What Is The Biggest Duck Of All Time?

[JAB5239]

Legacy is the point. Forget the ratings, both proved they were still relevant by beating Undefeated Champions (though Mercer dumped his belt). The fight should have happened. People would pay to watch the damn fight even now.

Legacy is one thing, but Holmes lost to McCall the same month in 1995 that George defended his mandatory against Schultz. Had he chosen to fight another geriatric instead of his mandatory he would have been criticized just as harshly. And for the record, I think Homes would have beaten him at that time but I would hardly call it a duck. We might as well say he ducked McCall too, no?

[Obama]

Legacy is one thing, but Holmes lost to McCall the same month in 1995 that George defended his mandatory against Schultz. Had he chosen to fight another geriatric instead of his mandatory he would have been criticized just as harshly. And for the record, I think Homes would have beaten him at that time but I would hardly call it a duck. We might as well say he ducked McCall too, no?

Nah. Foreman was too old to duck anyone cept Larry at that point. And he just kept on ducking him. As for Foreman being criticized, they stripped him of every title he had anyways. Even the fabulous WBU title.

[Scott9945]

I disagree with this. Business is business. Bowe trashed the WBC belt when Lennox was his mandatory. Tyson gave him step aside money to fight Holy. If Mike had one that fight would have been even bigger. Smart move. As far as Holy goes..both had other business to take care of in the years 93', 94' and 95'. I just gon't see where a duck can be insinuated.

Thanks for posting this so I don't have to. Lewis wasn't giving multiple options to Don King. Otherwise why wouldn't he take the biggest money fights available?

[JAB5239]

Thanks for posting this so I don't have to. Lewis wasn't giving multiple options to Don King. Otherwise why wouldn't he take the biggest money fights available?

There is so much more involved than the fans opinion who who should have fought who, and when. Back on the old AOL boards I hated Lewis but have since changed my opinion. He was a great champion and a smart businessman. Look hard enough and every fighter ever can be criticized.

[Scott9945]

There is so much more involved than the fans opinion who who should have fought who, and when. Back on the old AOL boards I hated Lewis but have since changed my opinion. He was a great champion and a smart businessman. Look hard enough and every fighter ever can be criticized.

Lennox retired with his brains, his title, and his money. You can't ask for a better role model for other fighters than that.

[gibo]

Biggest duck was delahoja claiming victory but wouldn't fight a rematch with TITO. You can't duck any better than that!!!!!!

[Tiozzo]

Ignoring all the color (but mostly talent) barrier cases, George Foreman ducking Larry Holmes has got to be #1. He ducked the man for 2 damn decades.

George never actually retired from boxing until after Briggs. His 10 year hiatus was just 10 years of ducking. Go ahead and look into it. He never officially retired, not making it up at all.

Just look at the dates. His last fight before his hiatus was against Jimmy Young in 1977. Holmes then proceeded to dominate the Heavyweight division from 1978 to 1985. Larry announced his first retirement in 1986. Oddly enough, George started fighting again in 1987. Larry came back out of retirement in 1988, tried his best to get a fight with George over the next 10 years, but ultimately failed.

Ultimate duck.

[Tiozzo]

sometimes, a fighter has good reasons tu duck someone (the fear of getting an ass whooping is NOT a good reason )

I remember some people accusing Lewis of ducking Byrd (because he vacated his IBF title instead of facing his mandatory Byrd), as if Lewis feared Byrd ()

it's so ****ing obvious Lewis ''ducked'' so that he wouldn't have to get in some kind of uninteresting mismatch with little money involved

so there are different types of duckings to me

[sonnyboyx2]

Ignoring all the color (but mostly talent) barrier cases, George Foreman ducking Larry Holmes has got to be #1. He ducked the man for 2 damn decades.

Holmes was never in a position to face Foreman and would have been destroyed should they ever have fought in the 70s, Holmes was always suspect to a right-hand over the jab (Roy Williams, Kevin Issacs, Weaver, Snipes, Arrington, Tyson, Shavers) Foreman was a devastating puncher.

[sonnyboyx2]

If we go back to the days of the color barrier there were obviously several black fighters who never got title shots, due to the conditions, it would be probably unfair to classify those as the biggest ducks.

To be fair, i will stick to my era in watching the sport. The HW division is the biggest division, and in the last 20 odd years that i followed the sport, my sole pick would be Rid**** Bowe throwing his WBC belt in the garbage can to avoid fighting Lennox Lewis. Lewis himself avoided Ruiz, and that has been discussed by me and sonny here already, so no need to give talk about that again.

The recent mega fight that didnt happen might be a good contender, but there is still a slight possibility that it still may happen, so we can't call it a duck yet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0eins2DhSo