How could he still be standing after that?

Not a single punch, but i thought it was a miracle that Nigel Benn made it out of the first round with McClellan and not only that, he was fighting back.

 

to this day i still cannot believe the second round of that fight. benn was smashed to bits in the first, the second was one of the biggest displays of heart i have ever seen. he landed bomb after bomb on the g-man and had him on the run for most of it.

 

Holmes Shavers II

 

I thought the constant pounding Lewis gave Tyson was impressive in the amount of punishment Tyson was able to sustain. Some of those punches were on par with the punch that KO'd Rahman. Personally I was amazed.

 

In Frazier-Quarry II, Jerry took a left hook from Joe that momentarily appeared to put him out on his feet. It was amazing and a little scary that Quarry stayed on his feet. Even Frazier seemed to back away slightly, waiting for Quarry to fall, but he didn't.

Later in the same round, a body shot did put Quarry down.

 

I thought Pink did well to stand up against Tysons constant onslaught..

I thought Franz Botha did unnaturally well to keep getting up after Mike Moorer got his hands on him...

 

I felt a bit sorry for Quarry in that fight. In the 4th, Jerry just looked like a beaten man, not just physically but moreso mentally... he just didn't have anything left. Even Frazier seemed to go a bit easy and thought it would be stopped, but Joe Louis was no more mercyful as a referee than he was as a fighter.

That was one hell of a performance of Frazier, by the way. The only thing that he could've done better was the choice of the color of his pants.

 

Even Jim Lampley was amazed it as it was one of the only positive things that he said about Mike.

The Right hand Ali took against Shavers was nothing short of phenominal. Dare I say it was the only time in Ali's career in which I felt that if Shavers hadn't fell for Ali's "possum" game he could have stopped him while he was still hurt. There is no other time in Ali's career after watching pretty much all his fights that I feel this to be more true.

Some of the shots Morrison was landing no Mercer were big.

 

Mercer said that the hardest shots he ever took were those from Morrison. Tommy could hit, no doubt.

There's a right hand Lewis lands on Mercer in about round 8 or 9 of their fight that has to be seen. It's a total Rahman-esque bomb, just goes splat right into Mercer's mush. Sweat blasts off his head but Mercer barely budges, and resumes trudging forward moments later.

Bigcat - Botha showed major courage under fire against Moorer. Botha doesn't get much respect, to be fair he was a limited fighter, but when it comes to solid blue-collar work ethic I think he put a lot of the more talented heavyweights to shame. He was utterly exhausted by the 12th though and the stoppage was fair.

Ironically, considering the poor reputation of his chin these days, I remember Michael Grant taking a dead-on full weight right hand from Obed Sullivan in the 9th round of their fight in '98 and not even flinching. Sullivan got absolutely everything behind it but Grant didn't seem to even notice (and just about a minute later was knocking Sullivan about for the stoppage). Sullivan wasn't a big banger but a 230-odd pound man hitting you like that should at least make you stumble. Same thing happened when Grant got hit flush with some wicked-looking hooks from Izon and Savarese, who were better punchers. But then one on-the-money right from Golota sends him toppling, and suddenly Grant can't help kissing the canvas all the time...

 

Too right. Big kudo's to Holmes not only surviving, but eventually thriving.

EDIT - had not read the thread thoroughly enough.

 

Oh, that reminds me...Ruddock getting up from that Morrison hook.
Ruddock often looked like he was absolutely annihilated by a knockdown, only to get up smiling away.

 

Trying to remember if he was offbalance and the affect exagerrated, but Duran took a very big shot against Barkley that could have easily dropped him.

 

Good one, though Ruddock was pretty much out of the fight even though he got up.


I agree with your pick of Lewis vs Mercer. It's interesting, Lewis won the fight by a small margin, but Mercer may well have taken the hardest and most punches of all opponents Lewis ever faced. Holyfield probably took more, but in those fights, Lewis seemed to focus more on speed, combinations and outboxing (especially the first) rather than pure power - as was the case with Mercer, he was really doing all he could to get the KO right there and then.

 

Marciano Walcott 1, Round 11.