Lennox Lewis, Greatest Heavyweight of all time

No. He was one-shotted by two mediocre heavyweights.

 

You have a point.

Whilst I have always agreed that Oliver McCall was never an opponent who Lewis should have lost to, his status as a "bum" is totally inaccurate and not to mention over stated.. The guy was one of the most durable heavyweights of all time. He had punching power that was still above average even for the 90's. In a different era, that power might have carried even more weight when sized to a smaller generation of heavys. He stood 6'2" and weighed 230 lbs. He had the experience of having been in the ring with Tony Tucker, Fancesco Damiani, Orlin Norris, Bruce Seldon, Buster Douglas, Mike Hunter, and Jesse Ferguson, as well as having sparred with Tyson for years. He also had Steward in his corner. His record of 24-5-0-17 wasn't pretty, but in Joe Louis or Jack Dempsey's era that would have been considered quite impressive, given that in those days, a man could lose 20 fights in a career and still get a title shot.

 

You don't rank Tyson, Dempsey, Walcott, Charles, Jack Johnson in your top 10?

And be fair he's also only 1 of 2 top 20 HWs to have never lost on points, well add the Klits onto that too when they retire. His ranked wins to loss ratio is also surely only surpassed by the unbeaten Marciano who beat less ranked opponents.

 

Oh absolutely...not! As reasons mentioned earlier i can't seem to rank him in the Top 5. On my list he currently stands at #7, right below Tyson and above Foreman. Maybe that's too low, maybe not.

 

Food for Thought:

From 92-04 Chris Byrd and Lennox Lewis went 6-0-1 and 7-0-1 against 6 common opponents.

Phil Jackson: UD, TKO
Lionel Butler: TKO, TKO
Levi Billups: UD, UD
Vitali Klitschko TKO, TKO
David Tua UD, UD,
Evander Holyfield UD, DRAW/UD
Andrew Golota DRAW, TKO

During this time both men lost twice. Byrd to Ike and Wlad, Lewis to McCall and Rahman.

And I think Byrd's scalp over McCline is better than Lewis' scalps over Grant and Briggs for obvious reasons:

[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8K8NKhoWeo[/url]


[url]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR_n7qKtO-s[/url]


Not saying Byrd is as great as Lewis, he wasn't, but I don't think the greatest Heavyweight of all time would let a guy match a lot of his better wins for so long without eventually putting him in his place.

 

He is a hard man to beat on points. You can knock him the **** out, though.

 

Ali ,Homes and Foreman flat out beat him... Foreman by KO. Ali and Holmes give him a boxing clinic...

 

We can not overlook that fact that Jack Johnson was KO'd in a single punch by a middling light heavyweight and that Dempsey was KO'd in a single punch by a journeyman and that Joe Louis was beaten down emphatically by an overthehill euro 190 pounder…

Again, Lewis faced the greatest gauntlet of legit sized modern power punchers any heavy champ has ever faced. And he beat every man he faced. Fact.

It's a new world. Alight from your velocipede.

 

H2H, no one consistently beats Lewis, therefore it is reasonable to claim he COULD be # 1.

Ali, Holmes, and Foreman are tailor made for Lennox, too big, too strong, too skillful, and hits too hard for any of them. Yanks and Lewis haters will cling on to the fact that he got nailed by a guy who shut his eyes and threw a good shot, and another idiot who Lennox wrongly thought wasn't worth training for, but conveniently forget the contempt, and ridicule he showed both in subsequent rematches.

 

Who besides Lewis have McCall or Rahman ever ko'ed that elevates them to big punchers ?

Oleg, Sanders or Akinwande dont rate really high in my book as far as punch resistance goes, lol, Rahman was extremely chinney too.

 

Obvious Lewis apologist.....................

In your land of dreams Holmes, Ali or Foreman never land but big bad Lemmie will exclusively..........the fact remains that he fought scared for twelve against a severely declined Oldiefield who was so done that he went life and death with the Huggybear.....and then fought another twelve supercautious in the rematch.......a guy who in his prime was almost parked in his first outing against Bowe and took a nap in the third encounter.

Ali and Holmes will jab him to death.........

His best chance is against Foreman but if journey man Rahman can axe him with one slow ass telegraphed right then Foreman will without doubt land too..........and that all what it will take, lol, the proof is in the pudding, the ONLY Heavyweight champ ever laid out TWICE by ham and eggers with one shot.

As far as I know he is the ONLY champ in ANY weightclass who wears that rare distinction.

 

It is an Endless Mobius strip of speculation based upon different critera, judgement, & unknowable factors like speculation upon strength of error. You can draw Venn Diagramms onto infinity, but differing premises & judgments render it all speculative.

Every HW great has MULTIPLE factors that could disqualify him from the best ever. Consider era/opponents, size & skills like speed, power, & notable boxing deficiencies, including against certain styles... their actual records, including length of dominance & success at peak...There is NOBODY we can argue does not have multiple flaws potentially disqualifying them as Best Ever.

Now you could judge Lennox best ever, at least if you find the '90's & modern size/power made a clearly superior boxer & heavily weight peak head to head-where presumably a traning/chin lapse is quite unlikely. I have him likely top 5 considering both legacy & head to head, certainly not #1.

Look, if he did not take a dive against the only undefeated HW in his prime, maybe this man could have been the GOAT. [url]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlDYeKXnJVs[/url]

 

Note the subjective tags "legit sized modern. "

I think Ali faced the greatest number of quality punchers period. Lewis faced no more than Louis, Holyfield, Holmes..etc.

 

Lewis hit too hard for Ali ,who was never legitimately stopped ? That`s priceless !! Even as Ali got old, losing his skills and flatfooted so he took the brunt of bombs thrown his way he was NEVER stopped !He was WAY faster than Lewis,not even in the same league... He would get into Lewis head AND give him a boxing lesson. How do you think Lewis beats Ali ? By being the first to KO Ali, which was never done ? Or Lewis using his speedy combinations (laugh) and outpoint him over 15 rds ? How does Lewis have superior skills ??? Speed ? Footwork ? Jab ? chin ????? punching in combination ? Conditioning ?? Yes, back in the day the real champs went 15 hard rds .Holmes was a FAR better boxer than Lewis and had much better lateral movement and footwork as well. Isn`t almost laughable to think of Lewis trying to compete (jab for jab) with the best jab the heavyweight division has ever seen ? Again over 15 rds, Holmes had incredible ring savvy and if he hits the deck at some point, he climbs off it to win...I find it quite amusing that people try to `bulid` up Rahman and McCall`s punching power as reason to justify it was ok that Lewis was KO`d by both...I agree with you on one thing. Lewis superb fight against McCall in the rematch (rememeber ? McCall was fresh out of detox and in the midst of a nervous breakdown even crying) was a performance for the ages...

 

And people seem to get aroused at Lewis `size` ... 6` 5`` 240... Ali,Holmes and Foreman all stood 6` 3``.The weights not really significant because Ali and Holmes counted on their speed where as Lewis with his bulk would actually find it a detriment against Ali and Holmes. And Big George was a physically big and naturally strong heavyweight so I don`t see Lewis bullying him around either. Also people want me to believe that even though Rahman and McCall ( who are on no one`s all time great punchers lists) big hitting George Foreman can`t turn the trick ??????? Early on in the fight, when Foreman comes out hard and looking to send Lewis a message. He would land his brand of TNT and he`d be seeing stars alright, form a comfy spot on the canvas !