If Vitali Klitschko...

To be fair about it, Lewis was getting through his defense to cause those cuts, so he wasn't dominating Lewis to the point of Lewis being ineffective.


But it can be argued that the first, big cut under the eye was caused by a glancing blow. So that is more of a misfortune than a lack of defense.........but you can argue that till you are blue in the face.......


But it was a great and closely matched fight and Vitali was holding his own with the great Lewis, and even leading on the cards. So regardless of what some say, Vitali was all Lewis could handle. I don't buy the excuses of Lewis being out of shape and unmotiveated. That holds zero water, at least with me. He was a pro fighter training for a pro fight, so his conditioning was what HE made it.

Close fight that should have been rematched, but Lewis wisely decided to bow out, and not risk it.

 

Are you out of your mind, the best heavyweight in history?? You obviously seem to be a big vitali fan.He was pretty dominant in his prime but that was against low caliber opposition. His best names on the record are Bubba Johnson and Sanders.

Against the only two bigger name fighters, he lost. I agree with you that the Byrd defeat was not a real defeat and should not count for much.

However the Lewis defeat was real as the cuts were caused by punches and that was against and out of shape past his prime Lewis. He gets way too much credit for that fight.

Remember Mercer was able to give a younger Lewis version a tough fight too. Anyway I am not even convinced he could have beaten the likes of Mercer, Moorer, Morrison, Ruddock let alone a prime Holyfield, Bowe, Tyson, Lewis, Holmes...

 

not the best....but he could have found his way into the top 10. he had size, power, chin, heart, underrated skill and killer instinct just not the physical health of his brother. quite a shame

 

Head to Head ?

Prime and healthy ?


I would favour Ali and Lennox over Vitali, and possibly Big George.

I would favour Vitali over all the rest.


However, based on his resume, the quality of his opponents and all the other intangibles, he's not in my top 10 ATG Heavywts.

And at this point, he's unlikely to get there.


So to answer your question, NO.

 

his level of competion was HORENNDOUS , maybe not his fault...but he never fought anyone that was dangerous...out of 38 or so fight...maybe kirk johson was dangerous besides lewis.....look at his record...
in his 25th fight he fought cruiserweight herbie hide who he towered over....
and its a stretch to say beating danny williams and corrie sanders is on a path to greatness.... look at his record, 3 maybe 4 names in 8-9 years.....

 

he is in my head to head top 5. nobody would have had an easy victory over vitali. as for morrison and ruddock beating vitali .

 

As iceman71 pointed out, his resume is just ass. All the way around.

How anyone can be put on such a pedestal by doing absolutely nothing is beyond me. The only thing I can see that matters is that it is indicative of how far boxing has sunk. That a guy with such a **** resume (not alone in this era) can be regarded based simply on H2H measures tells me that fans only care about theorycrafting, not seeing the real deal.

 

Lennox would have beaten Klitschko, regardless of the cut. He was getting through obviously.

 

To all the people who complain about posters like myself who are fed up to the back teeth with the rabid Vitali-love and can't understand why we feel the need to post negative statements in the Vitali jizzfest threads, this is a case-in-point.

Basically the thread poster is saying "ignoring his losses, is he the bestest-estest fighter ever in the world ever?"


You can play this bull**** game with any fighter:

- If Audley Harrison was aggressive, had a chin, more power and more talent, would he be an ATG?

- If Butterbean weighed 230lbs, had better skill and never lost, would he be a champion?


It's ****ing pathetic.

:roll:

 

He would have gone down as the best Klitschko....
But as of right now, he has to play #2 to baby Bro.

 

Thats different, your changing those guys skills and body types atsch Not even a close comparison :deal

 

By ignoring Vitali's injuries, aren't we changing his body type?