George Foreman vs Lennox Lewis

I think this fight could take two directions, The Lewis of the Tyson fight could carefully bring George into the 7-8th round but he may then outbox or hurt a tired Foreman but George could also hurt Lennox (George hit harder than McCall and Rahman but a young version was a bit more telegraghed) the other problem I have is Lennox never Ko'd anyone after the 8th round but a young Foreman( a GIFT stpp over Peralta) did not either. An older more relaxed Foreman would be handled by Lewis UD12. Lewis was not as protected as George leading up to the title and George was carefully matched if not he could have lost to Quarry(COULDA not Woulda) or Bonavena,Shavers, or one of the other guys he did not fight ..........but it is not likely.

 

LEWIS FOUGHT A LOT OF BUMS ON HIS WAY UP.....HIS FIRST BIG NAME WAS RUDDOCK......BUT LEVI BILLUPS/38 YR OLD MIKE WEAVER THE GREAT GARY MASON....THE GREAT DEREK WILLIAMS....THE GREAT JEAN CHANETT.....ECT...WERE NO BETTERTHAN FOREMANS OPPENENTS B4 HE FOUGHT FRA:hat:hat:hat:hat:hat:hat:hat:hatZIER

 

Why don't you post the names with records beside them both fought right up to their first title fight.

 

I wouldn't really call size one of Foreman's "greatest" assets, particularly since his size wasn't especially great.

Here I'm afraid you're just plain overrating Lewis. Ali is in the top three-four fastest-handed champions of all time, and in the '70s, it was primarily his footspeed which had declined somewhat, not his handspeed. Lewis was fast for a 6'5", 240-pounder, but not in Ali's league.

I suspect Foreman's rather experienced and savvy cornermen(Ray Arcel, Archie Moore) would be aware that his hands-out-in-front-with-gloves-open defense wouldn't be effective against a guy like Lewis and train him to modify it somewhat for this match.

Lewis was neither as fast nor as active nor as intelligent as Ali, and if he were throwing quick, darting right leads instead of sitting down on the right as a power punch, then I'm sure Foreman could take them.

There were a fair share who thought Holyfield could've had a win/draw in the rematch. Lewis also took more than a bit of punishment in the Vitali fight, although he was admittedly aging and rusty at the time. Not to mention he was flattened by two guys who were tactical masters or brilliant offensive technicians.

The knockdowns against Ali and Young were clearly due to exhaustion, and Foreman was rusty and lackadaisical when he was knocked down twice by monstrous punches from Lyle, who he still rallied to beat.

Why don't we look at a much more important statistical comparison in this category? Lewis was knocked out twice in 44 professional fights. Foreman was knocked out once in 81 pro fights. In other words, Lewis was knocked out on an average of about four times as often as Foreman was. Moreover, Foreman's only knockout loss was due to exhaustion against Ali(by the way, when I say "durability" I'm referring to the guy's chin/ability to stand up to punishment in the short term- Foreman took a single hard punch very well), whereas Lewis' knockout losses were both while he was fresh early in the fight by single punches against mediocre run-of-the-mill contenders. HUGE contrast in the critical category.

 

GO ON BOX REC AND CHECK IT OUT LAZY:smoke:smoke:smoke:smoke

 

I did, i found out your claim that Lewis's early opponents were no better than Georges to be a crock of ****


:smoke :smoke :smoke :smoke :smoke

 

Lewis is getting overrated on these boards.

 

Your great wisdom is only exceeded by your depth of defence.

 

Dangling

 

I don't think he would've destroyed Frazier like he did if he was 6'2 190lb.

If you make a list of 10 great heavyweights (no specific order), for instance:

Ali
Louis
Dempsey
Frazier
Marciano
Foreman
Liston
Lewis
Holmes
Tyson

Then Foreman has a size advantage over Ali (slightly), Louis, Dempsey, Frazier, Marciano, Liston, Holmes (slightly) and Tyson. The only one he doesn't have a size advantage over is himself and Lennox Lewis.
So i think it's rather clear that size is one of his assets, considering he has it but almost no one else does.

The 74 Ali may have a bit faster hands, but there's not all that much between them, watch those fights i listed or for instance the Morrison fight. You'll see very fast hands, no way that the 74 Ali is in another league.

And at any rate, he is in another league than Foreman in that department.

Just like they did when he fought Ali?

I don't think he had them in his corner against Ali (was it Saddler?), but so what? You can't say "well i'll have the '74 Foreman with better trainers", that's just speculation. I might as well then say that i'll have the Lewis with the speed of '94 and all the training of Steward that he got later. Doesn't work that way.

How is Lewis not as intelligent as Ali? Because he knows how to block a left hook or a jab, or because he was never completely befuddled for 40 rounds by a Ken Norton?

Bottomline is that Lewis is going to get through a lot of those right hands with Foremans leaky defence.

When 95% of the Americans and even most of the Britts don't like you, and you still win rather decisive against the most popular fighter in the division while fighting his fight, you know you've done something right.

Indeed Rahman and McCall knocked him out and Vitali did punish him pretty badly, although Vitali was never outboxed himself. Opposition has something to do with that obviously, but he's a formidable fighter you don't want to fight when you're 37, nevertheless.

And who says Foreman is not going to get exhausted against Lewis? He's fighting a bigger, faster man who can fight off the backfoot for 12 rounds.

Wow, Foreman had 81 fights and was only knocked out once. Did you know that about 30 of those had losing records and another 40 were tomato cans?
Foreman fought a gigantic amount of bums and nobodies to pad his record, during both his first and second career. Lewis took the hard path to the title.

If you want to run statistics, why don't we have a look at significant fights, i.e. not against tomato cans but against ranked contenders by Ring magazine, the most objective ranking system we can agree on.


Foreman during his first career had a record of 5-2, lost 1 by knockout.
If we include his second career then it's 6-5 (although it should be 7-4 with the wrong decision in the Briggs fight), with 1 loss by knockout.

Foreman's win percentage against contenders is 70% in his first career, losing 14% of his fights by knockout.
Foreman's win percentage against ranked contenders over his entire career is 54%, losing 9% of his fights by knockout.



Lewis has a record of 18-2-1 (should have been 19-2 with the wrong decision in the first Holyfield fight) with 2 losses by knockout.

Lewis' win percentage against ranked contenders is 90%, losing 9% of his fights by knockout.

Clear edge to Lewis. He did much better against ranked contenders and lost less fights by knockouts if we're looking at Foreman's first career or equally much if we're looking at his total career.


On top of that, Lewis avenged both his defeats by dominating and stopping his opponents in the rematch, showing that no one has his number.
Foreman didn't avenge a single of all his 5 losses on his resume; he never showed that he could beat a skilled boxing type of fighter with a good chin.

Lewis fought three times more contenders and has a much better win percentage. Talk about a huge contrast. If you include Foreman's second career, then he faced two times more contenders while retaining a 90% percentage, to Foreman's 54%.



And i still don't get why getting exhausted is somehow not a factor a for Foreman but Lewis' chin is?