Povetkin and Solis might turn out to be better than some of the names you've listed. It's not like all those heavies set the bar that high during their time as contenders (and brief time as champions).
dsimon writes: AS a boxer yeah maybe... as a puncher? And there are a dime a dozen when it comes to boxers in the heavyweight division no? All the 'eastern Euro heavies are good boxers, but they do not have power. This would be fine except that to beat the Klitschkos we need somoene who can punch. Look I don't hate the style so much just the sheer volume of guys who can box pretty good and can't punch through a wet paper bag. If the heavyweight division was full of rahman, Mccall, Tua, Golata I would probably feel the opposite and welcome a few of the Eastern Euros.
We can stick with the Lewis theme if you want...because as punchers go, Tommy Morrison was considered a better one than Rahman or McCall, but he turned out to be one of the easiest opponents of Lewis' career.
Euro's can't punch? Thats so general and weird its hard to even respond. Where on earth do you come up with this stuff? Who DOES punch? Americans? Africans? Non-Euro's? ::
He gets major credit if he stops Peter (Which I think is a good possibility.) If he gets stopped , he gets credit for not being properly prepared.
Your memory is not so good dsimon. Lewis fought Briggs after Briggs beat Foreman in 97 and Briggs was in the top 10 and actually the 'lineal' heavyweight champ although with no belt. Lewis fought Grant who was a WBC mandatory and #1 challenger to Lewis' titles in 2000.
I'd give Klitschko more credit for fighting Gomez after one fight back than fighting Peter in his first one.
Briggs' win was also considered one of the worst decisions of the year. Lewis was basically biding his time until Holyfield found a deal he'd accept.
Solis is the Cuban Nightmare. Same short fatty, who can´t handle tall fighters. He couldn´t even get to Julius "Killed by Fraudley" Long or Harry "I beat up my own father" Duiven.
Yeah, that was when Castro kept him away from McDonalds and BurgerKing. And it´s not the trainers, becasue they have gotten Gomez in excellent shape for the Virchis fight. The guy just doesn´t care.
Yeah, it's obscene that he's consistently above 250, but he's certainly more skilled than guys like Tua and Peter.
Reading the other results from tonight, it looks like the ol' kickboxer Ustinov managed to do something Solis couldn't. Solis did stop Welliver in 5. Did you see either of those?
Viatalie should got no credit and the guy should just retire.. no one really likes him, his style is ugly. he should just go run a potato shop in russia.. maybe offer them with different kinds of cheese and sell coffee with it.. kinda like a Potatoe and coffee bar