Lennox Lewis, Greatest Heavyweight of all time

Mason, Golota, and Grant being touted as elite heavyweight power punchers is also a bit much.

I would rank Oleg over Briggs and Morrison, Oleg at least can claim to have KOed live contenders in Jefferson, Rahman x2..

 

So ignoring the moronic drivel you have spewed out, your criticism seems to be that Lewis couldn't knock out Holyfield. Hmm, perhaps he would have if he'd known the Yanks were going to put one of their cheating scumbag judges at ring side.

By the way who ever KO'd a prime Holyfield? Oh yes the gutless bum who threw his belt away, rather than fight Lennox.

Keep dreaming.

 

Funny you should mention that. See my post regarding Chris Byrd.

 

Agreed ! Who ever mentions Mason,Golota and Grant amongst great punchers anyway ??

 

Just a bizarre distortion to give Lewis a break for getting knocked out.

Frankly, I'll excuse him of the McCall loss as he was a different fighter then.

The Rahman loss is inexcusable though as it occured during the middle of his defining Championship reign, and Rahman simply isn't that dangerous of a fighter. Despite his bulk and physical power he wasn't exactly Earnie Shavers. The fragile Oleg KOed him twice, several contenders and fringe fighters went the distance against him without getting dropped or put on ***** street. Outside of Lewis, Meehan and Sanders were stopped on thier feet..Meehan took something like 20unanswered punches when his corner stopped it!

 

Great post Mongoose !

 

I agree with many of your points, but in fairness to Lewis he was 35 years old for the first Rahman fight and 36 for the rematch. He was also starting to show up at career high weights. Granted he won the second fight, but I think the light was starting to flicker.

 

This is revisionism and it shows you didn't either follow boxing back then or are simply biased. As seem to ignore 'what actually happened in Byrd fights' and how people rated him. No one was calling for Lennox-Byrd when Lennox was champ, not even Don King. On the contary Don King was paying Lewis to vacate belts and not fight his mandatories.

Byrd fought past it opponents and got gifts in many of his bouts. Many thought Golota beat him, the Oquendo fight was armed robbery, the McCline fight was close and McCline was terrible. Holyfield and Vitali both injured their shoulders. The Tua win is his best performance and he was on the ropes for much of that.

Ofcourse you ignore many of Lennox's best wins, I suppose that suits your agenda.

Meanwhile Lennox was busying unifying all the belts, before beating the HBO hypemachine in Grant and then fighting a top 10 ATG HW in Tyson for a massive payday. No one in 2002 was complaining about Lennox facing Tyson instead of Byrd And no one rated Byrd above Vitali when semi retired Lennox fought Vitali, before or after.

 

That fight was at high altitude too. Rahman flew in early to adjust, where as Lennox arrogantly thought he could fly in late. He blatantly thought he'd walk it without preparing properly.

 

PP, I always look forward to and respect your opinion... Lewis was a damn good fighter, no doubt about that... And he worked hard at fighting all the top contenders when he was on top, ducking no one. For what it`s worth, he would have stopped Byrd as well. I have big respect for Byrd and what he did,but Lewis would be too much everything for Byrd... Styles make fights, I just feel that Holmes and Ali had the speed, savvy and heart to outbox and outpoint Lewis. And stylewise, I think Foreman with his bludgeoning power has a shot at getting to Lewis chin. Granted he has to do it in less than 6, after that It`s Lewis coming on. Lewis is def right up near the top, just nor resting comfortably at the top,IMO...

 

Like every heavyweight champion in history, a critic can always find something to pick at. But the man did more than enough to earn my respect. There were a lot of solid contenders on that list and plenty of emphatic wins. He also showed heart, regrouped and came back from bad losses to score big victories, changed his style at a somewhat late age and became better for it. He medaled in two Olympics. He began fighting quality opponents very early in his prospect days. For me he's the complete package.. While its true he lost to two lesser men, he beat plenty of others who were better than those guys and even avenged the only losses he had. I can't rate him at #1. But he easily hits top 5 for me. At the moment I have Ali at #1, Louis at #2, Marciano at #3, and leave the #4 and #5 spots as being interchangeable between Lewis and Holmes. Others have very different lists, but this one works fine for me.

 

I don't think any of the the Great Champions were ever at their absolute best in defeat. Though I think the biggest problem with the first Rahman fight was a strategic one as Steward explained. Rahman can't counter so you have to stay aggressive and beat him back. Lewis tried to treat Rahman like he was Tua.

Though the point stands that Rahman was not as dangerous as being made out to be. Lewis even at less than 100% should not have lost the title to such an opponent, especially if you are going to claim he is the GOAT.

 

I stopped readiing after this accusation. Nowhere to go from there.

 

Well most of us ( including myself ) claim that Muhammad Ali is the GOAT, yet he lost to Leon Spinks and was gifted a few decisions while being roughly the same age that Lewis was when he lost to Rahman. And if we're honest, Rahman was more dangerous than a 7 fight Leon, though you may speculate differently.. I agree with what your saying and don't rate Lewis as the GOAT but I just wanted to point that out to you.

 

That's how I see it as well.