Lennox Lewis: The Last Heavyweight Champion

Lennox Lewis had to wait 3 1/2 years for another shot at the WBC Heavyweight Championship, and for revenge on Oliver McCall. In the meantime, he had never stopped disputing his 1994 stoppage loss to McCall, stating that he had gotten up at the count of 6 and was ready to fight. Furthermore, while he had been shut out of the title picture, the green WBC belt had gone from McCall to a man Lewis had already knocked out (Frank Bruno), and then to Mike Tyson, who was so unworthy that he ditched the belt rather than face Lewis.

Meeting in February 1997, Lewis came out and was easily handling McCall. While many of Don King's heavyweights became psychologically fragile under his constant abuse, McCall outdid the rest of the stable by breaking down into tears and refusing to fight in the 4th and 5th Rounds. The bizarre ending was declared a stoppage, and Lennox Lewis became a two-time champions.

Second Title Reign

His first defense came 10 days after his 32nd birthday. Lewis had to get past another King fighter, this time the 32-0-1 WBO Champion Henry Akinwande. At 6'7", Akinwande was a rare fighter who was actually taller than Lewis, and the two men filled the 18 foot ring. Forced to vacate the WBO title to challenge for the WBC belt, Akinwande had a number of fringe contenders on his resume: Axel Schultz, Jeremy Williams, Tony Tucker, and Jimmy Thunder. However, against Lewis he had no answers, and like McCall he soon refused to fight. Akinwande resorted to clutching and grabbing, and was eventually disqualified for excessive holding.

Lewis had never been popular with American sportswriters, who as a rule turn their nose up to any fighter not from the Western Hemisphere. That he knocked out Tommy Morrison and pounded out a win over Ray Mercer were downplayed, and the critics jumped on the chance to play up the strange and inconclusive endings of these two fights. With all eyes on the drama between Evander Holyfield and Mike Tyson, Lewis needed to do something dramatic to prove his viability, and he did it: he got in the ring with the "Foul Pole," Andrew Golota.

Golota had been on his way to beating Riddick Bowe, who on the basis of his 2-1 record against Holyfield had been arguably considered the best big man around, to a pulp on two separate occasions, when he managed to get himself disqualified for low blows each time. Dirty tactics aside, Golota was a big, powerful, skilled heavyweight who wielded a hard double jab. Lewis showed no fear, came right out and attacked Golota from the opening bell, and crushed him in the 1st Round. Golota was later shown to be as psychologically fragile as McCall, but at the time he was regarded as being very dangerous, and the fight had shadows of the Halloween night when Lewis demolished "Razor" Rudduck.

Lewis made his third defense against "the man who beat the man," fringe contender Shannon Briggs. Briggs had outpointed George Foreman to win the "lineal championship." A thrilling display of artillery saw Lewis overpower Briggs, put him down three times, and knock him out in the 5th. That was followed in September 1998 by a chess match points win over European champion Zeljko Mavrovic.

Lewis vs. Holyfield I and II

Lennox Lewis had originally been set to meet Evander Holyfield during "the Warrior's" second reign as champion. However, Holyfield was compelled to defend his title against Michael Moorer, fought injured and sick, and lost it. Having gained revenge over Moorer and become the WBA-IBF champion. With everyone else from their generation of heavyweights out of the picture, the time had finally come for these two titans to square off. In March 1999, a 33 year old Lewis met a 34 year old Holyfield.

The result was a travesty. Holyfield spent the first two rounds trying to sucker Lewis into following him onto the ropes, then spent the 3rd in a full three minute charge to knock Lewis out, and then spent the rest of the bout fighting in spurts, but largely neutralized by Lewis's cautious use of size and reach to keep him at bay and score points. Lewis won the fight be a large margin, but was robbed by the judges in a Draw.

The result was a rematch held in November, both fighters now a year older. The irony is that the rematch was much closer, as Holyfield continued to show his prowess as a dangerous man to see more than once. Lewis won this bout too, however, even if by a bigger margin on the scorecards than he earned in the ring. Lennox Lewis was now the Undisputed World Heavyweight Champion.

"The Man"

Don King prodded the WBA into ordering Lewis to fight their #1 contender, John Ruiz. Lewis, who was not particularly interested in boxing another one of King's misfits in a low paying bout, declined and vacated the title. Despite this, Lewis had finally earned the recognition he craved as the heavyweight champion, and few considered him anything less than "the man."

Instead of fighting Ruiz, Lewis went after the top dogs of the rising crop of heavyweights. HBO had been grooming 27year old Michael Grant as the next big thing in the heavyweights. He was another example of a rare heavyweight who was bigger than Lewis, at 6'7" and 250 lbs, and also had a decent resume behind him, with wins over tough Nigerian David Izon, Lou Savarese, Obed Sullivan, Al Cole, and a trench war victory over Andrew Golota. As with Golota, Lewis went straight after Grant and flattened him in 2 Rounds.

After knocking out durable fringe contender Franz Botha in 2, Lewis went after the Samoan slugger David Tua in November 2000. Tua wielded a wrecking ball left hook, and had used it to defeat Hasim Rahman, Obed Sullivan, Oleg Maskaev, John Ruiz, and Darrol Wilson. Thus far, Tua had lost only one fight, an upset loss to Ike Ibeabuchi in a fight that set the standing record for most punches thrown in a non-title heavyweight fight. Having already cleaved a path through the new generation, Tua was arguably the most dangerous of the lot. However, Lewis was seven inches taller and had fourteen inches of reach. Since his loss to Ibeabuchi and a surgery to remove bone chips from his elbows, the Samoan had shown less fire, and did not have enough to overcome such enormous advantages. Lewis played it safe, jabbed all night, and busted Tua up on the way to a unanimous landslide win.

The Upset

Baltimore knucklehead Hasim Rahman was a 20-1 underdog, but he trained his heart out, whereas Lewis went to the set of Ocean's 11 for a cameo appearance, and failed to train at altitude at all for a fight held in Capetown, South Africa. Puffing for breath early, Rahman drilled Lewis with a hard right and knocked him out.

The incident was reminiscent of the McCall debacle in some ways, but this time the knockout loss was completely legitimate. However, Lewis had learned from his previous loss, and had an ironclad rematch clause. Meeting in November 2001, a properly trained Lewis dominated Rahman and knocked him out in the 4th, becoming a three-time heavyweight champion.

Lewis's next fight was little more than a payday, because he took on a much-faded Mike Tyson. By 2002, Tyson was a joke, but he could guarantee the Jerry Springer crowd would tune in simply to see if he tried to brain Lewis with a corner stool. Lewis disposed of Tyson easily over 8 Rounds.

Next Lewis was supposed to fight the under-motivated, but talented Canadian Kirk Johnson. Johnson, however, dropped out, and was replaced by Vitali Klitschko. The Ukrainian was younger, every bit as big as Lewis, and highly motivated. he came out early to rock the champ in Round 2, but Lewis bounced back in the 5th and 6th. Opening a cut on Klitschko's eye, Lewis hammered it open into a horrific gash, resulting in a 6th Round stoppage. The ringside doctor later described it by saying "When he raised his head up, his upper eyelid covered his field of vision."

Retirement

Lennox Lewis announced his retirement shortly after stopping Klitschko, with a record of 41-2-1 and 32 KOs. He was only the third man to win the heavyweight crown three times, reigned as the Undisputed World Champion, and his second reign boasted 9 successful defenses. Along the way, he cleaned out two separate divisions of heavyweights, fighting virtually everyone who was a worthy contender at the time and who would dare get in the ring with him. Although he never gave Ray Mercer a remach, Lewis left no unavenged blemishes on his record. He was inducted into the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame in 2008, and the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 2009. In the modern era of boring Slavic heavyweights, he is widely regarded as the last truly dominant and worthy heavyweight champion.

Sources: boxrec.com; live fight footage; http://www.lennoxlewis.com/; http://www.ibhof.com/