I don't claim to be an HIV expert, but wouldn't Kenzie have been born with HIV if Tommy had been positive back then? I personally believe Tommy had HIV, but he was also a pathological liar and meth can definitely eat away at your body before killing you early. I've also known people personally who came up with some crazy lies to cover their meth use. I never understood the negative tests that followed, unless all of those samples were not Tommy's blood.
Or he paid a Doctor to claim it was negative.
For the record, I doubt he had it way back in 1989 because it would've been detected sooner if he had, but he may have contracted it before he tested positive.
Wouldn't have been too long though. It shows up on the test pretty quickly as I understand it.
In nevada a fighter just had to give bloodwork at the beginning of every year once and that satisfied the requirement for the caldenar year. Many states didnt require testing at all. Morrisons positive changed all that
I don't claim to be an HIV expert, but wouldn't Kenzie have been born with HIV if Tommy had been positive back then? I personally believe Tommy had HIV, but he was also a pathological liar and meth can definitely eat away at your body before killing you early. I've also known people personally who came up with some crazy lies to cover their meth use. I never understood the negative tests that followed, unless all of those samples were not Tommy's blood.
margaret thatcher wrote: ↑12 Jun 2020, 16:34
Pretty hard to beat an era with Holy, Lewis, Vander, and Tyson. It even had some Klit if you're into that type of thing
Bowe, Old Man Foreman, David Tua, Ray Mercer.
The 90's was stacked.
Even Larry Holmes had some moments in the 90's.
Dokes, Ruddock, Morrison, moorer. Not even remotely close in talent and even more of a gap in entertainment.
The 90s would have been a lot more entertaining if more big fights had happened.
You had guys like Moorer and Bowe who basically avoided all the top fighters of their era besides Holyfield and spent their time padding their records with journeymen/gatekeeper types.
Imagine if we had seen Bowe-Witherspoon, Bowe-Ruddock, Bowe-Tyson, Bowe-Lewis, Bowe-McCall. All fights that could and should have been made.
Pointing out that matchmaking sucked in the 1990s isn't really a controversial stance. Compare it to say the 1960s middleweight scene and the difference is immediately glaring.
On top of that in many of the biggest fights that were made like Lewis-Tyson and Lewis-Holyfield one of the fighters involved was shot or badly faded. Heck, Holyfield was thought to be shot when he fought Tyson but that turned out to be a miscalculation. Had they known Holyfield still had a lot left, it probably wouldn't have happened.
Part of the problem may have been that fighters received title shots without having to do much to earn them. They have less incentive to face the best if they don't have to fight top guys to earn their shots.
Yes, there were some good matchups that didn't happen that should have. Happens in just about every era. There were some that did. The era should be judged by what actually did happen. If you think the middle weight division was better, fine. Start another thread on that if you want. (Please put it in Boxing History)
The question is if the heavyweight era was better in the 1990s than now.
Cojimar 1946 wrote: ↑15 Jun 2020, 14:20
Part of the problem may have been that fighters received title shots without having to do much to earn them. They have less incentive to face the best if they don't have to fight top guys to earn their shots.
Is this a complaint for the 90's?
Because if it is what did Duhaupas, Gerald Washington, Szpilka, or Eric Molina do to get shots at the title?
Cojimar 1946 wrote: ↑15 Jun 2020, 14:20
Part of the problem may have been that fighters received title shots without having to do much to earn them. They have less incentive to face the best if they don't have to fight top guys to earn their shots.
Is this a complaint for the 90's?
Because if it is what did Duhaupas, Gerald Washington, Szpilka, or Eric Molina do to get shots at the title?
It's absolutely a huge problem today. None of those guys warranted title shots either.
Today there are only three different match ups that would be worthwhile. So far only one has happened yet.
In the 1990s there were dozens of potential ones. Obviously many did not happen or were when one guy was past it. However, there was certainly more than 1 big matchup in the 1990s.
Ambling Alp II wrote: ↑15 Jun 2020, 16:16
Today there are only three different match ups that would be worthwhile. So far only one has happened yet.
In the 1990s there were dozens of potential ones. Obviously many did not happen or were when one guy was past it. However, there was certainly more than 1 big matchup in the 1990s.
This isn't even remotely close.
First of all what constitutes an era is subjective but most people see it as more than one year. If we end up defining an era as 10 years then we can't make an assessment of meaningful matchups based on one year.
Secondly, I assume you are referring to Fury, Joshua, and Wilder but I think there are a number of younger up and coming heavyweights like Daniel Dubois, Bakhodir Jalolov, and Philip Hrgovic who may end up being better than the three you mentioned. It's premature to act like Fury, Wilder, and Joshua have established themselves as the best of this era. They have not done so.
Wilder's best wins are a faded Luis Ortiz and Stiverne. I don't think he even proved himself better than Povetkin and Pulev. Joshua was recently knocked out by Andy Ruiz and one that was not in especially good shape even by Ruiz standards.
For a 10 year period I would say 1990-2000/1991-2001 was among the strongest 10 year periods in history.
You had among others
Lennox Lewis
Evander Holyfield
Mike Tyson
Tim Witherspoon
Vitali Klitschko
Wladimir Klitschko
Ike Ibeabuchi
Tony Tucker
Tony Tubbs
Chris Byrd
David Tua
Oliver McCall
Frank Bruno
Michael Moorer
Larry Holmes
Ray Mercer
Carl Williams
Hasim Rahman
Riddick Bowe
John Ruiz
Kirk Johnson
Corrie Sanders
Gary Mason
Andrew Golota
etc
In addition to the elite you had solid journeymen/gatekeeper types like Larry Donald, Monte Barrett, Michael Grant, etc
Nostalgia often compels people to reminisce about the past, falsely believing in an idealised version of history, making things seem much better back then than they really were.
Here are some interesting facts about nineties heavyweights, using the aggregated list of top-ten annual ratings of The RING, based on the amount of appearances:
• Evander Holyfield (9 times)
• Lennox Lewis (9 times)
• Michael Moorer (8 times)
• Riddick Bowe (7 times)
• George Foreman (7 times)
• Ray Mercer (6 times)
• Mike Tyson (5 times)
• Tim Witherspoon (4 times)
• David Tua (4 times)
• Razor Ruddock (3 times)
• Henry Akinwande (3 times)
• Andrew Golota (3 times)
• Ike Ibeabuchi (3 times)
• Tony Tucker (2 times)
• Tommy Morrison (2 times)
• Oliver McCall (2 times)
• Shannon Briggs (2 times)
• Michael Grant (2 times)
Apart from Evander Holyfield, it seemed that all the other big guys rarely faced each other (unless the A-side agreed to compete against past-his-prime big names that brought decent paydays).
This was usually the result of a commercial decision, whereby the current “champ” often waited for the demand for certain fights to “marinate”, whilst exploiting their opponents’ advanced years, in order to minimise the risk of defeat (i.e. Lewis-Holyfield; Lewis-Tyson; Tyson-Holyfield I) etc.
And if a commercially unpopular fighter that didn’t provide a big payday opportunity over-performed, such as Ray Mercer against Holyfield & Lewis or Axel Schulz versus George Foreman, then they weren’t granted immediate rematches (despite the scoring of those bouts being controversial to the point where immediate rematches were justified).
Some people might also choose to be dishonest and claim the nineties had some “strong” names (such as Wladimir Klitschko, Tony Tubbs, John Ruiz, Kirk Johnson, Corrie Sanders and Gary Mason), but none of them were considered amongst the top-ten at heavyweight during the nineties.
And even the likes of Vitali Klitschko, Chris Byrd, Frank Bruno, Larry Holmes, Carl Williams and Hasim Rahman only appeared once in The RING’s top-ten annual ratings list.
Of course, people are entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts.
Heavyweight boxing during the nineties was really good, but nowhere near as “great” a many are claiming, because a lot of big names refrained from facing each other during their physical primes.
Last edited by Enlightened-One on 22 Jun 2020, 04:34, edited 1 time in total.
Nostalgia often compels people to reminisce about the past, falsely believing in an idealised version of history, making things seem much better back then than they really were. And this certainly applies to the heavyweight division during the nineties.
Here are some interesting facts about nineties heavyweights, using the aggregated list of top-ten annual ratings of The RING, based on the amount of appearances:
• Evander Holyfield (9 times)
• Lennox Lewis (9 times)
• Michael Moorer (8 times)
• Riddick Bowe (7 times)
• George Foreman (7 times)
• Ray Mercer (6 times)
• Mike Tyson (5 times)
• Tim Witherspoon (4 times)
• David Tua (4 times)
• Razor Ruddock (3 times)
• Henry Akinwande (3 times)
• Andrew Golota (3 times)
• Ike Ibeabuchi (3 times)
• Tony Tucker (2 times)
• Tommy Morrison (2 times)
• Oliver McCall (2 times)
• Shannon Briggs (2 times)
• Michael Grant (2 times)
Apart from Evander Holyfield, it seemed that all the other big guys rarely faced each other (unless the A-side agreed to compete against past-his-prime big names that brought decent paydays).
This was usually the result of a commercial decision, whereby the current “champ” often waited for the demand for certain fights to “marinate”, whilst exploiting their opponents’ advanced years, in order to minimise the risk of defeat (i.e. Lewis-Holyfield; Lewis-Tyson; Tyson-Holyfield I etc.).
And if a commercially unpopular fighter that didn’t provide a big payday opportunity over-performed, such as Ray Mercer against Holyfield & Lewis or Axel Schulz versus George Foreman, then they weren’t granted immediate rematches (despite the scoring of those bouts being controversial to the point where immediate rematches were justified).
Some people might also choose to be dishonest and claim the nineties had some “strong” names (such as Wladimir Klitschko, Tony Tubbs, John Ruiz, Kirk Johnson, Corrie Sanders and Gary Mason), but none of them were considered amongst the top-ten at heavyweight during the nineties (at least definitely not for a prolonged period of time, since their names never appeared in the annual ratings list).
And even the likes of Vitali Klitschko, Chris Byrd, Frank Bruno, Larry Holmes, Carl Williams and Hasim Rahman only appeared once in The RING’s top-ten annual ratings list.
Of course, people are entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts.
Heavyweight boxing during the nineties was really good, but nowhere near as “great” a many are claiming, because a lot of big names refrained from facing each other during their physical primes.
Nostalgia often compels people to reminisce about the past, falsely believing in an idealised version of history, making things seem much better back then than they really were. And this certainly applies to the heavyweight division during the nineties.
Here are some interesting facts about nineties heavyweights, using the aggregated list of top-ten annual ratings of The RING, based on the amount of appearances:
• Evander Holyfield (9 times)
• Lennox Lewis (9 times)
• Michael Moorer (8 times)
• Riddick Bowe (7 times)
• George Foreman (7 times)
• Ray Mercer (6 times)
• Mike Tyson (5 times)
• Tim Witherspoon (4 times)
• David Tua (4 times)
• Razor Ruddock (3 times)
• Henry Akinwande (3 times)
• Andrew Golota (3 times)
• Ike Ibeabuchi (3 times)
• Tony Tucker (2 times)
• Tommy Morrison (2 times)
• Oliver McCall (2 times)
• Shannon Briggs (2 times)
• Michael Grant (2 times)
Apart from Evander Holyfield, it seemed that all the other big guys rarely faced each other (unless the A-side agreed to compete against past-his-prime big names that brought decent paydays).
This was usually the result of a commercial decision, whereby the current “champ” often waited for the demand for certain fights to “marinate”, whilst exploiting their opponents’ advanced years, in order to minimise the risk of defeat (i.e. Lewis-Holyfield; Lewis-Tyson; Tyson-Holyfield I etc.).
And if a commercially unpopular fighter that didn’t provide a big payday opportunity over-performed, such as Ray Mercer against Holyfield & Lewis or Axel Schulz versus George Foreman, then they weren’t granted immediate rematches (despite the scoring of those bouts being controversial to the point where immediate rematches were justified).
Some people might also choose to be dishonest and claim the nineties had some “strong” names (such as Wladimir Klitschko, Tony Tubbs, John Ruiz, Kirk Johnson, Corrie Sanders and Gary Mason), but none of them were considered amongst the top-ten at heavyweight during the nineties (at least definitely not for a prolonged period of time, since their names never appeared in the annual ratings list).
And even the likes of Vitali Klitschko, Chris Byrd, Frank Bruno, Larry Holmes, Carl Williams and Hasim Rahman only appeared once in The RING’s top-ten annual ratings list.
Of course, people are entitled to their own opinions, but not their own facts.
Heavyweight boxing during the nineties was really good, but nowhere near as “great” a many are claiming, because a lot of big names refrained from facing each other during their physical primes.
