What the hell happened to Golota???

Witherspoon had a better defense than Golota but didn`t bother training much and snorted a lot of coke.

 

I concur. His best win was Danell Nicholson, although he proved to have some worth in the fights with Byrd and Ruiz.

 

When guys start fighting top 10 competition, their defense becomes a far bigger part of their game. Golata had a poor defense and it showed. Once hurt against the hitters, he was done away with quickly since there was zero for him to fall back on.

That and like mentioned earlier, boxing brains. Tough sport to excel at without being at least "good" in the boxing brains category.

 

Well Lewis did something similar to ruddock. He just had that kind of handspeed and power where if he got to you early you might never get back into the fight.

Golota also apparently had a panick attack before the Lewis fight.

Bowe was not shot. Maybe he was damaged in the rematch.....but Bowe was never that hard to hit and he NEVER took that good of a punch. A shot, legless Tyrell Biggs had him wobbling all over the place.
Holyfield knocked him down and basically out on his feet for an entire round with a single hook after looking like he was having a heart attack for the previous 4 rounds. Foreman thought Holyfield was about to die, that's how tired he looked when he put Bowe on the canvas.

Bowe had a huge heart, was magnificent offensively and had a great workrate when he showed up at his best but defensively he was always leaky and the chin showed itself to be vulnerable SEVERAL times.


Golotas skills are way underrated the mid 2000s version was way past it physically but was still very competitive. He just happened to suffer from crippling anxiety that he didn't conquer until he was already too old.

 

Seemed like he was trying to use some head movement (he'd take his head off the center line by dipping down to his right) but he did a terrible job. It seemed unnatural for him and he took himself completely out of position with it. And it was completely predictable. Lewis quickly figured it out and stunned him for the first time after he did it one too many times. Once he got hurt, Golota forgot about head movement altogether, and the rest is history.

https://streamable.com/32gwe

 

I agree with most of this but I didn't see the Biggs fight as evidence of a shaky chin. Biggs caught Bowe with a hard right, right on the jaw when he was goofing around and out of position.

https://streamable.com/mhnyg

 

Golota also had that European upright style of fighting. Vitali K had the same style, but he's taller, has longer arms, and great at fighting at a distance where he could hit his opponent without getting hit back.

 

I do. Biggs can catch foreman, Mercer, holyfield or Tyson any way he wants and they're not going to wobble around like that.

Bowe was always vulnerable and stunn/hurtable. Not just from KO Punchers(which he fought a suspiciously small number of)
It's part of what made him entertaining.
The Holyfield KD was a big indicator. The only other top HW Holyfield did that to was Douglas who took a perfect counterpunch and quit.

He didn't put Stewart, Cooper, Czyz or even Bean down like that. Even Moorer was less hurt by any single punch.

Holyfield beat Tyson badly and Tyson didn't fall over like that despite tyson gassing out, overextending, loading up and getting timed and countered all the time.
Holyfield Took plenty of shots from much harder punchers than himself and he never just went down without taking a beating.


If it was the only time he got hurt, I might agree but he got hurt in several fights well before attrition should have become a factor.
And that just didn't happen to the iron chinned guys in that era

 

Bowe’s opponent selection suggests his chin was being protected. The only puncher he fought was Hide, and Hide was nothing special.

 

The problem was his head alright, , between his ears

 

True. Remember when Nate Campbell was goofing against Robbie Pedden and got KTFO'd. Campbell had pretty good chin as his later fights showed.

 

Just to be fair, Ty Biggs wasn't legless and shot. He'd won 4 in a row and came into the Bowe fight in tremendous shape. He knew it was his last shot at the big wheel and he fought as such.
Bowe ground him down, too strong and durable.

 

That can happen to a lot of good fighters. Even Lewis suffered an early KO against McCall. Sometime they just get off to a bad start and never recover.

 

Can anyone tell me one big fight Golota won ? He was a true head case. Hopefully he has gotten it together outside of the ring.