Regardless of solely sharing the ring with Evander Holyfield, Riddick Bowe has supplied his tackle the place ‘The Actual Deal’ would rank in a dialog involving Lennox Lewis and Mike Tyson.
Bowe and Holyfield delivered three fascinating heavyweight spectacles between 1992 and 1995, with the previous coming away from their compelling trilogy as a 2-1 victor.
Maybe most notably, the rematch, which Holyfield gained through a majority choice, noticed the notorious ‘Fan Man’ come crashing onto the ring apron throughout their encounter for Bowe’s IBF and WBA world titles.
It was in 1993, too, that Tyson was serving his six-year jail sentence, which means the timing for a conflict between him and ‘Massive Daddy’ was by no means fairly proper, together with the very fact the pair had been additionally childhood mates.
Throughout that very same 12 months, Bowe had binned his WBC title – refusing to face necessary challenger Lewis – and as an alternative fought Holyfield for a second time.
That trilogy with Holyfield was ferocious sufficient for Bowe to rank his former foe above Lewis and Tyson in an interview with Boxing Information.
“[With] Holyfield, it doesn’t matter what you do to him, or the way you do it, he’s going to be there.
“Lennox, I put him at quantity two as a result of he’s the largest of all of us – I suppose he proved that he was sturdy.
“Mike, he [wasn’t as] sturdy as these guys [Holyfield and Lewis] – as a result of they knocked him out. However, in his prime, he was the person that was knocking all people out, so I make Mike quantity three.”
Many could be tempted to put Lewis on the prime of a listing involving all three legends, particularly on condition that he ought to, in reality, boast two factors victories over Holyfield.
Their first encounter, in 1999, noticed each males come away with a extremely controversial draw, earlier than Lewis claimed a unanimous verdict of their fast rematch.
Then, in 2002, ‘The Lion’ secured an eighth-round stoppage victory over Tyson who, at the moment, was thought-about properly previous his greatest.
However nonetheless, most would seemingly regard Holyfield, who twice beat Tyson in convincing style, and Lewis as being the 2 flagship heavyweights of their period.
