Anyone who thinks Holyfield won the second fight should, qiote simply, stop trying to score fights. Holyfield gets way, waaaaaaaaaaaay too much credit for his 'improvement' from the first fight, but he lost the first 9-3 and he lost the second 7-5 (at absolute best). How anyone can claim Holy won seven rounds of the second fight is absolutely beyond me. MTF
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Forgot how good round 7 was. Lewis handed more, Holyfield landed the better shots and hurt Lewis. Holyfield round.
Holyfield did nothing in round 10, Lewis won it clearly. 7-3. Fight over on my card but I'll keep going.
Lewis won the 11th clearly. So clearly, that I'll give the first round back to Holyfield (because whiskey scored it that way) which means I have it 7-4 Lewis and I gave the only two rounds that really could have gone either way to Holyfield. Seven CLEAR Lewis rounds. Very clear. So clear that I'm pissed off you guys made me watch this again (although it was a better fight than I remembered)
Did you get the feeling, as I did watching it, that Lewis was making it unnecessarily hard on himself, possibly in the name of making it more exciting?
12th was pretty close, I'll give it to Evander. To recap, 2, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10 and 11 HAVE to go to Lewis, or you don't know what you're looking at. Seven clear rounds of boxing, absolutely no question who won those rounds. 6 and 7 were clear Holyfield rounds. 1, 3 and 12 were hard rounds to score. So I can see a range from anywhere between 7-5 to 10-2 Lewis. 8-4 would probably be the most fair card, giving two close rounds to Holyfield and one to Lewis.
Lewis won easily. Holyfield did better than the first time so people went crazy and said Lewis lost or it was a draw. Any score other than a clear Lewis victory means you are dumb or blind. My guess is both.
Lewis's performance in the rematch is one of the most pathetic showings I've ever seen, not unlike Junior "The Shitter" Witter against Zab. A solidly built, 6'5 heavywight with power, cowering away from a cruiserweight like a frightened kitten, behind a pawing jab. Disgraceful. God I hate Lewis. He makes Floyd look like a fearless warrior.
Honestly, that's not even really true. He was cowering much more in the first fight. He was clearly tired as early as the 7th or 8th in the rematch, but he fought a fairly aggressive fight. I was surprised when I rewatched it today to be honest. You don't think Holyfield won, do you?
Most of the people (non boxing fans) that I watched Lewis-Holy 2 with thought Holy won the fight. I thought it could have gone either way, edge to Lewis. When we watched Lewis-Holy I everyone thought Lewis won.
Foreman was pretty off base all night. He did a lot of the talking during the broadcast, openly cheering for Holyfield.
Of course, the opinions of non-boxing fans mean nothing, especially as it pertains to what actually ensued in the fight.
1st round : Lewis with all the good shots early, but holy came back at the mid point. Woud gave it to lewis 2nd round : Lewis clearly took it, Holy far too negative 3rd round : Close, close round, Lewis was more consistent but seemed to be buzzed toward the end, I'll call it 10-10 4th round : Awful round, but Holy didn't do nearly enought, 10-9 Lewis 5th round : Close round, but once again, Holy just doesn't throw enough 6th round : Clear Holyfield round, his best round of the fight so far, Holy just outworked him as Lewis seemed lazy and disinterested 7th round : Very good round, Lewis had the better work overall but was wobbled and stunned at least twice more. Close round but edge to holyfield 8th round : Good comeback round for lewis who, while not particulary effective, was far mor active. Still, Holyfield was a hard target and had some good moments himself but not enough of them 9th round : Good round, Holy was on his way to take it when he got hurt by a Lewis uppercut with 40 seconds left. Came back nicely toward the end thought to make this one very close Will watch the ohter rounds later on, but as of now, the fight wasn't as close as I remembered. Holy was competitive but not doing enough to take rounds consitently. A fight with a younger Holyfield would have been something and one that Lewis could have very well lost