How Do People Rate Lennox Lewis Higher Than Larry Holmes?

Nobody told Larry Holmes to keep fighting for so long.

Lennox Lewis retired on top. Larry could've done the same.

If Lennox fought until last year, I'm sure his career would look much different (and not for the better).

 

One place behind Wlad Klitschko. Maybe it should be Tyson. Not sure.

PS Spinks beat Holmes twice.

 

The last win of Lewis’ career is against a better opponent than anyone Holmes beat.

 

I like the high rating on Wlad, who is put on the bottom of the rankings too often.

Regarding Spinks, wasn´t that disk. already finished?

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Ka-Ching! https://www.boxingforum24.com/threads/larry-holmes-vs-michael-spinks-2.328617/

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He certainly beat Vitalis skin that evening. To bad for him.

 

Which is exactly the point. If he did, we can say with alot of safety, his losses would surpass Larrys even further (who was still stopped only one time to prime iron Mike).

If we draw the line at their respective age, which is Holmes after Spinks and Lewis retirement, Holmes has still 7 more fights on his resume, no knockout loss, and 4-5 more title defenses.
So it really must be an argument the quality of Lewis wins, not quantity, to put him ahead.

 

Cheers, l had no idea. Teach me to do a bit of research !

 

We're judging their careers. It's not up to us to DRAW ANY LINES and correct their bad decisions.

Lennox Lewis retired on top having beaten every man he ever fought.

Larry Holmes fought until he was 52 and ended his career fighting in a freak show against Butterbean.

That's on Larry Holmes.

So, in addition to everything else he did better than Holmes, add to the list that Lennox Lewis was "SMARTER" than Holmes, too.

You don't think there was pressure for Lewis to keep fighting? The Klitschkos called him out for a decade. Hell, Bowe is still calling him out every time they have a photo opp together.

Lennox Lewis was an Olympic Gold Medalist, beat everyone he fought as a pro, retired on top as the World Heavyweight Champion and a multi-millionaire... and never came back.

Larry Holmes could've done the exact same thing as a pro, but he didn't. His choice.

When you're comparing his career with Larry's career ... Lennox WINS.

 

Thats EXACTLY why we CAN DRAW ANY LINES, because Holmes finished his first career (until retirement) at the exact same age Lewis retired also (and didn´t come back).

You can´t judge Larry Holmes only negative credit for having a "seniors career", including an ridiculous "come-back debut decision" against the undisputed Top Dog of the division.
What of Larrys first and/or second come-back career are you going to value against Lennox Lewis, who was playing chess at that stage of his life ? Thats a loss-loss situation for Holmes.

 

Of course I can judge Larry Holmes after his losses to Spinks.

He boxed just as long AFTER the Spinks fights as he did leading up to the Spinks fights.

The Spinks fights were literally the half-way point.

It's Larry's career. The whole thing.

I bought his PPVs against Mercer, Holyfield and McCall. If they don't count, is he going to send me my money back? They seemed like they counted at the time. They seemed like they counted as they were hitting each other. It looked like they counted when Holmes vomited after the bell ending the Holyfield fight. Did I imagine that?

 

I´m not going to take that away from Larry Holmes or yourself for that matter! I´m saying that there is hardly anything to compare to Lennox (or lets say very diffiucult), who stayed in his house when the world was shouting for a Vitali rematch.

Thats a more reasonable ground.
Lets say Holmes lost both fights to Spinks, its still 7 more fights on his resume, more title fight wins, and two decision losses vs. two embarassing knockouts.
I guess we have to check for quality here. Quality that fills in the gap of two knockout losses. And I´m talking about quality only.

 

If Larry Holmes had retired after the two losses to Michael Spinks, their careers would be very comparable.

But Larry's continued on. And now they aren't.

Lennox's career was clearly better.

I just judge them on what actually happened. Not what I "wish" would've happened.

 

You´ll judge Larrys career downwards to a good margin, because of these losses to prime Tyson & Holyfield, as well as that closer one to McCall ?

To make it short: In a comparison with Lennox Lewis (retirement: age 37), I´ll call that absurd.

 

We're comparing their careers.

There's nothing absurd about it. You want to pretend HALF of Larry's actual career - that spanned from 1973 to 2002 - didn't take place. Sorry. That's absurd.

The guy had 75 fights. He probably should've stopped around fight 42 when he started looking for soft touches around the Lucien Rodriquez fight and couldn't even put them away. But he wanted to fight soft touches until he got to Marciano's record. Then he failed to reach that when he lost to Spinks. Probably should've quit then. Then he tried to win a rematch. Lost that, too. Should've stopped. Didn't. And fought for another 15 years.

If Holmes had actually regained the title, like Foreman did, you'd count that. Well, the losses count, too.

Lennox Lewis fought the much tougher Vitali Klitschko. Tore his face apart. Stopped him in six. But realized he didn't have much left. And STOPPED.

Holmes should've done the same.

 

The cut makes sense when Larry Holmes retired the first time after Spinks too. Thats why I made it and backed this up with numbers and arguments to do so.

What Larry did afterwards can be seen pretty different, but I have a hard time of downgrading him against a fellow with a void at this place. Certainly, I´m not pushing Lewis for not making a come-back and suffering from the comparable amount of losses due to age.

 

Lennox Lewis didn't fight after he retired. So there is nothing to base his performances on.