Lennox Lewis VS Joe Louis

i'm with you there, at least with the troll hunting. over the years, it seems to ebb and flow how many and how bad they are. i guess a few months ago we got an influx from another forum and a couple have lingered

 

No doubt technique, timing and placement can make up for lack of brute strength/raw power/whatever it is that you want to call that quality that naturally larger men tend to have in greater abundance than the small fry, but we're talking about more than just minor weight differences here. Billy Conn weighed in the 160s when he stunned and staggered Louis. That's over fifty pounds difference from the likes of Golota, Mercer, Bruno, Briggs and so on. And these weren't wild swinging oafs; many of these men were very well schooled and more than capable of getting the most out of their bodies when delivering power shots.

The same can't be said of Louis's larger opponents, with the possible exception of Buddy Baer. Galento and Max alone are pretty much the very antithesis of textbook punching, and Simon and Mauriello simply don't impress on film. The skilled technicians are almost all under two hundred pounds, and in some cases considerably below that. That's too much a gulf in size to make up for the possible advantages in speed, timing, technique etc.

So do I. There was an alternate video of Foreman Frazier bobbing around a few weeks back that gave me a very different perspective on the fight, and led me to question a lot of what I thought I knew about many of the more old school fights. We don't realise how lucky we are nowadays, being able to examine a fight from multiple different angles in crispest HD, and therefore miss nothing in the exchanges.

Ultimately though no such alternate footage exists of Louis to my knowledge, so we will have to draw our conclusions from the same sources as everybody else.

What I've gleaned from that is that Louis did take some hard shots, but not nearly as hard as some of the ones Lewis successfully absorbed. Maybe my opinion will change given the emergence of new video footage, but that's what I see from what's currently available.

I more or less agree with this, providing it's not limited to one or two fights but applied across a fighter's whole career. Especially in the heavyweight division, where anyone can drop anyone on any given day, it's simply not fair to judge a fighter's toughness on lone aberrations, whilst ignoring the vast body of evidence to the contrary.

I also think the "who" in the first statement has to be determined as much as possible outside the realms of resume, career achievements and public standing, and simply on how hard they can hit (determining that, of course, is a task in itself). Reason I say that is that I think it's very easy to confuse the issue here and start drawing erroneous conclusions as a result.

Sure, Rahman couldn't polish Schmeling's bootstraps from a career POV, but there's no doubt in my mind that he hit a lot harder. It's that last part that people need to focus on when assessing durability, durability and nothing more.

Yes, I know they are, and I'm only focussing on the latter one at the moment.

 

When it comes to the old-timers (pre 1960's), all bets are off. Imo, boxing was a different game back then. Modern fighters (especially champions) are a different breed today in general; they're bigger, they hit harder, they're quicker, they're better conditioned, they're all around better athletes. However, the one trait that the old-timer greats often have over modern fighters is "Heart". That being said, imo, Joe Louis is one of the ATGs that MIGHT be able to transcend his time period to the modern era. As a pure boxer-puncher Louis destroys Lennox, but my concern is the size difference coupled with the "Modern Era" advantage that Lennox would have. Lennox isn't great imo, but he's definitely better than Buddy Baer and Primo Carnera. Pre-war Joe definitely has a chance, but it would be brutal to say the least. All things considered, i'm gonna pick the Brown Bomber 6 out of 10 times.

 

Can't agree with that.

 

You cant agree that old school fighters who could brawl at a high pace over 15 rounders were better conditioned? The standard of conditioning today is a complete joke.....How people take you seriously is beyond me.

 

I'm not sure if you're disagreeing with me on all points or just 'stamina'? I'll agree that a prime Louis could hold his own in the stamina department when compared to Lennox; but Louis is a rare exception. Modern fighters have access to better technology and science than fighters of the 30's. Not to mention they have the advantage of history hindsight to better themselves. Sports change with time, it's inevitable. I'll admit that Boxing is one of those few sports that have long-lasting consistency based on the nature of the game, but the Joe Louis of his prime/time would barely qualify as a heavyweight today. Joe Louis is one of my favs, and he's definitely an ATG, and for as much as i think Lewis is over-rated i just don't see Joe dominating him. For example, do you think Alex Hannum, Ty Cobb, or Gordie Howe would be as good today as they were when they played? No. Times change.

 

Jim Jeffries was a much better athlete than Sam Peter.

Fact.

 

About the bigger guys have to be slower point again:
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That kid is 255 pounds and he unloads an 8 punch combination Ray Leonard would be proud of.

I don't think Lewis was slower than Louis.

 

I'm speaking in generalities. On the average. There are rare exceptions of course, and perhaps Jim Jeffries qualifies as such, it's debatable; but for the most part, modern athletes are superior to their "old-time" counterparts.

 

I was responding to the bold. All that you wrote above is true in a sense, but having access to something and actually using it are two different things. All the modern nutrition and technological advances in the world aren't going to get a fatass to get up and do his morning run, or take that bargain bucket out of his pudgy paws.

 

Fact is you're basing this on how may fights.. 23?

I can't think of a single fighter who fought less and gets more credit for his accomplishments than Jeffries does.

 

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Gotta disagree with you here, bro. Louis's handspeed was markedly faster than Lewis's, especially in combination. Lewis's hands weren't slow, though, and his feet made up for his sometimes sluggish upper body movement.