If this forum were around in 2000-2001 everyone would Lewis after his KO loss to Rahman

Zbigniew Pietrzykowski was a 4-time European champion and is considered the best Polish boxer in the history of Polish boxing. Check how many Olympic gold medals Poland had in boxing. Pietrzykowski is a three-time Olympic medalist, in 1956 he lost to the legendary Laszlo Papp (whom he later knocked out in the match) but he was still too inexperienced. in 1960 he was in top form and was the main favorite for gold. In 1988, Bowe was a 21-year-old who had fought two categories lower three years earlier and who had no successes in his career. I have no idea what you base your opinion that he was more talented than Foreman and Frazier. The fact that Riddick later became world champion does not matter at all - in 1988 he was just a talented amateur without success. If for you defeating Bowe at this time is a great success for Lewis because he won against the future ATG, then the fact that Jorge Lewis Gonzales won against two ATG must be an even greater success, right? does your logic work in such a way that you mention defeating Bowe in the amateurs as a great success for Lewis, which even Ali does not have because Ali never won against the future ATG and meanwhile you have an example of a not the best boxer from Cuba who won against two ATGs - Lewis and Bowe!! Tyrell Biggs also won against Lewis according to your logic they should be higher than Ali who won against Pietrzykowski. Completely twisted logic that perfectly shows the way of thinking of Lewis' fans. It doesn't matter that Bowe was not close to ATG in 1988 and lost even to not the best boxer Cuba, what matters is that Lennox defeated him so it must be considered that this is a greater achievement than Ali, although realistically and sportingly it is not even close. but a simple fan believes in such nonsense and that is the secret of Lewis.

 

My logic is Lewis beat an all-time great heavyweight in his last Olympic fight, an all-time great heavyweight in his last pro fight, and he beat everyone in between.

Beating Poland's best light heavyweight in 1960 (who didn't win a world amateur or Olympic gold) .... doesn't really factor into anything when it comes to ranking all-time great heavyweights.

Because Pietrzykowski wasn't a Hall of Fame heavyweight. He wasn't even the best amateur light heavyweight in the world. Hell, Ali wasn't even considered the best heavyweight on the US team.

Percy Price and Ali boxed at Fort Dix to determine who would be the US heavyweight representative. After Price knocked Clay around, they had Ali drop down in weight and compete at 175. Because if Ali couldn't beat Price, they didn't think Ali could've beaten the best heavyweight in the WORLD at the time, Franco De Piccoli (who actually won gold).

They thought Ali's chances were better against Pietrzykowski, because he was smaller and not as good as the Italian. (Which proved correct, because Ali barely got past the Pole, and De Piccoli won gold.)

Riddick Bowe WAS an all-time great heavyweight and that's who Lewis had to face off against to win the Gold. And Bowe won just as many Olympic silver medals and Pietrzykowski did, but did it at Super Heavyweight, not light heavyweight.

And my advice is to watch more than one Jorge Luis Gonzalez fight. Like, let's say, the one that happened the very next week, when Lewis won. Because you're clinging WAY TO HARD to an amateur fight that happened a year before the Olympics as the basis to run down Lennox Lewis' entire Hall of Fame career ... that continued on for another 17 years and was filled with many great wins.

Your argument sounds like a guy who saw a couple fights and then made broad generalizations.

Lennox Lewis was great. Arguably the best heavyweight ever, when all is said and done.

 

If your logic is that you claim that Lewis, by defeating Riddick Bowe in amateur boxing, achieved more than Ali, because Bowe is a future ATG and not Ali's rival, it is logical that Jorge Gonzales, by defeating two future ATGs, achieved even more, right? According to your logic, Lewis is bigger than Ali because he has one HoF (Bowe) and Gonzales is bigger than Lewis because he has two (Lewis and Bowe), yes or no? You didn't write anything else, my friend if I missed something, please correct me. Interestingly, Henry Tillman, Tyrell Biggs, Buster Mathis also turned out to be better than Ali in this respect, of course according to your logic, but Gonzales is the best, although he was not even the best Cubans, as you yourself stated. It's a pity that the Cubans couldn't take part in the Lewis tournament since their not-so-good boxer defeated two Olympic finalists from Seoul and Savon also defeated Mercer without any problems, in case you didn't know. I think you are a typical Lewis fan who sees a nice book with a nice cover but doesn't want to read it carefully. How is it that 20 years ago, really serious people were arguing about whether Lewis was in the top 10 HW or out of it when he retired, and today they are arguing whether he is in the top 5 HW even though he hasn't fought a single fight since then. The less you remember Lewis's career, the better it seems, and the more you look into it, the weaker it becomes.

 

My logic is Lewis beat an all-time great heavyweight in his last Olympic fight, an all-time great heavyweight in his last pro fight, and he beat everyone in between.

It's the WHOLE THING.

He left the amateurs winning the top prize against an all-time great heavyweight, he left the pros retaining the top prize against an all-time great heavyweight, and he beat everyone who stepped in the ring with him in between ... and those fighters included many great, even all-time great heavyweights.

It's not that hard to grasp.

That is better than beating the best Polish LIGHT heavyweight in your last amateur fight, losing to not a great champ in a rundown ballpark in your last fight, not beating everyone in between, and suffering the effects of all your fights for the rest of your life. Clearly.

It's the whole thing. Last amateur fight to last pro fight, and everything in between.

 

The Law of Jorge Luis Gonzalez: (1) Any win in the ams can be reduced to being worse than beating Jorge Luis Gonzalez and (2) any accomplished am who turns pro and has an abbreviated pro career (i.e. Miroschnichenko, Dychko, Jalolov, Boytsov) must be assumed to be a worse head to head pro than Jorge Luis Gonzalez.

Coauthored by @Jakub79 and @Totentanz.

 

that's right, I wrote the same thing, according to you, Lewis defeated Bowe, who was the future ATG, so he is better than Ali, who defeated Pietrzykowski, who didn't even fight professionally and was only a LHW. According to this logic, you have to put Gonzalez, who has defeated two ATGs, even higher, and put, for example, Buster Mathis and Tyrell Biggs on an equal footing with Lewis. I understand everything, you just confirm everything I write in threads about Lennox Lewis. Your rhetoric is very familiar to me.

 

Obviously guys should be rated on what they did in their primes. Otherwise every win Lewis has suddenly doesn't matter due to the awful losses his opponents suffered past-prime.

 

No. From the last amateur fight to the last pro fight and everything in between. I can't be any clearer. The WHOLE thing.

 

You can't be more clear when you write that Lewis defeated the future ATG Bowe, which even Ali didn't do because he won against Pietrzykowski, just as I can't be more clear that Jorge Gonzales achieved an even greater thing by defeating two such great players, i.e. Bowe and Lewis. What don't you understand about your own logic? Comparing to Ali, you wrote about Lewis' amateur fight, so which one are you talking about?

 

Realistically Riddick Bowe is not a great heavyweight and Vitali probably isn't either based on accomplishments. Bowe has no depth and Vitali has a terrible resume. Who did Vitali beat that you find so impressive? I don't think I'd favor anyone Vitali beat over Luis Ortiz

I didn't know anyone rated Bowe as an ATG

 

I have no idea what you're saying here. They're just words in no discernable order. I think we're done.

 

Realistically, they're both great heavyweights and Hall of Famers. But, don't let facts stand in the way.

Has everyone gone mental here?

 

That's setting an extremely low bar for greatness. Bowe ducked virtually every top fighter of his era. Hard to see how his ducking of everybody aside from Holyfield is in any way compatible with greatness. You don't become great via ducking everyone. His career is far more memorable for who he didn't fight than who he did fight.

If Bowe is great so are Douglas and Corrie Sanders

 

It's already been decided, dude. Their careers are over. They were World Heavyweight champions. They're Hall of Famers.

You can't do anything about it now. I didn't set the bar.

I'm going to go now. Nothing is happening here.

 

None of that has anything to do with greatness. Plenty of non-greats in the HOF and many non-great champions. If being in the HOF equated to greatness Gatti wouldn't be in. I think even Braddock is in the hof.