Lennox Lewis lost to 2 journeyman. Should he be stripped of his ATG status

It’s hard to conquer the HW division longterm for that reason. The size of the fighters presents opportunities for lower level fighters to sometimes upset the champion. Sorta why I hold Wlad Klitschkos reign in high value. The current guys now show you why it’s so hard to have a 5 year run as the champion let alone a whole decade.

 

It does nothing to his ATG status. If anything it makes it stronger because he avenged those losses like a madman with something to prove.

The mans record is near flawless and is very much the Mayweather of the heavyweight division. That is to say...Lewis won every fight he was in and even with the two losses, he avenged them. Beat Holyfield (twice), Golata, likely would've beaten Bowe had they fought, McCall, Rahman, Mercer, Tua, Briggs, Tyson (despite being a shell of himself), etc. Most notably he took on Vitali while almost being a shell of himself, yet made a comeback mid-fight, turned the tables and got a stoppage. He went out on top which is something that almost never happens for any boxer regardless of weight division.

To do what he did against what is arguably the most stacked heavyweight era in history (many of whom were on steroids) is something few could ever do outside of Ali or Foreman.

He is very definition of an All Time Great.

 

Magnificent fighter.

The OP might be a crack ***** though.

 

Thread fail.

 

And he got coldcocked by both Hassim Rahman and Oliver McCall. The China Chin Syndrome.

 

No.

 

Lennox Lewis is far more than just ''good ''.He is an all-time great.He clearly belongs
in the top 5 heavyweight-champions of all time.
Only the peak Muhammad Ali ( 1964-67 ) would be favoured to beat a prime Lewis.
To deprive Lewis of his ATG status because of two mishaps would be plain daft.

 

No no, on here it doesn't matter if an old fighter lost to lesser opponents they're still great, but when a current fighter loses any type of fight they suddenly a bum or overrated

The nostalgia on this board is laughable

 

Wlad lost to Brewster and Sanders, but rebounded to be a HOF heavyweight. So yeah, you have to look at the whole picture. Losses are bumps on the road. If you let those losses define you, and not rebound, that is different.

 

In reality, you could say the same about Tommy Hearns, losing twice to Barkley in that thought process, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

 

You seem like a fairly low IQ type of guy. I’ll ask the esteemed members of this forum to go easy on you.

 

Holmes also lost to the "journeyman" who knocked out Lewis.

 

Look at the ATGs that been knocked out by lesser fighters, You’ll be shocked when you start looking at the names.

 

You don't see Wilder losing to McCall? I can't see Wilder (or anyone) stopping McCall, so that would mean Wilder has to outbox him. I actually like McCall's chances at outboxing Wilder, and probably shattering his confidence forever. Fury messed him up, but at least Fury did drop when Wilder landed his bombs. What happens when McCall just walks through a few of them like they were jabs?

 

In Lewis's defense, in both cases, the stoppages could easily have not been stoppages. Many refs would have let him continue on. Maybe he would have recovered; maybe he wouldn't have. But he really didn't look very bad off with either one.

With those refs, Shavers would have stopped Holmes, Wilder would have stopped Fury, Lyle would have stopped Foreman, Cooper would have stopped Ali, etc.