This content is protected
Shame there wasn't a decisive conclusion in that one.... Still one of the more bizarre moments in boxing history. Seems like the 90s was chalk full of those! What a body assault by Sanders... Sanders/Maskaev would have been a great fight, while it lasted anyways.
McCall sometime trains in my gym in Chicago. To this day, he cuts a pretty menacing figure. He still has a powerful build.
Why? Because Lewis landed flush punches and couldn't hurt him? Lewis hurt McCall badly the round before he started crying. Then Lewis was just afraid to hit him.
It's well documented McCall was a crack addict. Look at the way he runs out and the look in his eyes, he must have used just before he left the dressing room. I think Lennox would have won the rematch anyway, but through no fault of his own he was beating up on a guy going through crack withdrawal that night.
McCall had no business being in that ring, and its one of the most shameful things Don King has ever been responsible for.
Oliver McCall sparred around 100 rounds with Mike Tyson -- Tyson used to go all-out in sparring -- and was never dropped by Mike. It does seem a shame that Oliver McCall is remembered far more for his mental breakdown in the second Lewis fight than he is for blitzing the then unbeaten Lewis in the first fight, for which the Atomic Bill was a 5/1 underdog.