Max Kellerman on Lennox Lewis

agreed. look at it more of 50/50 type fight with the slight edge to holyfield. but to the original topic, despite lewis's size, he did always impose himself due to the fact that he was a bit passive at times. there are big fighters who imposes their size on their opponents more frequently then lewis did.

 

You do know Lewis was a safety first fighter, right?
And that Holyfield in 28 fights upto Toney was only stopped once by Bowe in an all out slugfest which took a good Bowe 8 rounds.

Foreman 6'4 250+lbs collosal size advantage.
Bowe 6'5 240+ collosal size advantage.

Two legends, he lasted 44 rounds out of 48.

 

My point is that despite facing a man who was years past his best, and significantly smaller, he was not able to finish him, nor have him in any real trouble... I agree that Lewis won the vast majority of the rounds in those two fights, but I still don't know if even to this day I'd call it an all out domination.... A prime Holy has a very good chance at beating a prime Lewis, which given his status as a former cruiserweight, would really put an ugly dent in Kellerman's argument.

 

It's hard to say. There's a definate size different that may have given Holyfield trouble at any stage of his career. And fighters often fight down to their level of opposition. Meaning Lewis may have fought differently if he felt it was close or he was loosing. That said, prime Holyfield's no joke for any fighter. He's incredibly hard to knock out and in his prime he had a good work rate. That makes getting decision wins fairly common.

 

How many safety first fighter ko'd guys with grade A chins?
Not too many I'd imagine.

The only chance Holyfield has is a decision, and Lewis never lost one of those.

The first fight was an all out demolition, Holyfield went on to the ropes in round 3 and practically stayed there till round 12.

The second much closer, there's even an argument that it could be a draw.

Prime Holy has a good chance of beating most ATG HW's.

 

Steward talks a lot of drivel as well though, to be fair. When he was congratulating Taylor on losing rounds I lost a lot of faith in his knowledge.

 

Not technically he doesnt, but yes he does change up his prediction in mid fight, which is always comical.

 

He makes a great point, one which will blow completely over your heads. Because yes, it is cool to rank ancient fighters higher. And its also cool amongst anonymous internet armchair critic nobodies who's involvment in the sport is limited to sitting at a computer acting like they know it all, with no credibility in the world of boxing, to discredit and mock credible proffessionals involved in the world of boxing.

 

Because Mike Tyson was a boxer from the ancient past and a fight with Lewis in their primes would have been a mismatch due to size?

 

I'm talking about the not cool to rank modern fighters, and Lewis greatest HW(H2H atleast), points.

 

Most people don't rank contemporary fighters because it's difficult to truly judge a fighter until their career is over. Some might put Pacquiao into their top 15 all-time now but what if (and that's a big if) he gets knocked out by Clottey in his next fight? There would be those who say he was never any good to begin with. But those who will patiently wait until the end of his career are the ones who will judge him based on his overall career, not recent success or lack of success.

Same with Roy Jones, to some he was the greatest after the Ruiz win but he has been abandoned by many fans since then. To me he's still a great fighter, just not a top 10 all-time great.

As for Lewis being the greatest heavyweight, I don't think there's much of a case. Head-to-head he is tough to beat but size is not everything. I'm not saying that a Rocky Marciano would beat Lewis but a Muhammad Ali or Larry Holmes definitely could.

 

I'm talking more along the lines of 19th century fighters making it into top 10 P4P lists and being favoured H2H, despite the fact that nobody alive was around to witness any aspect of there life and career and there is no surviving footage, or so little of such poor quality you cannot make out who is who.

 

I don't see any 19th century fighters making top 10 ATG lists. Perhaps you mean Sam Langford? He fought into the 1920's and there's a bit of film on him, some of which is fairly impressive.

 

you're assuming thats what he meant. but can the same logic apply to the fighters of the same era?