Lewis thinks...

I disgree the handspeed and reflexes he had between 84-89 was matched by no other heavyweigh. he was as fast as a middleweight

 

Lewis always thinks too much thats his problem

 

Hard to say. Lewis would certainly try manhandling Tyson and he far stronger than Tyson, who have minimal inside fighting skills so I think Lewis WOULD manhandle Tyson if they met in their primes. Tyson was a middle range fighter, and in close, Lewis would definately lean on him, elbow him and use his upper cut against him. This is pretty much assured.

 

Van, I'm an educator by profession - a big part of learning is repetition!

 

Lewis of 95-98 vs Tyson of 87-89

I think Prime Tyson would do it to him.

Ray Mercer gave Lewis some difficulty during Lewis's prime, and Tyson was a better operater than Mercer.

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Not much difficulty? Lewis is smart enough to know that Tyson wants to get inside that reach and fight at mid-range. It's the only range he can fight at and get his punches off at. Lewis is smart enough to know that he's over-matched at mid-range against a guy with greater handspeed who puts combinations together better.

So he'd do his absolute best to keep it at distance or inside. On the outside, he knows he has a good enough jab in terms of accuracy and force to keep Tyson off him, keep his distance and look to set up the right-hand behind it. Crucially, Lewis has a good sense of timing and I don't think he would struggle that much to time Tyson's head movement. Crucially aswell, he is quicker of foot & more mobile than often given credit for.

He's got the advantage on the inside aswell. I think his inside game is better than Tyson's, who was really more suited to mid-range. Lewis is clever enough to use his size against Tyson to impose his physical strength on him and take away the leverage on his shots on the inside.

 

I personally dont think anyone except Ali could have dealt with Tysons quickness and ferocity.
I think Lewis is one of the few who had a chance with a Prime Tyson, but I do think Tyson knocks him out.
Lewis was a special fighter though, make no mistake about that.

 

I would say the Lewis of the first Holyfield fight was his absolute peak performance, in my opinion, versus probably an '87 Iron Mike.

 

+1

 

Very good analysis. This is my take on it as well.

 

I dont think Lewis's jab would keep Tyson at distance, however his right uppercut was good enough, and that is one of the punches Tyson was the most suspect to.

Check out round 1 of their fight.

Tyson did the better jabbing, and slipped Lewis's jab easily enough.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md7Z3OeYo0E[/ame]

LL's jab wasnt that effective in the early rounds, it was the counter uppercut that was the the best weapon LL had.

A Prime Tyson would deal with them uppercuts.

 

Prime Tyson is a mythical creature who appeared once or twice. He appeared when Tyson won his title from Berbick, interestingly he disappeared again for his next fight with Smith (Prime Tyson would have knocked old washed up Smith out in one round). He appeared again a couple of years later for the fights with Spinks and Bruno but then disappeared never to be seen again when Tyson met Douglas who coincidently wasnt scared of him. It would really have been interesting to see how prime Tyson would have done against a foe who wasnt intimidated... I guess we'll never know...

 

And? There's more to boxing than having great genetics and being a good athlete. Sure he was good technically aswell, but mentally he was weak and he still had flaws in his game.

And regardless, yes, they are matched. Watch Ali versus Ernie Terrell or Cleveland Williams. He more than matches him for handspeed [so would a prime Floyd Patterson aswell, but that's irrelevant as he wouldn't beat Tyson].

No swarming heavyweight would ever beat Foreman. Even Cus D'Amato admitted that much. Tyson tries to press a guy with his size, strength and power and he gets beat down in a matter of minutes.

Holyfield in my opinion also had the style to always beat Tyson. He wasn't exactly slow himself, was very durable, hit hard enough to hurt Tyson and discourage him and had an array of technical skill to compliment his rought tactics, which pyschologically would have affected any version of Mike, be it pre or post-prison [as we saw].

I'm undecided on Liston, who had a very heavy jab that could back Mike up, physical strength, big one-punch knockout power in either hand and again good technical skills. He was hittable like Holyfield but again durable. The only reason I'm undecided is because of the disparity in speed and I'm not sure if Liston could really take the fight to Tyson.

 

And Ali got dropped and badly hurt by 185lb Henry Cooper.

I'm sure if you had been talking about boxing in the early 60's you'd be calling Ali (Clay) a glass jawed joke.

Lewis' two losses are the only times he was down in 44 fight.

 

A few points I'd like to make.

01. That wasn't a prime Lewis either.
02. He didn't jab not nearly enough, and he didn't jab with any authority or conviction. He never jabbed to keep Tyson off him, he nonchalantly threw it out there looking to merely judge the distance to throw power punches.
03. He wasn't composed enough in that first round or cautious enough, as I believed he would have been faced with a prime Tyson. He was sloppy and never did any clean work in that round because of that.
04. I know we aren't talking about a prime version of either, but see how at mid-range he was easily able to close the distance and clinch Mike everytime and lean his wait in there?
05. As for the uppercuts, a prime Lewis had very good uppercuts. Mike's peekaboo style was susceptible to uppercuts and he was hit by them [noticeable against Douglas].