Joe Frazier '70 Vs Lennox Lewis '97

Okay, fair enough.

 

Sure, i'm not saying Frazier is easy to KO, but what i am saying is that every top opponent of his landed plenty of world rocking shots with ease early on. It's almost a certainty that Lewis would to. Whether Lewis punches harder than Foreman or not is rather subjective, but i think we can all agree that Lewis is a category, if not several, above Quarry, Bonavena and Ellis in terms of pure punching power.

I will give Mathis credit for being a very talented fighter who was pretty good despite being rather fat. And i won't call him a journeyman, he was a fringe contender at least, and i think he was ranked in Ring's top10 during a month or two, perhaps even going into the Frazier fight.

However, Lewis is several leagues above him not just in class but also in natural size. Lewis was a ripped 6'5 245lbs, Mathis a fat 6'3 245 lbs.

I don't doubt that Frazier can beat a bigger men, but the evidence isn't too overwhelming. And Lewis isn't just a big man, he's also very skilled, powerful and athletic.

How would you call Frazier's chin iron?
I'd be interested in hearing which other iron chinned fighters were knocked down 6 times in two rounds, knocked down twice by Bonavena, and by a journeyman Mike Bruce.

Again, i am one of the bigger Frazier supporters here, but to suggest he has an iron chin is stretching reality beyond any credible value.

Frazier only has one plan. Bob and weave, come forward, apply a lot of pressure, and take them out sooner or later. But that also means taking a shipload of punishment early on, hence the relatively short career.

 

Agree with you with regards to what happened in the fights and how they ended. Still, you have to admit that Frazier's right hand is often made absent by many on this forum and even you are guilty of that as well. I don't want to go searching through the data just to prove this point but an overwelming majority who post about Frazier disclude his right hand as anything significant, which is wrong.

He did have a better than decent right hand which rocked many of the fighters he faced who waited for his left hook. I have never, ever said Frazier was a "one armed fighter," but many including you have said so repeatedly. You're right about distributing the credit between Durham and Futch and yeah, Durham arguably did a whole lot more for Frazier career than Futch. Correct me if I'm wrong and I know that you'll add your expertise to this subject but I think Durham is more responsible for keeping Frazier more conventional as a boxer, throwing jabs and straight rights. It got him into trouble as an attacking style against Bonavena. Futch made Frazier bob and weave more, while Yank started him slipping. After the FOTC, Frazier did less slipping and a lot more bobbing and weaving. For the first minute of the George Foreman masacre, Frazier started slipping as opposed to bobbing and weaving and did OK until Mercante lost control of Foreman's grabbing and shoving.

I believe George Benton is more responsible for making Frazier use his right hand which he neglected against Foreman, using it better against Quarry and Bugner.

 

Okay, i was going overboard a bit; Frazier indeed is lighter on his feet (literally and figuratively).

Stick to the original question. What makes you say Frazier has an iron chin?

Let's just stop pretending and admit that the criteria "what iron chinned fighter did he knock out?" is a very silly one, by which Foreman, Tyson, Marciano et al would all be considered not so big punchers.

Well, i won't say Frazier is one-handed, but we have to be realistic: all of Frazier's significant damage was done by the left. His short straight right hand was good, but no more than that. His left hook was magnificent in its delivery, consistancy, fluidity and speed. But it was not a big one-punch KO hook and he had to be up very close with it. All of which works to Lewis' advantage.

I didn't know exactly how Benton helped Frazier, but nice to read that. One of the more under-rated trainers for sure.

Frazier himself said that one of the knockdowns against Bonavena weren't flash knockdowns, but that he was genuinely hurt.


And whether Lewis gets up 6 times against Foreman? Probably not, but Frazier's defence against a fighter like Foreman was garbage. Lewis would never got hit by those shots succesively while offering little in return. He's a very fast starter (see the fights against Golota, Ruddock, Botha, etc), much harder to hit than Frazier in general, more versatile and will tie Foreman up when hurt.

I'm not saying Frazier's chin is shakey; very few fighters can take the amount of slegdehammer shots he took from Foreman and i think it was more his lack of early defence rather than his chin which cost him the fight.

Having said that, his chin wasn't iron and quite frankly, you're the first one making that claim since i've visited these boards.


And yes, Rahman and McCall stopped Lewis, but both were incredible right hands (not left hooks), and both defeats were avenged in dominating fashion.

And what happened when Lewis fought other big punchers like Tua, Klitschko, Ruddock, Morrison, Bruno, Tyson (still good for a few rounds), Mason, Briggs and others?

bottomline: Lewis is much more proven against punchers than Frazier, and on the occasion that he did get stopped or troubled, it was the right hand that did it, not the left hook.

 

Iron, Granite, Sterling Silver or Stainless Steel call it what you like. The implication or assertation that Frazier couldn't take a punch is ridiculous. As for Lennox, I like him. I'm not trying to imply he is a Bum. Personaly the 2 KO loses on his record are not Earth shattering. Louis was KOd. Our Man Frazier was KOd. Foreman was KOd. Fighters get KOd sometimes even the great ones. It does and can however give one a glimpse into potential *****s in a fighters armour. Sorry for the confusion. I think my post was censored. Unbelievable. What do they got here? PC software?

 

Thanks Mac. Crazy Man.

 

Gentlemen.

I think this fight can be summed up in 2 sentences.

1) Neither fighter had what could be called an iron chin, though both had good chins with Frazier having the better recuperative ability. If hit with enough heavy punches either fighter can be stopped.

2) Lewis will hit Frazier much more often with his arsenal than Frazier will hit Lewis. Frazier's best punch, his short left hook, can be blocked by Lewis sticking out his right arm. It's the same tactic that Steward, who would be in Lewis's corner, devised for Tommy Hearns when he knocked out Pipino Cuevas, who also had a deadly left hook. Moreover, to get in range to land the left hook Frazier will have to eat Lewis's heavy artillery. Factor in Lewis's reach advantage and ring generalship and IMO Lewis will hit Frazier with heavy right hands and uppercuts more than Frazier will land left hooks.

Result = stoppage win for Lewis.

 

Well that seems a bit extreme. Either Frazier has an iron chin or he can't take a punch at all?

I've always thought of Frazier's chin as a good one, and his lack of defence/activity/style was the first cause in losing to Foreman, not his chin.


But i ask again: what makes you say Frazier has an iron chin and do you still stand by those words? You're sure going through a lot of trouble to support the unsupportable statement that only knocking out an iron chinned fighter shows that one is a big puncher. Why don't you just admit that that was a silly statement.