Lewis vs Briggs

briggs never revised his statement. vitali broke his face, so i can imagine that briggs had felt like vitali hits harder. :hey

 

fu

We. Need. Boxes

 

Two days ago (28th) was the 22nd anniversary of Lennox Lewis vs Shannon Briggs

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Love Lewis' response to this salvo. Stands there, hands down.... pauses and smiles... then drops him. Awesome bravado...

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I felt Lewis was out on his feet but then recovered well and closed the show.

 

Decided to watch it again in full. First time since the fight itself and first with the US commentary.

Thoughts:

Larry Merchant miserable in advance? Check.

I liked Big George's contribution. Didn't say a lot but added some knowledge and experience. No bitterness from him about the Briggs decision.

Nice to see the two guys coming out to a minimum of fuss. Quick ring walks and preamble into the action.

Lewis started horribly complacently, that was his biggest flaw. He knew he was better than the guy and didn't give him enough respect,

Watching the first couple of rounds I started to wonder if I'd underestimated Briggs. When he threw actual combinations he looked dangerous, far more so than the one two which was predictable.

Then Lewis gets into the zone and you see what a dangerous guy he was. Accuracy and power, Foreman identified the left hook as the shot and sure enough it starts to open Briggs up.

If you order a Cappucino, make it as strong as Frank was. Good assertive refereeing from the outset. No probs with the stoppage, even if that was more of a slip the right hand was zeroing in and Briggs was surely done.

So I came out with more respect for Briggs, a brave guy, not quite top level but better than I remembered. Lewis was a class apart but showed the same complacency that marred his efforts against McCall and Rahman.

Once he was in the fight though he looked a handful for any heavyweight.

 

And 22 years later, Briggs still shouting for a "shot".

 

great mic work in that clip, you can hear the punches, ref, & fighters really clearly.

 

Great fight

 

Shannon Briggs TKO'd himself with a left hook. What a way to go.

 

Briggs was one of those early rounds dangermen like Sanders and Hide who if you could weather the storm tended to wilt past the third round.

Huge puncher though, if you go by the stats, and game as anyone. Underrated win for Lewis.

 

Yes I think it was. I think in the UK at the time Briggs wasn't seen as a credible contender. You can hear Larry Merchant sneering at him in the build-up so I guess it was a widespread opinion. He'd only one loss on the record but he'd been hyped pretty strongly on the back of beating some very suspect opposition, maybe that was the source of the suspicion.

Looking back at his record as a whole though he was probably better than initially thought. Real power, maybe unfortunate to be boxing at a time when not one but two super heavyweight champions emerged.

That last time he came off the canvas had shades of Tyson Fury. As he hit the deck the HBO commentary team were in no doubt the fight was over. Huge credit to the man for getting to his feet and credit also to the referee for not allowing his bravery to take him much further down the inevitable path.

Lewis was some sight when he started seriously dismantling someone!

 

I like Briggs—Lewis. It’s a rare example of an outmatched fighter giving it 100% and going for broke. The Lewis and Kbros eras were filled with opponents totally packing it in during title fights.

 

Same bravado that got him KTFO in another bout. But I agree, great stuff from a visceral entertainment perspective.