BoxRec

Bowe sold himself short! He was too strong and applied too much pressure to lose to Lewis anytime 92-96. Lewis had a horrible time with Ray

Mercer who was much shorter and also Holyfield as well! He even had trouble with Shannon Briggs! I assure you Bowe limited himself by not

taking care of Lennox Lewis he would have beaten Lennox as pro. Bowe was the BEST heavyweight in the 90s no doubt! Bowe not fighting Lennox

falls into the same bracket of Tyson leaving Kevin Rooney!

You should probably stick to the CS, bnov. We put up with just about anything over there, including your inane ramblings, but I fear for your safety over here with the old school folks.

Yeah,but he should probably check this out first before he leaves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vR3k71ogKmY

Not sure I'm on board with the drama, or the author in this case.

However, the theme rings true. But what is it that you want to give either Lewis or Bowe credit for?


I happen to agree that Bowe should be the odds on favorite in that match. I think he would have beaten Lewis....and much of your conjecture makes sense to me.


And then there is the other side of this. And it is significant.


Bowe made a choice....he was the champion, and he must be accountable for his actions. For whatever reason, whether to punish Lewis out of a paycheck for spite, or out of fear of a guy who bested him in the past, HE chose NOT to do the historically courageous thing. That is...to fight the best no matter what. So all you and I or anyone can do is GUESS. I almost want to GUESS that Lewis would win, because Lewis gave the crown a bit more lustre by facing the best, when he was the man.

So I think Bowe attained better skills, and was a better fighter for a time prime vs prime....(keeping in mind that Lewis had a longer prime) AND I think Lewis was the better champion.

This statement comes from someone who honestly thinks Bowe could have been the best of all time, had he not completely lost his mind, abandoned his imposing will, lost his discipline as a fighter, and sort of came unglued in all areas somewhere along the line. He also may have been susceptible to the punches that he absorbed, as he seemed quite affected by his career in the ring, a bit more than most. Perhaps absorbing the punishment and having that affect him, is the very reason for what happened to him.....

At any rate, Lewis is greater than Bowe, even if Bowe attained the higher degree of ability for a short period of time.

The thing with Bowe, he certainly had the tools to beat Lewis pre McCall 1 because Lennox was reckless & too over reliant on his power, but he never had the belief, otherwise the fight would have happened in 1993.

Lewis post McCall 1 would have beaten Bowe, but not by a knockout, as Bowe was tough & had the heart of two lions, even if he didn't want to fight Lewis previously.

It would have been a great contest. It is a shame it never happened for whatever reason.

SteveO wrote:It would have been a great contest. It is a shame it never happened for whatever reason.

We know the reason: Rock Newman wanted to to protect his golden goose for as long as possible.

He wanted to make sure that Bowe made as much money as possible & maximised his hard won title for as long as possible before risking putting him in with Lewis.

This episode should be a lesson to all about making fights when they're hot & not trying to fanny about building contests that don't need building.

Some will say it was sensible, but I'm not a manager, I am a fan & I want to see the best fights.

The sad thing is, Bowe could have beaten Lewis in 1993, but we will never ever know now.

Syntax Error wrote:

SteveO wrote:It would have been a great contest. It is a shame it never happened for whatever reason.

We know the reason: Rock Newman wanted to to protect his golden goose for as long as possible.

He wanted to make sure that Bowe made as much money as possible & maximised his hard won title for as long as possible before risking putting him in with Lewis.

This episode should be a lesson to all about making fights when they're hot & not trying to fanny about building contests that don't need building.

Some will say it was sensible, but I'm not a manager, I am a fan & I want to see the best fights.

The sad thing is, Bowe could have beaten Lewis in 1993, but we will never ever know now.

Holyfield did the same after Douglas he fought foreman , cooper and Holmes two ancients and a cruiser weight

Yep, making money after winning the goods makes good business sense, and is a course of action many take, and you pay a price in terms of historical status.

Just is what it is.

stevedoc wrote:

Syntax Error wrote:

SteveO wrote:It would have been a great contest. It is a shame it never happened for whatever reason.

We know the reason: Rock Newman wanted to to protect his golden goose for as long as possible.

He wanted to make sure that Bowe made as much money as possible & maximised his hard won title for as long as possible before risking putting him in with Lewis.

This episode should be a lesson to all about making fights when they're hot & not trying to fanny about building contests that don't need building.

Some will say it was sensible, but I'm not a manager, I am a fan & I want to see the best fights.

The sad thing is, Bowe could have beaten Lewis in 1993, but we will never ever know now.

Holyfield did the same after Douglas he fought foreman , cooper and Holmes two ancients and a cruiser weight

Yes, that's true.
Unfortunately there is a whole list of potentially great fights that never happened.

I think with Futch that Bowe had a good shot at beating Lewis but it's hard to favor him. Lennox could think very well in the ring, that wasn't Bowe's biggest strength. Yes that would have been an excellent fight

stevedoc wrote:

Syntax Error wrote:

SteveO wrote:It would have been a great contest. It is a shame it never happened for whatever reason.

We know the reason: Rock Newman wanted to to protect his golden goose for as long as possible.

He wanted to make sure that Bowe made as much money as possible & maximised his hard won title for as long as possible before risking putting him in with Lewis.

This episode should be a lesson to all about making fights when they're hot & not trying to fanny about building contests that don't need building.

Some will say it was sensible, but I'm not a manager, I am a fan & I want to see the best fights.

The sad thing is, Bowe could have beaten Lewis in 1993, but we will never ever know now.

Holyfield did the same after Douglas he fought foreman , cooper and Holmes two ancients and a cruiser weight

To be fair to Holyfield, he signed to defend his title against Tyson in November 1991, but we all know what happened after that.

I'm not sure he would have beaten Lewis. On his day, Bowe was a great fighter but I think he was a bit vulnerable mentally. I think that would have affected him against Lewis given their history etc

Lewis would have beaten bowe. He'd not have had too much trouble finding him. Also the mental side is key. Lewis v strong mentally, bowe not at all.

You can point to some of Lewis' best fights as evidence that he wold win. Or point out Bowe's best as evidence that he would win.
Or point out Lewis' worst or Bowe's worst.
They each had things they did better than the other.

Could have gone either way.

Ambling Alp II wrote:You can point to some of Lewis' best fights as evidence that he wold win. Or point out Bowe's best as evidence that he would win.
Or point out Lewis' worst or Bowe's worst.
They each had things they did better than the other.

Could have gone either way.

That's the beauty of boxing, no one knows for sure whose gonna win, being better than the other guy sometimes isn't as good as being better on the night.

I still think that Bowe always had a certain "very bad day in Seoul" on his mind and that would always be to Lennox's advantage.

Its this kind of thing that made me wish they would've made fury v price cos I knew one of them would trip up sooner or later, luckily some do happen with Joshua v white and smith v fielding being good examples at a lower level.

A focused Riddick Bowe, the one that beat the great Evander Holyfield in fight #1, beats any version of Lennox Lewis, everyday, and twice on Sunday.

Bowe was one of those guys that wasted the talent and had no desire to train after he won the heavyweight title

littlepug wrote:

Ambling Alp II wrote:You can point to some of Lewis' best fights as evidence that he wold win. Or point out Bowe's best as evidence that he would win.
Or point out Lewis' worst or Bowe's worst.
They each had things they did better than the other.

Could have gone either way.

That's the beauty of boxing, no one knows for sure whose gonna win, being better than the other guy sometimes isn't as good as being better on the night.

Yeah, they were close enough that it would have depended on who happened to be better that particular day.
Not sure why people put much weight in their amateur fight. Nobody thinks Max Marek would have beaten Joe Louis or Duane Bobick would have beat Larry Holmes.

Lewis did some advantages and would have had a serous chance.

Bowe was managed by the completely insane Rock Newman

That had plenty to do with his demise.

True...often thought Newman's oddball antics were more of a nuisance for Big Daddy in those situations; the kind of extra distraction Bowe could have actually done without.

He'd have been a total, hyper pain in the backside in the whole run-in to a Lewis fight and probably put Bowe - who was a sensitive dude who needed some calm and focus - right on edge.

Newman's braggadocio maybe not a game-changer on fight night; but I don't think it would have helped create the ideal conditions Riddick would have needed either and these things can have an effect. Lewis would have either laughed at Newman or used his BS to spur him on.

elmersalsa wrote:A focused Riddick Bowe, the one that beat the great Evander Holyfield in fight #1, beats any version of Lennox Lewis, everyday, and twice on Sunday.

Bowe was one of those guys that wasted the talent and had no desire to train after he won the heavyweight title

Spot on.

If Bowe's gym could have been relocated to his fridge, he'd still be HW champion today!

Delaying a Bowe/Lewis super fight made perfect sense financially - but Bowe eating his way out of the title wasn't part of the script.

A curiously forgotten part of the Bowe/Lewis tale is that in June 1994 they signed for a mega fight that would be staged early 1995. This was extensively covered in the press, but the narrative has not managed to drift into the consciousness of cyberspace, for whatever reason. All Lewis and Bowe needed to do was survive their next opponents: Oliver McCall and Larry Donald. The script said easy nights for Lewis and Bowe. Reality was easy nights for McCall and Bowe.

HBO and Bowe tried to entice Lewis into a big money fight in 1996. Lewis opted to fight the 36 year old Ray Mercer for far less money. Bowe turned his attention to a Mike Tyson mega fight and in the interim took an easy looking fight with undefeated Andrew Golota. . . .

I like both Lewis and Bowe. I rooted for Lewis throughout his career. I always thought Bowe had too complete a skillset for him - especially in 1993. Bowe was a fully developed fighting machine. Lewis meanwhile was firing on about three cylinders.

Amateur results mean nothing. So what if Lewis, an experienced man, beat Bowe, an inexperienced boy. Tyrell Biggs did the same thing in 84 vs Lennox Lewis. When they met in the pros it was man vs man. Jorge Luis Gonzalez gave Bowe a far worse beating than Lewis did. That must have played on Bowe's mind in training, because it brought out one of the most focussed and fearsome versions of Big Daddy that we ever saw. Bowe's deep hatred for Lennox Lewis would have conjured up the same sort of animal, and I think Lewis' deficiencies would cost him dearly.

Oh yeah?
well Im not so confident he would have.

Bodyshot3 wrote:I still think that Bowe always had a certain "very bad day in Seoul" on his mind and that would always be to Lennox's advantage.

That seems to be history's common consensus.