Alex Stewart or John Mugabi

Mugabi to all three.

I thought Stewart was very good though. He stepped in with some very good versions of Holyfield and Tyson, gave Holyfield hell, he arguably beat Foreman, and gave a prime Moorer a scare.

 

Stewaert Was Kinda Like A 90s Mac Foster

 

Not really,

Outside of begining their careers with the exact identical record of 24-0-0-24, the similarities pretty much end there. While both guys had more or less a padded record, Foster at least fought a veteran Cleveland Williams twice, plus Thad Spencer, whereas Stewart's biggest win in his first 24 fights was probably Dave Jaco. Stewart was also KO'd by the vast majority of the top raters he fought, but Foster was only Ko'd once, possibly indicating better durability. Of course I acknowledge that Stewart fought bigger punchers in Tyson, Moorer,and Holyfield. Additionally, Stewart was an olympian who turned pro at a usual young age and with a more extensive amateur career, but Foster had a more limited amateur background, and turned pro a few years later than Stewart did.

 

Even if Cleveland Williams had hobbled into the ring on one leg he still would have been a more worthy opponent than the crap that Stewart fought. I say this with regret, because Alex is a fighter that I had high hopes for. I was 15 years old when he fought Evander Holyfield, and I can remember waiting in anticipation for at least two weeks for that fight. Although I later became one of the biggest Holyfield fans of all time, I was actually rooting for Stewart at the time. I didn't like the way Holyfield's then manager Ken Sanders was saying that he could easily beat Tyson, and therefore I wanted him to choke. At the time, I knew little about what a fighter's record meant, and I was ignorant enough to think that Stewart's perfect resume meant that he was going to knock out Evander.

As the fight unfolded, Holyfield was stuffing Stewart's face full of jabs and hooks, with Alex being able to do little else, but aimlessly follow him around the ring. A few times he was staggered, and didn't even know how to smother the attack with a clinch despite being in his 25th pro fight!! Stewart's only good moment was in the 5th round when he landed a barage of punches which rocked Holyfield. Evander had basically stopped boxing and decided to trade with him-a tragic flaw in Holyfield's long career. At the end of the round, Lou Duva screamed at Holyfield " stop tryin' to be a hero by taking shots god damn it, and get in there and punch!!!" In the sixth round, Evander basically sent Stewart back to his corner a bloddy mess. The fight was later stopped during the eighth.

I am almost certain that Alex Stewart would not last 15 rounds with Muhammad Ali the way that Mac Foster did. He simply did not have the stamina, durabilty, instincts, or survival skills needed to acheive such a feat. The fact that he barely survived 10 rounds against Foreman was probably more related to the fact that George's ability to finish men was declining by that point, and Alex's style may have gelled well with this version of Foreman.

 

Stewart took the Holyfield fight because it was the only decent paying bout that his managers could get him. They said that they tried to get him earlier fights with guys like Tillis, Berbick and Witherspoon, but couldn't close the deals. My guess is that they were actually trying to protect him, or weren't very good business people. My reason for this claim is that an undefeated heavyweight olympian is a hot comodity. If you look at most hot prospects coming out of the amateurs, they rarely seem to have problems getting decent fights. Stewart for whatever reason didn't and I don't think that it was due to him being feared. He was floored by a journeyman named Terry Anderson, and showed very early on that he had no defense or any real tenacity for a fighter.

At the time he faced Evander Holyfield, he had a very undeserved rating of #2 by the WBA. A fight with Holyfield not only meant big bucks, but a shot at the title, had he won it. There was really no other option but to take the fight given that he had everything to gain and nothing to lose. Therefore, it was not so much guts that landed him the ring with Holyfield, so much as it was a golden opportunity. It was certainly an investment of much higher returns as opposed to a risky fight with Tim Witherspoon for no money and little recognition.

You might ask, " well, then why did he step in the ring with Tyson, Foreman and Moorer?" My answer would be, that they too were high paying fights with a potential future for a title shot had he won. The thing to focus on here, is how come he never fought any good fighters in between? The story of Stewart's career was, he either fought the elite for big bucks, or otherwise, pure journeyman and tomato cans. If he was going to fight a good fighter, it had to be richly rewarded, which is why he never developed in the interim between big fights in my opinion.

 

And the same could be said for the Foreman fight in Stewart's case. George was 43/44 years old and getting to the point where he was not finishing guys quite so easily anymore. People act like Foreman's comeback was one continuous entity between 1987 to 1997, with him undergoing no dererioration. Foreman hit his comeback peak against Holyfield and steadily declined thereafter. Sure he still had enough left to capitalize on Michael Moorer's chin, but I firmly believe he was on the downslide.

As for Ali's weak performance, well I still say that Stewart couldn't go 15 rounds with even that version of Ali.

 

Great thread guys! I really liked Alex Stewart and felt bummed when Foreman was given the nod in their bout, i thought he won that fight. I think that his fight with Ezra Sellers was a thrill. Somehow Alex managed to be in some exciting scraps.

It's funny because although Alex showed fear of his opponents he had a big heart too.

 

I managed Alex in his later years, and you will never find a better person than Alex, Truely a Gentleman. I almost stopped the Ezra Sellers fight after Alex got knocked down and had a very hard time getting up - he tried to get up and fell back down ( Alex also had a knot on the temple area the size of an orange after the fight ) I'll try and find the picture with Alex, Me and Kevin Rooney taken in the hotel room after the fight, the knot was one of the worst I've ever seen.
I can tell you in no uncertain terms that Alex at least when I had him couldn't get a good fight to save his life. We were supposed to fight Monte Barrett, but he kept on pulling out and we were under contact with the Goosens. Alex was in Catskill through X-mas & new years ( actually had dinner at Vinny Paz's that year ) so That was how the Ezra fight happened. I had to force Alex to fight Sellers - Alex wanted no part of a small southpaw

Actually we all had breakfast together before the fight. Ezra is a real class act also.
Craig

 

Nice first post. Can i get your name please? It's a pleasure to have someone so close to the action in here.

 

.............Welcome aboard, man! :good I'm sure you have lots of stories and neat insights we'd like to read, hope you stick around......


As to the question at hand, Mugabi is the answer to all three questions. With Stewart, it was more of a "wait and see" proposition because he really hadn't fought anyone of note. Mugabi, while limited in his own way, had fought some guys on national TV that had a bit of cache', and the way he won those fights was more spectacular, so he was definitely hyped more.