How is knocking out a future HW champion, and beating world heavyweight title challangers as well as challenging for the world title itsel something a "club fighter" would do?!?
Who knocked out a future HW champion ?:huh:nut Who are you talking about ? and which HW champion he was ? And clubfighters might happen to "beat" decent opposition rarely . But are you considering their combined wins resume when you use the word "challengers" instead of the word "challenger" ? And as I previously replied , in another thread , to you , the whole era was a crap era so they , as the second tier/best of their poor era happened to be the contenders/challengers. It was the era of the mighty clubfighter . Clubfighters ruled the world back then , excluding the champions , maybe .
Cleveland Williams KO7 Ernie Terrell who would become WBA world heavyweigh champion :good Not only do you not watch boxing, but you don't have a proper grasp of Boxrec which you use as a substitute and also hate Really? Most people would consider them fighters who fight at club level :nut
When Terrell fought Ali he was considered to have the best jab in the division,he was also the number one rated contender.Terrell had not lost a fight in 5 years and during that time had beaten. Foster Jones Folley Machen Zech Lincoln Chuvalo. It was perceived as a very tough fight for Ali ,I know, because I was around then.Hindsight has showed that Ali handled Terrell and his jab easily, but that was not the consensus going into the fight.
Okay so there were alphabet trinkets already back then. Now I am deeply impressed by Cleveland Williams and will start considering him an ATG top15 HW. I do not use boxrec as a substitute for watching fights. I actually love the concept of boxrec (but not the staff there) , it is genius . (1) So every fighter is a clubfighter. (2) And sometimes they are offered money to step into the ring to pad someone's record. And the just might pull an upset.
Why? Are those your two strata for ranking fighters?! ATG top 15 HW OR Club fighter :nut Then how do you come to the judgement on these men as clubfighters?! If you don't watch them fight, AND you don't use boxrec, how do you come to these conclusions?! What, the concept of lying to you persistantly?! :nut
I could see Lennox dropping Ali with his powerful straight right hand early in the fight, but that's it. Ali wins a 12 round UD, outboxing Lennox and beating him to the punch. I don't think Lennox makes it three rounds more against Ali in a 15 round fight. A prime Lennox Lewis could make this contest very exciting, especially if he comes to fight and attacks Ali like he did to Holyfield the first time. If Lennox sits back, jabbing backwards from his heels like he did to a well past-it Tyson and allows Ali to move freely, it's only a matter of time before he gets stopped on cuts.
Lewis will always match up well head to head. He has almost all of the tools with large, athletic, proportionate size. I think it is easy to get carried away in H2H situations because of that. On a fundamental level though, Lewis has no marquee wins even remotely close to the level of beating an ATG like Ali. Everyone looks great against mediocre competition, and it can be shocking how quickly that impressiveness can change once they face proper talent. Ali, on the other hand, has many wins over multiple ATG's, and that is the unbiased information that makes me choose Ali.
ali would have beaten lewis pretty easily at his peak too fast and athletic either a late stoppage or points.
Lewis is clearly an all-time great heavyweight champion, but I just don't see him beating Muhammad Ali.
the 15rd limit would be the thing that dooms Lewis and Ali would fight that fight with the knowledge that Lennox never stopped anyone past the 8th rd . Ali would give Lennox movement and use his speed of hand and foot and then start making Lennox feel some of his power and combo's after rd 7-8 ...Lennox either goes into silent agreement and tries to survive or takes a swim in deep water...where I fear Ali drowns him
First off,the Ali that fought Norton was certainly past prime.As far as jabs are concerned,other Ali opponents were better jabbers than Kenny.Second,Norton was certainly not "an average fighter".Third,the Holyfield that Lewis fought was stopped by Riddick Bowe YEARS before Lewis and Holyfield tangled.Fourth,prime Ali was much better than the past it Holyfield that gave Lewis a tough time in their second fight.Fifth,unlike Lewis,Muhammed was NEVER knocked out,stopped only later in his career when he was unable to defend himself,so forget about a ko victory.Sixth,your friend claims Ali used his size advantage well as part of his defense,but didn't Lewis use his size advantages for both his offense AND defense?Seventh,Muhammed's mind games would have worked wonders.Lennox never fought a heavyweight remotely as good or as fast or as mentally strong as Muhammed.Muhammed by clear decision.