Pound 4 Pound... who is the better fighter ? Calzaghe or Lewis ?

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Where do you rate Lewis p4p compared to Tyson and Holyfield?

 

Lewis would be WAY ahead of Tyson - they aren't even close, either on skills, H2H, accomplishments or resume.

Holyfield is different though, his cruiser achievements are considerable as are those at heavy - but he lost some fights against chumps and was owned twice by Lennox.

 

We aren't talking H2H here this is a P4P debate, two very different things as you know.

Tyson was 5'11 (not sure the weight) but it was considerably less than Lewis and he was 6'5 or 6'6.

So you are saying that p4p with no weight advantage Lewis is greater than Tyson? And no way in hell is Lewis greater than Tyson skill wise come on.

Take Lewis physical advantages away from him and he's not as great as some make out.

 

Take Tyson's punch away and he isn't as great as some make out

Hell.......

Take away Whitaker's defence
Take away Mosley's speed
Take away Eubank's chin

You could go on forever.

It is useless talking P4P for heavyweights - because after all they are fighting in the same division. Joshua Clottey beat Judah weighing 147, but Judah was 143 so was he better on a P4P basis?

I personally think Tyson was chronically overrated, you are welcome to disagree, of course.

 

I do disagree about Tyson but forget that it's not the issue here.

Most weight classes have a difference of at most 7 pounds.

The difference with Heavyweights is that you can get massive mismatches in weight because there is no upper limit.

That is my reasoning for Lewis being overrated P4P. How can you not call it a mismatch when you have someone coming in at 5'11 and 220 pounds against a guy weighing 6'6 and 260 pounds for example?

Surely you can see the difference here and my reasoning behind it?

 

Exactly. Calzaghe was ineffective to the point of impotent against Hopkins, he didn't land a single clean punch the whole night, Calzaghe won purely on activity and workrate against a 43-year-old who simply no longer had the stamina to match his energy. The difference in skill level was painfully obvious for 12 rounds. I don't see any heavyweight doing this to Lewis. OK, the 1967 Ali would outbox him, but Lewis's skill and power would mean he was always dangerous and he would work his moments. 1967 Ali was on a different skill level to Hopkins anyway. Lewis's technical skills for a heavyweight were superb.

Put him in with peak Tyson, peak Holyfield, peak Bowe, peak Holmes, peak Frazier, peak Foreman, peak Liston, peak Louis, etc etc, and Lewis would not be outclassed against any of them.

Put 168 Calzaghe in with the Roy Jones of 1994-96, or the 168 Toney who beat DeWitt and Barkley 1992-93, or if Hopkins had moved up to 168 between 1997-2004, and you would have seen Calzaghe exposed. He only looked so good to you at 168 because he was hammering in tomato cans for years and years, and the longevity has fooled everyone. The only class opponent Calzaghe fought at 168 was Kessler, who gave him trouble and Kessler was no Jones, Toney or Hopkins.

Your point on Lewis's size advantage makes no sense. That argument could be used to criticize any big heavyweight in history, and make any fighter who fought in a lower weight division look better because they fought men their own size. But a 210lbs heavyweight fighting a 230lbs heavyweight is completely INCOMPARABLE to a featherweight fighting a middleweight. You say you understand that, but then you immediately again devalue Lewis's wins because of size, so you clearly don't understand it really.

Lewis's heavyweight resume is significantly stronger than Calzaghe's resume, this is the crux of the matter.

Lewis beat all the best heavyweights of his generation save for Bowe, who openly avoided him.

- For the British and European heavyweight title, Lewis beat Gary Mason, who was 35-0, who weighed 235lbs to Lewis's 227lbs

- He blasted out the highly rated Razor Ruddock, who weighed 231lbs to Lewis's 227lbs

- He stopped Frank Bruno in a huge domestic clash, Bruno weighing 238lbs to Lewis's 229

- He annihilated Andrew Golota in 90 seconds when they both weighed 244lbs

- He blitzed number 1 contender Michael Grant in 1 round when Grant weighed 250lbs to Lewis's 247

- There was 4lbs between Lewis and Tua when Lewis turned in a great performance in a dominant UD win (Lewis 249, Tua 245)

- Lewis defeated the monster that is Vitali Klitschko. After watching that fight, although it was stopped with Vitali ahead, the tide was turning IMO, Lewis was beginning to take control, and would have taken a famous win had the ref not intervened to save Klitschko from further injury


This is a number of examples of where Lewis did not enjoy a substantial size advantage - you will see it encompasses some of his very best wins. There are more where the weight disparity is so small relative to their size that it's completely unimportant and not an advantage at all.

But bear in mind, that if you demean Lewis's excellent resume on account of his size, then you must also do the same thing to Bowe and both Klitschkos, who are also big heavyweights. The heavyweight exploits of guys like Tyson, Holyfield, Michael Spinks etc should show that size is not anywhere near as important in the big league as it is for lower-weight catchweight contests.

Joe Calzaghe was an excellent supermiddleweight but proved this by fighting poor opposition. Lennox Lewis was an excellent heavyweight who proved this by beating all of the best heavyweights of his era, big and small.

For me, the two guys are on different levels. Lewis is one of the greatest heavyweights in history, an ATG forever. IMO, Calzaghe has not proved he is of similar quality at all.

:bbb

 

Very narrowly behind Holyfield, and a bit ahead of Tyson.

 

I can, but as they are fighting in the same division it is difficult (for me personally) to agree with your rationale - but a good point nonetheless.

Peak Tyson was say 215 @ 5'11''
Peak Lewis was say 240 @ 6'5''

Tyson spent plenty of his earlier years knocking out bigger guys (weight wise) such as Tony Tubbs, Frank Bruno, Bonecrusher Smith etc, whilst none were as big/gifted as a peak Lennox - I don't think size is that much of an issue.

A lot of people knock Lennox for fighting a shot version of Tyson - which I suppose is correct, but they forget to acknowledge that Lewis was a couple of years beyond his own prime as well.

IMO, peak Lewis owns peak Tyson in exactly the same fashion.

 

It is actually particuarly difficult to gauge how great Lennox Lewis is p4p. If you look at what he does in the ring it is all based around using physical advantages to the maximum. A scaled down Lennox Lewis, I couldn't imagine being so successful. At the same time he wouldn't be so lumbering in the ring.

It's sort of irrelevant considering what Lewis achieved, but its worth noting when talking about his skills.

I think you could replicate what Calzaghe does at any weight class and have a lot of success.

 

I suppose a fighter ought to do what works best for him - being unorthodox works for Calzaghe, being physically strong worked for Lewis.

That is not to deride from their other skills - which they would have more than likely made up for in other areas.

 

I think so too. Win one of the less prestigious belts, stay at home for 9 years defending it against weak opposition, have a couple of good wins, beat up the corpse of a great fighter and retire. I think that could be easily replicated at any weight class and be viewed as extremely successful.

What Lennox Lewis did would be far harder to replicate. Only Bernard Hopkins and Roy Jones Jr have achieved something similar of late.

 

What he said ^^^

 

Congratulations on completely missing my point. And you will sit there and tell me to refer to the issue at hand, whilst being intellectually dishonest in your responses to me :-(

I was referring to the skills and style they employ in the ring.

 

That was an excellent post from Pacfan 84.

The first four words anyway.