the "real"greatest Heavyweight!

[THE PHILOSOPHER]

Lewis was already considering retirement,

Here are the exact quotes from Lewis and Steward from 2003:

Jones, the WBA champion, now seems to be Lewis’s long-term target. “We’ll just keep fighting guys until the big fight with Roy Jones comes up and I think it will happen eventually,” Emanuel Steward, Lewis’s trainer, said.

Oh dear....

Lewis: Weight 250 +
height 6′ 5″
reach 84″

Jones: Weight 199
height 5′ 11″
reach 74″

lol.

And 11 days notice is hardly a fitting amount of time for unranked vitali to prepare for lewis, boswell is not lewis!!

[Fenster]

@THE PHILOSOPHER

Not sure what relevance you think that Manny Steward quote has? Roy Jones was a possible big money fight although serious negotiations never happened (even Roy said Lennox was too big for him after beating Ruiz). It was in Steward's best interests that Lewis continued (huge paydays).

Here are quotes from Lewis on retirement in 2003 - Speculation has been mounting over the last six months that Lewis will retire from the sport altogether rather than step back into the ring. "Retirement - that is an option for me. It's certainly tempting. I really need a fight to make me feel the desire to go through all the training," said Lewis. "It has to get me excited. At this point I'm not excited by anyone."

Here's a quote from Steward in 2003 after Lewis made the Johnson fight - "Lennox can only lose through complacency, he can go on until 40, he will KO Johnson, Vitali, Roy Jones"

Lewis had 11 days to prepare for Vitali, Kirk Johnson was certainly not Vitali. They were in the same boat except Lewis no longer had a serious desire to fight whereas Vitali had everything to gain.