prime marciano vs '88 tyson

[man]

I can’t agree. A year earlier Holy was getting knocked out by Bowe…who was so worn out that in his next 2 fights got mangled by Golota.

Tyson, quite literally, got two bites at Holy and lost them both.

holy maybe was no prime anymore, but
further away from prime than tyson seems
a stretch. i do not think bowe was that bad
against holy. he underestimated golota and
prepared poorly. the version that left the ring
with holy is not the same that entered gainst
golota.

[SenorPipino]

I can’t agree. A year earlier Holy was getting knocked out by Bowe…who was so worn out that in his next 2 fights got mangled by Golota.

Tyson, quite literally, got two bites at Holy and lost them both.

holy maybe was no prime anymore, but
further away from prime than tyson seems
a stretch. i do not think bowe was that bad
against holy. he underestimated golota and
prepared poorly. the version that left the ring
with holy is not the same that entered gainst
golota.

Did he also underestimate Golota and prepare poorly the second time too?

[man]

I can’t agree. A year earlier Holy was getting knocked out by Bowe…who was so worn out that in his next 2 fights got mangled by Golota.

Tyson, quite literally, got two bites at Holy and lost them both.

holy maybe was no prime anymore, but
further away from prime than tyson seems
a stretch. i do not think bowe was that bad
against holy. he underestimated golota and
prepared poorly. the version that left the ring
with holy is not the same that entered gainst
golota.

Did he also underestimate Golota and prepare poorly the second time too?

good point. it's boxing though. people
can age quickly.

[SenorPipino]

Bowe did age quickly. He showed signs of major decline in his '95 bout with Holyfield, including the first knockdown of his career, and then looked sluggish and off-balance in both bouts against Golota the next year.
Maybe the countless low blows had something to do with it, but even Bowe saw the handwriting on the wall and retired after those beatings.
(Let's not discuss his farcical comeback against non-descript competition.)

[Mr E]

Style-wise they were almost the same

i never saw that similarity, but i will watch some fights
and have a look.

Case in point, a look back at the Holyfield-Tyson fights shows that a man with an incredible work rate of punches can off set Tyson's defense and offense. Holyfield by my count averaged out to 55-65 punches a round, though he sometimes threw as high as 80-100 against second string competition.

i think a prime evander gives every boxer in history a
long night. but the tyson of then was not the same as
almost ten years earlier IMO. what happened was that
his assaults did not yield victory early on and then
frustration kicked in and with this one of the key things
in mike's arsenal went down the gutter: head movement.

i don't say mike '88 would have easy game with evander,
but the fight would have been way more competitive. i
just do not see a prime tyson being so frustrated that quickly
and from then on rely on single punch hopes. i think one
can argue that a prime holyfield met a (well) post prime
tyson.

btw i would be interested in mike's punches per round from
86 to 89. do you have these?

Good stuff here and elsewhere on this thread, man. Well done.