Would Lennox Lewis's Jab Cuddle Antics Have Worked Vs Today's Super Heavyweights?

That, and he fought in an era where PEDs were even less regulated than modern boxing. So his opposition may have actually been more athletic than today's guys, ironically.

 

I do think Lewis should be considered an ATG - but he wasn't the most consistent fighter and didn't always use his size all that well.

Lewis was not a quick starter and he was caught out with big punches twice early in fights. I'm not really doubting his chin, but I don't think he had quite the heart or focus that some other champions had.

And I'm still absolutely flumoxed as to how the much shorter Ray Mercer was able to bother Lewis all night with his jab and it's a mystery to me why Lewis seemingly had nothing on his punches the night he fought Željko Mavrović.

Against Wilder?

He beats & stops Wilder about 19 times out of 20 because there's probably a 5% chance that Wilder does manage to land a big shot on him early in the going. Otherwise, Lewis pretty much uses him as a punching bag, breaks him down, and stops him.

Lewis would struggle mightily with Fury because he couldn't outrange him and Lewis never was much for in-fighting. Have to give Fury the nod.

 

Grant had great punchingpower, but he was actually not that difficult to bully and back up. Golota was pushing him around quite a lot early in their fight. Ditto Savarese and others.

Aside from clinching (the Steward influence), I never did think of Lewis of being heavily reliant on infighting. At least not to the extent of, say, Riddick Bowe.

AJ is definitely not the best when it comes to knowing when/how to tie up his opponent.

 

Lewis has shown more impressive feats of infighting than Fury and Lewis was agressive against taller men. He would not try and swap jabs with Fury

 

I'm saying he could beat him, what does wilder have to do with anything? That's like me saying Fury has better finishing ability than McCall and Rahman. Caveman logic.

Fury is substantially larger than Lewis and has a sizeable reach advantage, Lewis struggled with fighters that jabbed with him and attempted to control pace. This is what Fury does, and does well.

 

Look Lewis did get tagged twice due to lack of concentration however he avenged those and beat everyone put in front of him. Lewis showed heart many times and especially his very last fight with Vitali so I respectfully disagree.
I don't know why your confused about Mercer who had a lot of pedigree but was inconsistent. my counter is Lennox fought plenty of quality opposition compared to most of today's Heavies some of which have only fought one or two lives bodies.
Styles do make fights and if you fight a variety of quality opposition even if your elite then one or two are going to cause stylistic problems.
This is why I have an issue with people overrating both Fury and Usyk both of which I like BTW. Is that they've fought few few elite fighters to gauge how good they really are. You can't go of what you 'think' they could do you go of what they have done and until someone is tested with a variety of styles it's purely hypothetical.
You say Lewis couldn't infight yet then what was the Vitali fight?
An optical illusion?
Fury would be facing someone who like Wilder had a lot of punching power but had far more ways and skill to deliver those punches.
If Fury was from the first or third fight with Wilder and out of shape then Lewis stops him without too much effort.
There is absolutely no comparable or evidence to say Fury could hang with Lewis. It's purely fantasy in peoples heads.
I say that as a fan of both fighters but for me you have to prove that and Fury is nowhere near that in reality as the only top Heavies he's fought was an ageing Vlad and an unskilled and overrated Wilder. That is just the truth of the matter.

 

He constantly held Tyson in the first two rounds of that fight leading to two warnings by Mills Lane.

 

His opponents didn`t look very athletic at all.

 

Fair comment but that's only one fight it's hardly a consistent pattern. Vlad and Fury have done it far more but then Lennox was more offensive in style than those two.

 

Lennox Lewis is a level above the best of today. No fighter is invincible, but I would not pick any active heavyweight to be a favorite to beat Lewis.

Usyk is would give him the best challenge.

People might say Fury, and Fury is very good, but I think Lewis would absolutely maul Fury. Wilder dropped him a few times, but Wilder has power but little skill. Lewis is also notorious difficult to bully in the clinch. Lewis would put Fury down over and over until the ref stops it. Other option is he grinds Fury's face into hamburger meat and stops him that way.

AJ, Wilder, Ruiz, Whyte, etc are a few levels below Lewis. He knocks them all out. (Ironically if Lewis was fighting in this era and he did pick up a loss it would be to one of these types if they catch Lewis being lazy. But for these mythical situations we usually assume the fighter is always at their best)

 

Wilder couldn't finish Fury when he knocked him down. If Lewis knocks Fury down, the latter's getting stopped. Lewis was a far better finisher.

 

Like roy jones against griffin in their rematch, an angry and motivated lewis is hard to beat and would have a chance to beat other heavyweights in history, problem is he was too arrogant and fell asleep a lot during fights.

 

Lennox Lewis weighed over 250 pounds in his last fight (256 I think).
So he belonged to today’s Super Heavyweights.

 

What do you mean by "looking athletic," then? I'm talking about their actual physical attributes.

 

Which today's super heavyweights? Usyk is the champ and he is 6 foot 2