If Riddick Bowe stayed in shape... Could he have been great?

Since you asked this in (at least) two forums, I'll give my opinion here too. :- )

I felt at the time, and still do, that the reason manager Rock Newman put Bowe in the ring with Michael Dokes less than three months after winning the title in the epic battle with Holyfield was to keep him in the gym and in shape. He defended a little more than three months later against Jesse Ferguson (it was supposed to be against Mercer, as we know). Bowe was keeping busy and looking good. But he got a ton of (IMO) undeserved flack for his choice of opponents. In my view he was entitled to a gimme defense after Holyfield I. And, again, he was supposed to fight Ray Mercer in May and instead did the honorable thing in defending against Mercer's conquerer.

Then he had a layoff. When he had to wait nearly six months for the Holyfield rematch it wasn't good. Sure enough, he came in at the heaviest of his career. Newman should have pushed for the second Holyfield fight to happen in late September '93 (I don't know... maybe he did).

When Bowe fought every three to four months he was fine; longer than that was just too long out of action for a guy like Riddick Bowe.

 

That's funny! Makes sense though. If you've got something you want to talk about, well, different people go to different forums...

Just curious... which forums? I pretty much stick to here and BoxRec. There's a couple others I check out from time to time, but they don't seem to be very active. I'm wondering if I'm missing some good discussions on a forum I'm not aware of.

 

I like Bowe but he seems to get a lot of passes here. Before he fought for the title, he struggled in a couple of fights to the point where Holyfield was widely favoured to stop him.

The same Holyfield who had been taken the full distance by 42 yr old Foreman (to be fair we didn't know at that point how durable old George was), same Holyfield who had not been able to floor Cooper after the first round despite raining punches on him and who had then gone 12 with 42 year old Holmes. Evander was not held in high regard at this time and yet still critics and bookies alike favoured him to beat Bowe.

That should put Bowe's 1989-92 body of work into perspective. Bowe's was a good pre-title career but not enough to stand him among the greats by itself. It needed more substance from the subsequent title reign which did not happen as I'm sure most would agree.

Bowe's chin is the thing that gets most undeserved praise, for me. In fight 3, he was decked by Holyfield who looked so bad, commentator Foreman feared for his life. And Golota had Bowe in all sorts of trouble from head shots which he couldn't repeat with any other top fighter; other than Bowe in the rematch, that is. Bowe's chin made Golota look like a puncher but he wasn't.

The lack of resilience Bowe's chin (not his heart. That proved its mettle.) showed vs Golota is brushed off as he was, we are told, 'shot' by then. He was 29! At that age, Lewis got stopped by McCall and was forever afterward known as chinny despite surviving some big punchers like Ruddock, Bruno, Mason, Morrison, Tua, Briggs, Mercer, Klitshko - names all conspicuously absent from Bowe's CV.

At the end of the day, if he had stayed in shape, he probably would have been considered an all-time great but if my aunty had nuts she'd be my uncle. If Lennox Lewis had stayed focussed for McCall and Rahman would he be viewed as the greatest fighter ever without the stain of those kayo losses? Possibly. But he didn't stay focussed. So he won't be judged so highly. And the same criterion should apply to Bowe. If he'd had focus and stayed in shape, he would be viewed as a super great. But anyone looking to be viewed as great will have a hard time doing so without focus and discipline in their locker.

 

The vast majority of champions lose their direction once they hold the lineal title.

Bowe was just one of the more extreme examples of this.

It is the Joe Louis's of the world, who keep fighting every title defence like it was their only shot at the title, who are the real aberrations.

 

Yes he would have been great. He had it all except for discipline. Still think wen he was on he was great

 

Good post.

I think Bowe's other problem in 1993 was expecting Holyfield to be a depleted version from the one he faced a year earlier. He made the same mistake we all made. Most thought Holyfield was done, and would be stopped this time by Bowe.
In fact Holyfield was as good as he'd been, bigger, and boxing more sensibly that he had a year earlier.

 

Don't see why not, Bowe had all the boxing ability one wants to see in a great fighter. Speed,power, able to fight inside and out, especially for a man his size. Great jab. But you can't teach desire. And that was his downfall. Gotta have that desire for the little things... ( he had great desire and will while engaged in a fight). But to train, that consistency to get up every morning. The running, the sparring, the eating the right things. That was his downfall.

 

Actually no , he hardly gets any passes around here and receives more criticism than he does praise. Some people pick him to lose every h2h match-up despite beating everybody he ever faced during a great era.
More is made about his struggle vs Tubbs than any other HW who didn't have it all their own way while climbing the ranks.
Ali was close to a stoppage loss vs Cooper and many felt he lost to Jones.
Mike Tyson had difficulty with Tillis.
Holmes woulda been knocked out by Shavers had he not an iron chin.
Lewis didn't struggle with MaCall , he was ktfo. And he didn't look all that great vs Tucker either, a guy Bowe woulda cut down and left in a crumpled heap.
Purrity destroyed Wladimir in the later rounds. People act like that never happend.
All Bowe had was a little struggle in a fight he clearly won , but some how its worse than all those examples.

And yeah , he was over the hill at 29. Unfortunately his mentality didn't match his skill set and boxing is 99% mental.
Tyson was past it at a younger age. Ali was at 32. Buster Douglas was shot at 30. Marciano 32
His career may not have the depth as a Lewis , neither has Fraziers , but greatness is defined by what they achieved on one night. There's enough evidence on him to suggest to me he was an ATG , mainly in the skill set department which i think is the most relevant criteria when judging greatness . On their best nights , i don't think Lewis ever looked better than Bowe.

 

You can't define greatness by what fighters did on one night. Otherwise Douglas is up there with Ali and Louis. Greatness has to come from consistency.

And with respect, you yourself appear to question Bowe's mental capacity in the same sentence where you assert boxing is 99% mental. Surely by that criterion, and your own admission that Bowe was lacking in that department, you yourself cannot make a convincing argument that he was ATG material. Take 'could've's out of the thinking and we're left with one great showing and if we're bestowing ATG status with that as the lower limit, we're diluting the status as surely as the WBC, WBA, WBO and WTF have diluted the title 'champion of the world'.

PS Lewis wasn't KTFO by McCall. He was knocked down and got up. Like Bowe against Holyfield. And both were in a similar shape. It was Bowe's fortune that the ref and, more importantly, Holyfield gave him the chance to recover.

 

Had he been more disciplined he was definitely good enough to go down as a great. He very likely wouldn't have lost the rematch to Evander, it could have been Bowe who may have eventually beaten a comeback Tyson and even if he had lost to a peak Lewis in the late 90's he'd probably have a good enough resume and a long enough reign to be regarded as a great.

But coulda, woulda, shoulda doesn't cut it in the real world.

 

No , Douglas lost it all in his very next fight and never went on to do nothing. He's in Rahman's company , not Bowe's. What did Mike Tyson do on any one night that was so great and he is undeniably an ATG.

I noted on Bowe's commitment to the sport long term , something he did not have , but that doesn't take away from what he achieved from 89-96. And during that time he exhibited all tha hall marks of a great boxer.

He was out on his feet when he got up and could not stand still like Bowe when he stood up. Terrible , terrible post

 

It wasn't a terrible, terrible post. It just had a different opinion to yours. I am often finding my opinion to be different from yours. For example, you say skill set is the most relevant criteria when judging greatness. I say achievement trumps that. Otherwise, we are pitting Howard Davis Jr against Duran in mythical match ups to see who the best ever lightweight was.

You cite Bowe's achievements from 89-96 as evidence that he had all the hallmarks of a great fighter. A lot of fighters show all the hallmarks of a great fighter. But you have to achieve something with that to stand out from the crowd. And if you're judging a Bowe over his entire career of only 7 years, which takes in the formative years fighting journeymen after turning pro as well as the poor years of 94 and 96 (Donald, Mathis Jnr and Golota x 2), that short time span has to be packed with more noteworthy performances than Bowe managed.

 

yup