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Knew this was coming and i said a month or so ago that Lennox is in great shape all of a sudden,add to that Haye strutting around like the he's best ever UK Heavy............
Lennox Lewis set for £25m purse if he faces Klitschko - The Daily Record
Lennox £25m to battle Vitali | The Sun |Sport|Boxing
Rule nothing out in the fight game.;)
He need's to jump at that oppourtunity, 25 big one's is plenty of reason to come back. BTW Vitali would KO him at this point
I don't see Lennox coming back after all this time to fight Vitali. What's the point? if he comes back i think he will do it when he is older than forman was when he won his last title.
I think money is the last think Lewis needs, so why come back and fight a guy u busted up in his prime and at the end of your career?
For Lewis it was always cementing his legacy. Lewis would never come back for all the money in china.
What a decision to make. I.e what's more important to you, your legacy as an all time great or £25 Million. I can't see Lennox coming out of retirement. I don't think he had much left to give when he fought Klitchko, whereas Klitchko was probably at his peak. I haven't seen the fight from Saturday yet, but from what I hear it doesn't look like the lay off has hurt Klitchko too much. Too risky for Big Len
Why do people care about legacy anyways?
Everyone talks as if a loss on a record at the end of a career ruins all the previous acomplishments but it doesn't mean anything.
How as Ali's legacy diminished by his loss to Trevor Berbick?
Or Sugar Ray Robinson?
Or Jack Johnson?
When we look back at old greats nobody even brings these fights up.
Look at Holyfield, although most think its sad that he's still fighting on and risking his health only a moron would suggest that a loss to Sultan Ibragimov means that Holyfield wasn't as good as we all thought prior to the loss his acomplishments have already been created.
In no other sport does poorer performance late on in a career affect that sportsman's legacy so why does anyone care about legacy?
I mean I don't think boxers should hang around too long after their prime for health reasons, its a risky game to play, but if I was Lewis and got offered £25,000,000 to fight Vitali and the chance to be seen as the best heavyweight in the world again I would ask myself the following question 'Am I healthy enough and can I get back into a good enough shape to have a chance to win the fight?'
If I answered yes I would be out of retirement and making that fight.
The possibility of defeat affecting my 'legacy' wouldn't matter to me at all. My acomplishments already stand, I've been the undisputed and nobody can take that away. This is a new opportunity to carve a bigger legacy AND make an absolute crapload of money and be the talk of not just boxing, but world sport all over again. Hell Don where do I sign?.........
Agreed;D
F*ck "legacy" if someones dangling a £25 mil carrot in front of you...then theres merchandise,and a slice of the PPV...
SERIOUS money;)
See my lenghty reply above but in a nutshell why would Lewis's legacy as an all time great be at all at risk if he came back? He's 43. B Hop has lost to Taylor twice and Calzaghe and will probably lose to Pavlik but none of these losses are to the detriment of his legacy, In some ways he's even enhanced it with these losses proving that even at 43 he is a force to be reckoned with.Quote:
Originally Posted by BIG H
Legacy is soooooooooooooooo overated. If Lewis loses to Vitali it doesn't diminish his legacy one bit, it just adds a loss to his record, at age 43 after 5 years out of the sport.
In exchange for £25,000,000.
Now that's a gamble I'd be more than happy to risk.
Furthermore his legacy is actually damaged if he doesn't take the fight anyway. Critics are always murmouring about how he got lucky against Vitali and then got run out of the sport by him. If he turns down a £25,000,000 offer to prove fight him now some could argue he's just a chicken shit.
At least if he came out of retirement he would be manning up.
But people will undoubtedly say and probably believe that Klitchko was better than Lewis prime for prime (if Len lost)Quote:
Originally Posted by BilboSee my lenghty reply above but in a nutshell why would Lewis's legacy as an all time great be at all at risk if he came back? He's 43. B Hop has lost to Taylor twice and Calzaghe and will probably lose to Pavlik but none of these losses are to the detriment of his legacy, In some ways he's even enhanced it with these losses proving that even at 43 he is a force to be reckoned with.Quote:
Originally Posted by BIG H
Legacy is soooooooooooooooo overated. If Lewis loses to Vitali it doesn't diminish his legacy one bit, it just adds a loss to his record, at age 43 after 5 years out of the sport.
In exchange for £25,000,000.
Now that's a gamble I'd be more than happy to risk.
Furthermore his legacy is actually damaged if he doesn't take the fight anyway. Critics are always murmouring about how he got lucky against Vitali and then got run out of the sport by him. If he turns down a £25,000,000 offer to prove fight him now some could argue he's just a chicken shit.
At least if he came out of retirement he would be manning up.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BilboSee my lenghty reply above but in a nutshell why would Lewis's legacy as an all time great be at all at risk if he came back? He's 43. B Hop has lost to Taylor twice and Calzaghe and will probably lose to Pavlik but none of these losses are to the detriment of his legacy, In some ways he's even enhanced it with these losses proving that even at 43 he is a force to be reckoned with.Quote:
Originally Posted by BIG H
Legacy is soooooooooooooooo overated. If Lewis loses to Vitali it doesn't diminish his legacy one bit, it just adds a loss to his record, at age 43 after 5 years out of the sport.
In exchange for £25,000,000.
Now that's a gamble I'd be more than happy to risk.
Furthermore his legacy is actually damaged if he doesn't take the fight anyway. Critics are always murmouring about how he got lucky against Vitali and then got run out of the sport by him. If he turns down a £25,000,000 offer to prove fight him now some could argue he's just a chicken shit.
At least if he came out of retirement he would be manning up.
Its not about the money for Lewis, he achieved his goals made a shed full of money and beat the best around at the time. So why would he want to come back.....thats the bottom line. Personnally I would love Lewis to come back but I don't think it will happen because Lewis is happily retired knowing the fact he is mega rich and his legacy is intact.
I honestly don't understand why people want a fighter LIGHT-YEARS past his best coming out of retirement?
Lewis retired undisputed champ. He beat everyone he faced. He finished healthy and loaded. That is a GREAT boxing success story.
The only people that say Vitali retired Lewis are the idiots that want Lewis back to see him LOSE.
Vitali should just let it rest and be man enough to say i lost to the best heavyweight in the world.Why does he want to fight a 43 year old Lewis that has been retired for 5 years?
To be fair, I don't think Vitali even mentioned Lewis this time, it's the usual "Lennox out of retirmenT" story that follows every heavyweight fight.Quote:
Originally Posted by littlebif
Vitali said he wants Valuev.
I would rather Vitali fight Valuev at this point....#1 it would be the two biggest guys fighting for the championship in the history of boxing and #2 Lewis has been out of boxing a lot longer than Vitali and it would bring more confusion to the division if Lewis was able to win because what would he do after that??? He could fight Wlad but I doubt that would happen. And who would Manny train???
Vitali-Valuev....I want to see Valuev knocked the funk out!!!!!
Lewis is real smart and has more money than he could ever need.
No chance of a comeback.
the size of this offer worries me...Lewis could come back for this amount
not sure how much money he has but this is serious dough, and as said before when does the 'fuck the legacy' attitude hit home with Lennox :rolleyes:
he has kids now right ?? that chunk alone would set one up for life
if he did come back I think Klitschko would humiliate him, maybe not KO him but we could see him retiring on his stool or something like that - not the way you want your last memory to be (still pains me when I think about how Benn went out) but for 25 million.......
am seriously worried this fight could actually happen :-\
I wouldn't blame Lennox for coming back for £25m and i think he could beat Vitali i think he would stop him.
I would disagree,in many other sports guys have stuck around one year to long and it left a bad taste in peoples mouthsQuote:
Originally Posted by BilboSee my lenghty reply above but in a nutshell why would Lewis's legacy as an all time great be at all at risk if he came back? He's 43. B Hop has lost to Taylor twice and Calzaghe and will probably lose to Pavlik but none of these losses are to the detriment of his legacy, In some ways he's even enhanced it with these losses proving that even at 43 he is a force to be reckoned with.Quote:
Originally Posted by BIG H
Legacy is soooooooooooooooo overated. If Lewis loses to Vitali it doesn't diminish his legacy one bit, it just adds a loss to his record, at age 43 after 5 years out of the sport.
In exchange for £25,000,000.
Now that's a gamble I'd be more than happy to risk.
Furthermore his legacy is actually damaged if he doesn't take the fight anyway. Critics are always murmouring about how he got lucky against Vitali and then got run out of the sport by him. If he turns down a £25,000,000 offer to prove fight him now some could argue he's just a chicken shit.
At least if he came out of retirement he would be manning up.
Willie Mays not being able to catch up to a fly ball playing with the Mets
Steve Carlton getting cut by 3 teams in one year
Joe Namath playing for the Rams
And yeah Ali-Berbick
Youve got to know when to fold em
Yes Lennox struggled a bit last time with Vitali but lets not forget Lennox took the fight with Vitali at a weeks notice he was training to fight Kirk Johnson who pulled out with a chest injury. Vitali was going to fight on the undercard he was number 1 contender for the WBC and Lennox decided to fight him had Lennox been training to fight Vitali he would have handled him a lot easier.
If Lennox was going to comeback he would have done it.
Im sure he had similar offers while Wlad was ko`ing everyone.
43yo no fight in 4yrs common its not like he is in Joe Louis position.
I think Lennox made around £100m from the sport but £25m could tempt him i hope doesn't as i have said loads of times but you couldn't blame him for £25m.
Lewis won't come back for less than £50 million
He said a few years ago he would have to get £40 million to come back
I cant see it
Lewis was one of my favourite fighters but i wouldnt wanna see him come back he has been out for to long.It shows how bad the division is trying to get the undisputed champ in LL to come back 5 years after he has retired.
If he did come back which i cant see who would he get to train him Manny Stewart is with the Klitchos now!
It is just to create some hype...There are no real fights out there for Vitaly that would create interest...The Valuev fight would be more of a freak show.......The Peter fight was the biggest draw there was for him....
Lennox is not coming back no reason to..nothing to prove and he certainly does not need the money
You make a fair point about their previous fight. But i can't see why you, and the others are all saying i think this will happen, i think lennox will get seriously hurt or vitali will get beat...Quote:
Originally Posted by tysonbruno
NO ONE knows what lennox is like know FACT. We have seen Vitali, but there is no one of knowing what speed, stamina agility etc he has. unless u see some good recent sparring vids or a fight you can not call a fight.
Thread Merged
Hi folks.I've just read that Don king is going to offer Lennox Lewis a £25million bid for him to return to the fight game at the heavyweight division this week.Don King want Lewis to come back fighting and challenge Vitali Klitchko sometime next year:o:o
Lewis is now 43 years old!!
What do you guys think will happen??Will Lewis take the chance??
I very much doubt it.. Unless Lewis is extremely hard up for cash, which is doubtful considering his promotional and commentator gigs that he has, then i don't ever see this happening... it has to have been at least 5 years since he has fought, and that is a longgg lay off for even someone who is in their prime.. On top of that Vitali has pulled out of more fights than he's actually fought.. For lewis to sign a fight, train his ass off and commit to fighting someone who may not even be able to fight, seems silly to me.
Don King will have talks with Lennox Lewis later in the week so we'll find out what his choice is!Icant really see this getting pulled off ,but you never know £25million for one fight win or lose is a great lump some!!!!Time will tell:cool:
I've merged 2 threads here folks as they are on the same story
Don King hates the Klitchko brothers for dismantling his fighters and therefor cutting down on their marketability and that is a big loss to his greedy ass now he's grabbing at straws.Lewis wouldn't give Vitali rematch while he had the chance in 2003. I doubt you could melt Lewis down and pour him in the ring now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sonny78
Do you knwo if this is one of the biggest purses ever ? I think Evander and Tyson had 30 million for their rematch .
Lewis has got into shape recently and he always hints at a comeback but I duno if hes just playing with the journalists . I always thought he was too smart to comeback . But hes the type of guy that would only fight if he knew he could win . He doesnt need the money .
Anyway he wont be going back on his word cuz he always said if the offer was big enough , he would comeback .
For the record Lewis hasn't said a word recently,it was Don King who has simply said that a huge offer is their if he wants it!
isnt 25 million euro like 23 million dollars or sumthing
Lennox said before that he was offered more than that for a fight about 2 years ago and said he's not interested. He's got a family now and is financially secure and has a regular job with HBO.
He beat Klitschko when he was 38 and in the worst shape of his career - he has nothing to prove.
I don't think he will do it for any money, he retired at the right time and he appears to be content with his riches and enjoying a well earned happy retirement.
I must say though, I'd personally prefer to see him in the ring than sat outside beside Jim and Larry with a headset on........but there you go;D
I do laugh when people post that Lennox certainly doesn't need the money.
Seriously how much money would someone have to have to happily turn down a genuine £25,000,000 pay day?
I don't reckon the fight will happen because I don't think Don King could make good on his money offer.
But if the money was on the table, guaranteed, only a saint or a mug would choose to turn down it down due to the risk of changing the number 2 on their boxing record loss column to a 3.
He has made about £100,000,000 in his career.
Another £25,000,000 would not change his lifestyle, he would still live as he does, buy what he wants, go where he wants. So he does not NEED the money does he Bilbo?
To me and you, yeah it sounds fucking nuts to turn it down I grant you that.
I want VK to bait him up and show some f*cking character for once in his dull existence...
He bores me Vitali but he's very effective.
Lewis should not accept Vitali should get over it.
When they showed Lewis during the ringwalk on Saturday night he had a great big gut on him. He's not interested in coming back and I can't see King being able to come up with a hundred million guaranteed dollars (he'd have to pay two guys) to put the fight on. Lewis was only a PPV draw against Holyfield and Tyson. Two previously retired Europeans fighting each other at MSG is not going to pull in two million PPV buys.