Yes, that would appear to be it, although a bookmaking company in London has it 7/2 that he'll return to the ring within two years.
It was a pretty good decade with Lennox Lewis at the helm of the heavyweight division, although I would say that I don't take terribly seriously the pundits claim that Lewis fought essentially every top name in the division. He never fought Bowe, Moorer, Ibeabuchi, Maskaev, or Sanders; he avoided a rematch with Mercer after their terribly close bout; and he fought Holyfield and Tyson far past their respective primes.
I don't fault him for having avoided a fight with Byrd for economic reasons, but I'd rather have seen him fight Byrd or Ruiz than Botha or Rahman - the latter whom he took too lightly, and paid for having done so.
Still: knowing, as we do, the way heavyweight fighters can conduct themselves, I'd weigh the past decade under Lewis as positive, if lacking a bit of spark. The next decade, I'd wager, belongs to Vitaly Klitschko and/or Dominic Guinn.
LPS5 |
