Lennox Lewis in Today's Heavyweight Division

What did Witherspoon do after losing to a Tyson leftover? Fighting one decent fighter in Ribalta? There is no basis for ranking Damiani instead of Mason either. Both beat Biggs and had an unbeaten streak.
The other list included Tubbs, who got stripped against Norris because of a positive test result.

 

Gary Mason fought in December 1990. Less than 4 months before he faced Lewis. If there was a retirement it was an extremely brief one. Where is the evidence that this retirement factored in the ratings? In 1989 he was only 10 and the division in 1991 was considerably stronger than it was a few years earlier.

 

I think the rationale for rating Witherspoon ahead of Mason is that he was a far superior fighter whose accomplishments dwarf Mason's. He may not have had any good wins recently but would subsequently beat Carl Williams which is a better win than anything Mason ever managed.

 

I said "Mason briefly retired". Do your own research.
Box Rec
"Mason suffered a detached retina in his fight with Everett Martin. After a short retirement he staged a comeback, which ended with a TKO loss to Lennox Lewis. Mason would come back once again, but after winning two fights in the U.S. he retired for good. His final record was 37-1; his sole loss being to Lewis."

 

If you look at his record there is a pretty big gap between the Everett Martin fight and his next fight (about 9 months) whereas the gap between the Lewis fight and his prior fight is much briefer, less than 4 months. It seems more likely he announced his retirement but had unretired by December. Fighters generally like long training camps for big fights and had he retired at the end of 1990 that would have left him very little time to prepare for Lewis unless he retired for only a week or so.

There's also the little problem that he was barely in the top 10 (number 10) in 1989 and had done little to enhance his reputation since while in the meantime Bowe, Lewis, Mercer, and McCall had all emerged.

 

In any case Lennox Lewis followed the Mason fight by spending the next 18+ months fighting guys far outside the rankings so I would guess they didn't feel he was yet ready to step up whereas following the Ruddock fight he faced Tucker and Bruno

Given what he did in his own era he might fight Luis Ortiz in the fall of 2016, then in 2017 take on Kubrat Pulev and Dillian Whytte before fighting Anthony Joshua in 2018.

 

Lewis beating Mason contributed to him achieving his own Ring ranking, in '91. Mason and Lewis would face less of a problem in earning and maintaining a rating in today's division.

 

You seem to be forgetting that Lewis would be the 2012 Olympic SHW Gold Medal winner, in your scenario. In a landscape, which isn't dominated by American Heavyweights, what makes you think Joshua beats him to the top spot and leaves Lewis waiting for two or three years?

 

McCall lost to Douglas inJuly89 ,and to Norris in Nov90. I can find no evidence of him being rated prior to the end of92.Lewis" emerged" on the back of his win over Mason.

 

I don't see how lack of domination by American heavyweights would affect how quickly Lewis is moved. He would still probably take the same amount of time to start stepping up in competition. I don't think he would be able to beat Joshua personally but he could be the silver medalist at SHW.

 

As for Lewis having an easier time getting a high ranking in todays division, I don't see much evidence to support such an idea.

In Lewis's day a lot of guys got title shots without having to prove themselves.

Look at Riddick Bowe's competition prior to fighting Holyfield. Tubbs is the only world class opponent (although Ring Magazine apparently didn't rank him in the top 10). Beyond that he fought a lot of fringe types like Cooper who lost whenever they stepped up.
He didn't have to face Witherspoon or Tucker or Ruddock or other highly regarded guys.

 

I think Lewis stops Joshua.

 

Who had Fury beat to deserve a title shot against Wlad?
Who had Wilder beat to get a title shot?
Who had Ortiz beat?
Duhaupus?
Arreola?
Wach?
Sosnowski?
Stiverne?

 

Lennox in his prime would be the best fighter around by a good bit, he would have the most dominate jab in the game and an equally terryifing cross as wilder and skill level surpassing all. Lennox would be the undisputed champ in this era as well.

 

Sosnowski, Duhaupas, and Stiverne never challenged for the lineal title. I don't see how any of them are relevant.

When Bowe, Foreman, and Holmes challenged Holyfield he was the consensus champion.