How would you rate Lewis

Top 5 ATG at HW without a doubt.

Top 15 P4P ATG without a doubt.

Has a very good resume avenged both his losses and his draw that was not a draw, Lewis at his worst stood up to Vitali at his best, which is no easy task.

When you look back at Lewis it makes you realise how he was just on another level compared to the bums we have today, he turned from a young agressive KO artist into a boxing master with one of the best jabs in history, there are not many guys I can invision beating a focused Lewis.

 

:good This.

 

I usually have him hovering at the number 5 spot, that often changes though. All time great heavyweight, no doubt about it.

 

As this thread demonstrates, Lewis is among the more overrated HW champs. Great fighter, but not a clear top ten fighter as some make out, let alone top five:

* Only top leve HW champ taken out early by ordinary contenders when he held the title

* fought old versions of the other top fighters of his era (Holyfileld, Tyson), or didn't face them at all (Bowe)

* as a result, he has NO definitive victory over a great HW in their prime (or even close to it)

* overall the guys he fought are for the most part ordinary.

Lewis was a great fighter, and dominated the rather ordinary lot of contenders who were around, but he is nowhere near as great as some make out. Heck, he's not even the greatest HW of his era - that's Holyfield.

 

So beating a version of Lewis, that was clearly at the end of the road, would have provided Vitali the victory for him to...how did you put it..."definitively achieve his own legendary status"?

That really is a twisted perspective, especially when you consider that Lewis had given Vitali that same chance already and Vitali lost. You almost make it sound as though Lewis should have willingly lost to Vitali in order to give him a break.

And if Lewis had won their second encounter? What then? Was Lewis supposed to keep giving Vitali chances until he did eventually lose, could retire on a loss but be comforted by the nobility of his actions in cementing another Boxer's "legendary status".

Weird.

 

ATGs passing of the torch:

Tunney took his shot vs Dempsey
Louis took his shot vs Braddock
Marciano took his shot vs Walcott
Liston took his shot vs Patterson
Ali took his shot vs Liston
Holmes took his shot vs Ali
Vitali ****ed it, he wasn't robbed, he had his shot.

If the up comer can't take his shot against the old king when given the opportunity tough ****, end of.

 

Exactly.

He could have been a top 5'er had the situation lent itself, but he wasn't dealt the cards(fighters) to establish a true claim to being a guaranteed top 10 HW.

 

Yes. Don't you know Lewis should have been prepared to fight the K Bros over and over and over until 1 eventually beat him.

It's simply not fair that when Vitaly hit him hard in Rd 2 he didn't fall over and lay down and say "Ok Vitaly, here is your destiny, I owe it to you because, well, um, you're the peoples champion or something".

Yep, he denied Vitaly the chance to cement his status, by fighting him, and beating him. Weird isn't it.

 

Top 5 heavy, if not Top 3. Faced everyone in his era and beat everyone in his era.

 

Meh, don't really buy that argument. Who was really? If you're a dominant champ, everyone else is **** right? How many "top 10 guys" have multiple wins over over ATGs?

Holmes?

The Bowe thing is fair enough. Holyfield, I dont' really buy. He avoided Lewis for as long as he could.
Holy lost to Bowe (who isn't an ATG, Beat Holy 2-1, and it would probably have ended 2-0 if it wasn't for fan man).

Holy lost to Moorer when "prime". Never beat Lewis. (he was the same age as Lewis was v Vitaly, and ranked either #1 by the Ring, or had the Ring belt, can't recall. No matter what, he held the WBA and IBF belts at the time, so can't have been that ****).

If Lewis's wins over Holy 'don't really count', then none of Holys wins after those fights should count either right? Or doesn't it work that way?

How long before those fights were Holys fights against Tyson, which are waved as a sign of Holys greatness? 18 months? Or the rematch against Moorer?

I think this "how many greats did he beat" his bogus. The real question is "how many top contenders DIDN'T they fight?"

That's more like it.

As for those championing Holy? How many wins does he hold over NON-US fighters before the Lewis fight?

None that I know of. In fact, Botha might be the only Non US fighter Holy has EVER beat.

 

Yeah, but you HAVE to account for the 2 stoppages by b-/c fighters.
They shouldn't have happened, and they hurt the legacy.

I don't subscribe to the notion that a rematch erases a loss.
I also think Mercer beat him.

I still hold lewis in very high regard, but I think him being recently dominant in a sport that doesn't really attract many quality heavyweights anymore is detrimental to his overall legacy.

Yeah, he beat holyfield, but holyfield was past it.
Yeah, he beat ruddock and some quality HWs, but they never amounted to much as it was.

Beating briggs? Who got a gift vs old ass foreman?

He would need some more defining fights in my estimation, and the HW landscape just didn't provide it.

Plus I thought he was getting his ass beat against Vitali, and a rematch was definitely in order.

He's still in my 10-20 somewhere, if I actually had to think about it i'm sure I could reason him close to 12 or 13, but he's just shy of the real true gods of HW.

 

Not in my top ten HW.

 

Exactly. In order to rate Lewis in the top ten, you have to disregard all of these things like they never happened. But they did. Lewis WAS taken out early by second raters, he DID face Holyfield and Tyson when they were over the hill, he DIDN'T face Bowe at all, and he did get a VERY debatable decision vs. Mercer.

 

He would be in my top 10 heavyweights, but not in my top 50 pound-for-pound, though most definitely in my top 100 pound-for-pound. I'd guess at somewhere in the 50-80 region.