Suppose Lewis didnt duck John Ruiz and went on to defend his WBA title against his mandatory challenger? Ruiz at his peak huggness. The awkward tick tocking jab, righthand, grab Ruiz who gave Evander Holyfield fits. His excellent corner of experienced well mannered trainers. Who wins?
Ruiz gave a Shot Oldyfield who was 38/39 years old fits... seriously lefthook, the Peak Byrd who gave Vitali frustratingly elusive trouble would at least be a half decent match-up for a little while before Lewis brutally KO's him with holding & hitting, but this is just silly. John Ruiz can clinch very well, but Lennox can clinch even better with his tremendous physical strength, & do a lot more damage in the clinches with his brutal roughhouse tactics which make use of devastating power.
Stop making things up, Grant was rated as the next big thing by everyone back then, the WBA gave Lewis permision to fight Grant before Ruiz. King challenged the decision and paid Lewis to not fight Ruiz so he could promote Holyfield-Ruiz as a title fight. Ruiz obviously got his WBA ranking by bribery, he hadn't beaten a top30 contender at this stage of his career. LH31 has even completely dismissed Ruiz as a bum in the past but when it comes to Bowe/Lewis talk Ruiz is transformed to some super slick master boxer
it's ruiz so it'd be ugly. it'd be ugly right up until lewis' spectacular KO. and then Normie Stone storms the ring, calls Lewis a **** and demands a rematch