By Ryan Burton
Future Hall of Famer Evander Holyfield's career may have ended in 2011 but the prime of his career took place during the 90's when the heavyweight division was in a golden era. Holyfield faced Hall of Fame members Mike Tyson and Lennox Lewis twice apiece and Riddick Bowe three times while also fighting several other elite fighters.
In a recent conversation with BoxingScene.com, Holyfield said that you can't really compare his era to the current heavyweight era which has been dominated by Wladimir Klitschko and his brother Vitali up until his recent retirement.
"You can't compare those guys to this era because for one thing we had long amateur careers. If you ask those guys how many amateur fights they had you will see the difference. I had 257 amateur fights. I fought everybody. I didn't get cakewalks. I knew going into a fight it would be tough," said Holyfield.
With that being said, Holyfield feels that the Klitschko brothers would have made the necessary adjustments to have been successful in the early 90s.
"In their same style, when they first came in they didn't do too well. They got knocked out a couple times then they got with Emmanuel Steward who showed them how to hold on and all that and they started winning. "
"That shows you that power is knowledge and that any fighter can win if they are willing to make the adjustment. I think if they would have fought in our era they would have done fine because they made the adjustment. That's what we did. We were willing to make the adjustment," Holyfield told BoxingScene.com.
Send questions or comments to ringsidewriter@gmail.com . You can follow Ryan on Twitter @ringsidewriter