Greater Heavyweight - HOLMES or LEWIS ?

Would you say Lewis was in worse condition than Holmes was vs Snipes tho? Little doubt at all the same ref from the Holmes - Snipes affair would have let Lewis fight on via the same criteria per Holmes.

 

Agreed. It shows there sweet F.A. between these two and it comes down to personal faves and criteria.

 

I agree Byrd was no challenge for Lewis. However, you are trying to make Tyson worthy challenger, while the true was that he was completely shot at this point and only $$$ made this fight important. I am sure you can easily find a couple of better opponents even in 2002.

Rankings mean nothing (or rather, in some cases, there are meant to somehow justify a fight). Anyone perceiving Grant as "the next big thing" after his fight with Golota was delusional. Still, as the other option was Ruiz, it was not that bad.

I will not agree with you even here and this time I will try to defend Lewis. It looks IMHO it was Wlad who avoided any kind of serious challenge for most of his career. For someone who started his career with good promotor and great amateur experience it took him surprisingly long to fight top10 fighters (with the exception of Byrd, but in his case he had to revenge his brother). You can make the case for the last years of Lewis career, when he was generally preferring easier opponents (Vitali got the fight only as last minute replacement of Kirk Johnson).

 

Something like that wouldn't surprise me, yes. You know very well that boxing always has been and always will be very corrupt; especially when Don King is involved. You don't actually believe Lewis getting a draw against Holyfield was due to incompetent judging? It's crystal clear that they were bought.

And it's occured in other fights. Mathis was stopped very fast when Tyson knocked him down (King promoted), Williams was stopped fast, dito. I'm not saying that Lewis wouldn't have lost otherwise NOR that him losing is the result of a Don King "conspiracy", BUT what i am saying is that if the referees who were in charge of Holmes vs Shavers and Holmes vs Snipes, would hold the same standard as was done in Lewis vs McCall, then some would be talking about Holmes not being a top10 HW because he lost to "B-level" fighters in Snipes and Shavers by one punch stoppages.

 

Then you'd be running around in here proclaiming he avoided even "shot" (your claim) Tyson.

Lewis was only a very slim favourite over Tyson so lets not pretend he didn't have his backers at the time. MANY of them.

 

Well, much of that is hindsight judgment.

Remember that going into the fight:

-Tyson hadn't lost since his fights with Holyfield, had destroyed a very capable Golota as we saw with him against Bowe, Savarese, Nielsen and a few others. Not the stuff of legends, but he was still producing violent knockouts; certainly a big puncher with a great chin, if anything.

-Lewis had just lost to Rahman, was 36 himself and looked to be at the twilight of his career himself as well.

-Betting odds were pretty much even.

So, taking all of that into account, while he was hardly the Tyson of the 80's, he [Mike] was still a huge puncher with high handspeed and an iron chin, but only good for 3-4 rounds against Lewis-level opponent. Certainly a bigger threat, given his weak-chin accusations, than Byrd was, as well as higher-ranked and literally a 10 times bigger payday and popularity boost, the latter of which he needed desperately.

You do realise you're calling a lot of people delusional there? Sure, some of it was based on faith in a new American heavyweight, but there were very high hopes of him going in, and he was still favored to knock out Lewis by many. Knowing how it turned out, that sounds silly, but these are the facts going into the fight.

Interesting change of positions.

I will say that Wlad didn't seem to push very hard to make the fight, but Lewis made it pretty clear, between the lines, that he wasn't interested in fighting Wlad. I think he was more interested in the popularity-boost that Tyson gave him, and you can't really blame him. Plus the Rahman debacle ate up another year or so. But fact remains that Wlad was ranked in the top2 for 3 years without getting his shot. I think he's the only one that you can legitimately say Lewis avoided or at least didn't favor to fight.

 

One sidenote on the even betting odds going into the Lewis-Tyson fight:

A lot of people consider the Miske fight one of Dempsey's better wins. Well, he was a 7-1 (!!) underdog. 7-1 are insanely large odds. Hopkins, who was given no chance against Pavlik at all, was "only" 4-1. Pacquiao, whose fight with De La Hoya was a "mismatch", was 5-2. Historic revisionism is a common thing. A lot of people give Lewis no credit for the Tyson win because he was "shot", yet the Miske win for Dempsey is a good one, even though he was given **** all of a chance.

Against Brennan, he was 4-1. Again, a 4-1 fight is labeled as a "mismatch" these days. Carpentier was 3-1, dito (though one would expect an even larger gap given that Carpentier was a lightheavyweight and not that accomplished; for example, a similar fight in Louis vs John Henry Lewis was a whooping 15-1).

 

Well, I have to agree with some (but not all) of that.

In case of Grant - he already showed shaky chin and not much more in technical department against Golota, who was otherwise winning the fight easily (and almost stopped him in first round). It was the same Golota was destroyed by Lewis in something like 90 seconds. If someone decided to ignore those facts and still thought Grant was "the next big thing"... well, I think "delusional" is not bad term for that.

 

Weather or not one man was hurt more than the other, wasn't my point, and nor was the predicted behavior of one referree vs another. I think that the implication of such a stoppage taking place by order of the King, in the event of " just in case ", is ludicrous..

And if you're honest, I think you'll agree just how ridiculous it truly is..

 

Good one.

 

It wasn't a perfect performance, but that doesn't mean he's nothing all of a sudden. He still won. Patterson was still seen as the next big thing despite his loss to Maxim. Ali hardly looked impressive against Cooper when facing Liston. Oftentimes, and this is certainly true for the latter two cases, fighters rise to the occasion of a big fight. With Grant, we know that although he gave it a good shot, he failed. But at the time, he was touted as the next big American heavyweight star, and by many was picked over Lewis. Those are the facts. The same story applies to the Golota fight.

 

☝

 

This content is protected

IMO I think as boxing history goes Lewis will overtake Holmes on the ATG list.
Lewis' career is more impressive.

 

Lewis has the much better wins. Unfortunately Larry’s one opponent whom could have moved him up in the standings in Foreman retired before they could meet.

 

Holmes has a few things working for him right now.

1. For one thing, a lot of guys were in their prime when Holmes made that great, but somewhat overrated comeback performance against Mercer.

2. A lot of guys uncritically looking at 20 defenses without looking at the names, and who Holmes failed to fight.

3. When Holmes first left boxing, he was NOT beloved, and a narrative developed of him as the unappreciated great. We are now seeing the equal and opposite reaction.

How the hell is Holmes better than Forman, for example?

Forman's best win is Frazier and second best Norton. Holmes best win is a a lesser, nearly 35 year old version of Norton. Foreman has at least two wins better than anything Larry is sporting.

Holmes second best win is Tim Witherspoon. Let's put this in perspective. Witherspoon's reputation is built on wins over Page, Tubbs, Bruno and Bonecrusher- good but not stellar. I like Foreman's win over Moorer better, who can hang his hat on beating prime Holy.

Holmes third and arguably forth best are the wins over an aging Shavers. Foreman's win over Lyle is MANFESTLY better, as Lyle beat Shavers and was a more important contender.

The Mercer fight? Again, at this time Foreman was lineal champion again against Moorer, but if you need another name to plug in here, Foreman has a second win against Frazier,

Cooney is generally considered Holme's best...Forman also beat Cooney, albeit a lesser version, so if you want to get to their fifth or sixth best fight, we can give Holmes a point if you like.

I mean, really, Holmes doesn't stack up against Foreman, never mind, Lewis, Frazier, and a few other guys.

Holmes #3? Not on this planet. Out of the question. The wins aren't there. Maybe in some Marvel Universe alternative reality, or something.