BoxRec

KOJOE90 wrote:

Ezzard wrote:The problem with this thread isn't that Tyson didn't amass a decent record. It's to do with the usual talk about "he could have been the best ever". Tyson's probelms have been documented way back. The ridiculous fist fight with Mitch Green being a great example. Tyson was unhinged. This gave him his ferocity and his terrifying ring presence. It made him a top fighter but it also made him psychologically vulnerable to someone who could step back and see him as a man and not some unbeatable mythical monster.

Tyson was not messed up by King and Givens. They didn't help but he was always messed up as the incident with Green (plus countless others) proves. Tyson was built up so much in the public's collective imagination (just as Liston was) that it's impossible to separate the man in the ring from the perception of him as person.

Johnson, Dempsey, Tunney, Louis, Marciano, Ali, Holmes, etc... all got dropped and got up to win in fights. They all overcame tough fights to win. Mike couldn't do this. Even if he'd have not gone to prison, trained like a maniac 25 hours a day and lived like a monk he'd still have not had 30 defences because he was mentally fragile. Boxing is a lot more than who punches hardest and fastest.

Great post Ezzard.

The "If Cus had lived" theory has never quite sat right with me either. Tyson was always a person with 'mental & emotional issues' before, after and DURING his time under the protective wing of his mentor Cus.

Over the years the more I have thought about it the more I have come to believe the if Cus had lived another 10/20 years this would have made little difference to Tysons career in the long run.

And with respect D'amato hardly made Patterson into the greatest of champions... I think much of his influence on his fighters was a negative one, making his fighters too introspective and aware of their own fears and waeknesses...

>>>Firstly realise is spelt with an S. Its only you dumb yanks who spell it like that and seeing as you said British have good grammar I think you should accept that. Remember we have been going alot longer than you, then again you probably can't spell because your ancestors are all the scumbags we sent over there because we didn't want them.<<<

Ha…Ha…Ha…Ha! You really are an idiot! “Realise” is rarely ever even in a dictionary and when it is it has a definition of: earn on some commercial or business transaction. Geez, you really are clueless! Even semi-dumb people would have at least checked the spelling, but not you…no you are in a class of stupid all by yourself! I'm sure that you were not talking about a business transaction. Whereas Realize is what you meant, but you're too fornicating stupid to know the difference!


>>>Remember we have been going alot longer than you, then again you probably can't spell because your ancestors are all the scumbags we sent over there because we didn't want them<<<

Yeah…at one point you all own most of Europe and most of Asia yet you lost it all, which I know why…that because some of your stupid ancestors must have at some point been put in charge and due to the inbreeding your ancestors did not have sense enough to beat down many of the uncivilized nomadic tribes…now that it truly pathetic. And as you have demonstrated here, you’re ancestors have just continued to get dumber and dumber…you’ll be lucky if your offspring will even be able to walk considering how dumb you are! Also, “alot” is two words as well, not one. HA…HA…HA…HA…HA! You need to give up now, you have already shown that you cannot hang with me in anything, including English…what a disgrace you must be…to be corrected and outsmarted by a colonial hillbilly redneck!

>>>You are really showing how stupid you are when you think realise is spelt with a Z. HAHAHAHAH<<<

Tell me about it there genius. You should really check a dictionary before making any more of your ignorant statements, but I see now that it is just at boxing that you are dumb to, by being incorrect on something as simple as realize is not that bad…what is bad is that you thought that you were still right and instead of doing what an intelligent person would and look it up in a dictionary, you just dig yourself a deeper hole of stupidity…classic..HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

>>>Secondly calling someone a redneck with the record your country has with race relations is a bit much.<<<

Yeah, Tony Blair is such a deacon of good relations…


>>>Remember we abolished slavery when your country fought was still fighting about it.<<<

Do you really want me to go back into your history and break out all the instances of witch burnings, all the murder and butchery brought about by the Church of England, really, our history is moderate compared to the travesties that you guys have been responsible for. Besides, slavery was only abolished in the British Empire in 1838, whereas we abolished it in 1865, not much difference in years there Gump, but then again, if you weren’t such a twit, you would have known that before yapping about it and making yourself look like a very, very dumb individual. Hell, I probably know more about your country than you do! Give it up, you don't have a snowball chance in hell now you retarded idiot!

>>>Can I just assure my American friends on this site that in Britain we don't all share this guy's sentiments.<<<

Don't worry J-C...Arsenal is a one of a kind. Nobody would ever really confuse him as being an actual Brit!

>>>The "If Cus had lived" theory has never quite sat right with me either. Tyson was always a person with 'mental & emotional issues' before, after and DURING his time under the protective wing of his mentor Cus.
Over the years the more I have thought about it the more I have come to believe the if Cus had lived another 10/20 years this would have made little difference to Tysons career in the long run.<<<

I don't think it would have made a bit of difference either. Tyson was mental even when Cus was alive, he just had Cus taking care of incidents and keeping it under wraps, but Tyson has always been a problem child. If Cus had lived ten, or twenty more years it would not have surprised me if Tyson would have broke all connections to him at some point, just like he has with all that was close to him during those years. Maybe not since Cus was the father-figure in his life, and he would probably have always looked at Cus like that, but I don’t think Cus would have been part of Tyson boxing career after around 1987, or 1988…and regardless of anything, Tyson would have self-destructed because he was very self-destructive when Cus was alive, but being a minor a lot of the incidents were by law, not allowed to printed.

Arsenal wrote:J-C before you get involved read the thread from start to finish and see who started the personal attacks! Barry is well known for getting personal when people disagree with him.

I don't want to get involved in the arguement so this will be my last post on this thread. I have no problem with either you or Barry.

It is a sad fact that on forums such as these disgreemens will often end up with the trading of personal insults between posters. However on a board used by people from all over the world, including many Americans calling people "Redneck" and bringing up long finish wars and the history of the slave trade, can only be devisive and will likely offend people other the person the comment was originally aimed at.

You are right J-C and I apologize if anything I have said offends anyone other than Arsenal...it most certainly was not directed at no one else but him!

A bit like barry's homophobic comments? Classy act you Barry! But as I said get out of your own state, not into europe, just another one in the US, and stop reading your magazines and watching your videos!

As I have said on more than one occasion I bow to your superior knowledge Barry and your fantastic grammer. Keep spelling realise with a Z! You look great doing it!

By the way sorry for the inaccurate comments on slavery. Preventing black people using the same facilities as white people in the 1960's is not slavery just a racial prejudice!

>>>Preventing black people using the same facilities as white people in the 1960's is not slavery just a racial prejudice!<<<


Being that you never mentioned anything at all about the above post, it would seem to me that you must be a racist! Do you have problems with people of color using the same facilities that you do? Is that why you just spouted the above statement out of nowhere because you are in fact a racist and things like that are just constantly on your mind?

You're just digging yourself deeper and deeper in the hole!

Keep going Barry mate you look great! Yawn

No...you look great! LOL

I like the way you have worked out a way that I am racist from what I have posted. Is that to get people on your side?

You are so intelligent please leave me alone I can't cope!

HAHAHAH...This forum does make me laugh!

KOJOE90 wrote:http://watch.windsofchange.net/pics/pea ... r-time.jpg

In the interests of peace I have built a virtual ring/thread for them both to discuss their differences...... 8)

Silkov, can you please find out how tall is former welterweight contender Adolph Pruitt standing in height. Sorry to barge in, but I want you to read from my article about Napoles' challengers' height.

J-C wrote:

Arsenal wrote:Nevermind...by the way you ever been out of Virginia you redneck? You know the civil war ended over 100 years don't you?

Can I just assure my American friends on this site that in Britain we don't all share this guy's sentiments.

That's good to hear. barry seems to think swearing and acting like a complete pillock constitutes 'debate'.

Shep needs to give him another slap to go with the one he got the other week for abusing posters.

barry is a disgrace.

barry wrote:You are right J-C and I apologize if anything I have said offends anyone other than Arsenal...it most certainly was not directed at no one else but him!

barry the only thing that offends me is the sheer stupidity of your posts.

I heard you got a call from Tracy Callis and your ma and pa now think you are finally seeing a woman rather than running errands for the real historians.

"barry, tracy here. I want you to drive 200 miles to the library at Pigs Knuckle and search through the old papers there and photocopy anything to do with boxing and then fedex it to me tomorrow. No, I don't want any actual input from you, comments from you, offers to come and give me a massage etc. just the photocopies for me and the lads. Can you do that barry?"

Quality!!!!

I believe people on this board judge Tyson's ability in the ring on soley what he does outside. And Ive even seen some comments here saying Tyson had no stamina! In his prime he went 12 comfortable rounds with Tucker and went 10 with Tillis, Green and Ribalta knocking him out in the last round. Tyson went also went 12 with Ruddock and even in the 1st Holyfield fight he didnt look tired. The only fight Ive ever seen Tyson tired was in the Mcbride fight......but we all know he was past his prime (I hope because Ive seen posters use the Mcbride and Williams fighst to further belittle Tyson's accomplishments).

We are talking about Tyson the fighter, not the Tyson the man.

RazorKO wrote:I believe people on this board judge Tyson's ability in the ring on soley what he does outside. And Ive even seen some comments here saying Tyson had no stamina! In his prime he went 12 comfortable rounds with Tucker and went 10 with Tillis, Green and Ribalta knocking him out in the last round. Tyson went also went 12 with Ruddock and even in the 1st Holyfield fight he didnt look tired. The only fight Ive ever seen Tyson tired was in the Mcbride fight......but we all know he was past his prime (I hope because Ive seen posters use the Mcbride and Williams fighst to further belittle Tyson's accomplishments).

We are talking about Tyson the fighter, not the Tyson the man.

I'm judging Tyson by what he did in the ring... tell me what he did that shows that he deserves to be in the top ten all time heavyweights list?.... I keep asking people this and getting no response...

silkov wrote:

RazorKO wrote:I believe people on this board judge Tyson's ability in the ring on soley what he does outside. And Ive even seen some comments here saying Tyson had no stamina! In his prime he went 12 comfortable rounds with Tucker and went 10 with Tillis, Green and Ribalta knocking him out in the last round. Tyson went also went 12 with Ruddock and even in the 1st Holyfield fight he didnt look tired. The only fight Ive ever seen Tyson tired was in the Mcbride fight......but we all know he was past his prime (I hope because Ive seen posters use the Mcbride and Williams fighst to further belittle Tyson's accomplishments).

We are talking about Tyson the fighter, not the Tyson the man.

I'm judging Tyson by what he did in the ring... tell me what he did that shows that he deserves to be in the top ten all time heavyweights list?.... I keep asking people this and getting no response...

In top 10 heavyweights head to head Tyson deserves to be ranked 6th. In accomplishments he deserved to be ranked 10th at least because after all he was and still is the youngest HW champion and the first to unify all 3 titles so that alone has to get him at least 10th.

Tyson had gifts that no HW had before him - speed mixed in with devastating power. Tyson proved he can take a punch as evident in the Ruddock bouts as well as his losses e.g Holyfield or Lewis when he was past it. His knockout losses was always a sustained beat down until he finally went down - Tyson was never knocked out by one punch, it was always a sustained beating.

As for his heart it is a complicated issue - Tyson proved he had heart by taking the beatings he took espsecially from Lewis when he was past it, but he still took the punches. On the other hand Tyson was easy to discourage as Douglas and Holy proved, even though in both fights Tyson wasnt in the best of mental or physical state he wilted and lost the will to fight back when hurt. But Tyson still proved he had some heart as he took those beatings until he went down - he never surrended or quit in his stool.


Tyson had speed, power, took a great punch, good endurance and good heart - The only thing missing from Tyson was that he lost the will to fight back, but that isnt because Tyson didnt have that ability - It was because he got himself involved with King..... but Tyson was just a kid! He shouldnt have to make all these decisions when your barely out of your teens!

silkov



tyson as a 'champion' was one of the most dominant and best champions ever. he did every thing a champion should do during his reign


we first must look at tysons prime and realize he was the clear # 1 man of the late 80s. while the early 80s belong to holmes, tyson was the ruler of the late 80s.


Mike tyson like joe louis was one the most dominant champs ever! he literally wiped out very good fighters making them look lime bums. tyson asbolutley walked through the best of contender with relative ease. domination in a fight is something to be taken into note.

tyson


- he dominated the 80s in a more devastating fashion than larry holmes did. up until tyson lost the title to douglas, tyson was blowing away the best of fighters and didnt struggle in his title defenses.


tyson was so good that announcers and papers made a big deal when tyson was breifly stunned by a good punch( tucker 1st , bruno 1st, bonecrusher 12th). tyson was considered so indestructable that the thought of landing one good punch on him and stunning him was incredible let alone him being knocked down or out.




tyson did something no one had done since the 70s, he officially(even though there was an official linear champ) unified the titles. the 80s heavyweight division was filled with far too many alpha champs. it was getting ridiculous. holmes was linear champ, but holmes never did fight the other alpha champs and ultimately unify so theres 1 sanctioned champion. tyson however did unify and he did so in a short amount of time. tyson right away unified all 3 belts all on his own in a short amount of time and then defended until he was finally given the oppertunity to fight the 'linear' champ and when tyson beat spinx, there was now 1 legitamite heavyweight champion. duirng holmes reign, there was never just one champ like during tysons reign. think about this, right now we got 4 champions and everyones dieing for someone to unify it. now imagine if someone comes along and wins it, then unifies all the belts in one year alone? hard to imagine that happening so fast isnt it? well thats what happened with tyson. rather than load his defenses with bums after he beat berbick, he immediately went out and unified the division. in essence, tyson cleaned up the mess and restored the heavyweight division in the late 80s. NO MORE ALHPA CHAMPS FOR YEARS BECAUSE OF TYSON. HE FNALLY BROUGHT THE LINEAGE OFFICIALLY BACK.


sorry im not trying to bash holmes, it wasnt all his fault, im just trying to make a case how big of a deal it meant for mike to unify



tyson as champion followed by all the rules a champion is supposed to do. tyson OFFICIALLY CLEANED OUT THE DIVISION IN THE 80S AS MUCH AS ANY HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMP EVER DID IN HIS REIGN.


- all of tysons title defenses were top contenders. they were all world class fighters. even larry holmes filled up his title defenses with a lot of undeserving journeyman. however tyson never did that. he not only defended it frequentley, but fought the best heavyweights of the late mid-late 80s. out of tysons 9 defenses, 7 were alpha champs so tyson basically wiped out all the alpha champs. in comparison, holmes beat only 5 alhpa champs and he had a total of 20 title defenses. so as u see, tyson was fighting the most elite fighters out there


- tyson not only beat the top contenders and alpha champs, he DOMINATED THEM.

pinklon thomas
tony tubbs
bonecrusher smith
trevor berbick
tony tucker


all these guys were good to very good heavyweights who were alpha champs and when they fought tyson, they were easily dismantled in 2 rounds. all these guys were never outclassed that badly or beaten that badly before they fought tyson. tyson however changed things. tyson was so feared that potential top contenders didnt want to fight him.

imagine what tim witherspoon or greg page must think seeing tyson flatten thomas and tubbs in easy fashion. tubbs and thomas were both fighters who beat witherspoon and page.


some of these top world class fighters like tony tubbs, larry holmes, pinklon thomas, tony tubbs tony tucker, etc all these guys were experienced former/current champions that HAD NEVER BEEN KNOCKED OUT BEFORE. well tyson did it easily.

- tony tubbs when well past his prime gave riddick bowe a near even fight.

- tubbs and thomas both great chins, were made to look like nothing when they fought mike and suffered brutal KOs

- holmes only once in his career would be knocked out and that was by mike tyson in brutal fashion making anyone wonder if even the prime holmes could deal with iron mike.

holmes went on to become a top contender in the early 90s and 5 years after he fought tyson he went 12 close rounds with a prime holyfield. still no one except tyson ever stopped LET ALONE knock out holmes.



and the big champions are defined by there biggest fights right?

well tysons biggest fight in his prime was michael spinx fight who IMO is a top 35 heavyweight of all time. the first man to beat larry holmes. the fight was hugely ballyhooed and spinx was a hall of famer great fighter......

well in tysons most importan fight, he pulled a joe louis-max schmeling II and annihlated spinx in one devastating round. that was mikes peak fight. mikes that night had a chance against anyone in history. great champions preform there best in the biggest fight, and in his biggest fight in his prime mike won in brutal fashion.



so mike


- earned his title shot by blasting out some of the top 10 ranked contenders

- cleaned out the division fighting only best top contenders/ champs

- mike immediatley unified the title cleaning up a huge mess and officially bringing back the one linear champ

- dominated these very good heavyweights and had no controversial fights and mike did not duck anyone

- defended his title on a consistent basis

i mean all the stuff a champion should do, mike did in his 80s title reign which would have been perfect had it not been for the douglas loss.






perhaps 2nd to louis, tyson was the greatest heavyweight puncher of all time. he had incredible handspeed, devastating combinations which he mixed up, he had an incredible body attack, he had incredible two fisted KO power and incredible snap on his punches. mike had special power, power only a few champions had. joe louis had it. the power im talking about is when mike hit you, guys did funny things. they did delayed reactions before falling like berbick, tubbs. thats special power. joe louis used to make guys do the same.


tyson skillwise ranks amonst the best


he was one of the greatest punchers ever, one of the best defenses in heavyweight history, incredible speed, very solid boxing skills, good jab, fantastic counterpuncher, incredible body attack, very unpredictable, very good chin, proven stamina, etc. he even had a wonderful build had 5'11 218lb of muscle.

what other heavyweight u know was one of the greatest punchers who ever lived and one of the best defenses who ever lived.


tyson proved he could go the 12 round distance and outpoint very skilled heavyweights like tony tucker whom was a very good big man and tyson won a one sided decision. tyson showed he could not only beat u by devastating knockouts, but by outboxing u. people give lots of credit to liston for outpointing a highly skilled boxer like machen over 12 rounds, but why not give tyson credit for winning a easy 12 round decision over a very good fighter like tucker?


chin? well tyson was never even badly hurt until the douglas fight despite facing some big punchers. it took douglas 10 rounds of damaging blows to finally put tyson down for the count. and how bout huge puncher razor ruddock who landed flush on tyson in there 12 rounder and tyson just stood there. even again frank bruno, bruno tagged him good in the 1st round and bruno by some is considered one of the hardest hitting heavies in terms of force of all time.



i think the fact is, tysons get penalised mostly from what happened post prison but by that time he was well past his prime and it should not be held that much against him.


great champions bounce back from losses right? well after the loss to douglas, tyson scored two victories over # 1 razor ruddock and was responding beatifully and was on the upward trail again to a shot vs holyfield but of course the rape incident would have happened. but tyson vs holyfield in 1991 had it not been for the rape would have eventually happened so we never know whether tyson would have responded back or not. and tyson wasnt even at his best anymore by then, was without rooney.


and what about tyson well behind on points nearly coming back to KO douglas in the 8th? in fact it was a very skecthy count and a case could be made tyson would have won right there. if tyson had won right there, everyone would have been talking about how much heart tyson had coming back like he did. but shouldnt that knockdown and almost near knockout be considered a good mark on tysons record for nearly coming back in the heat of adversity like he did?


i believe tyson should be in the top 10,

unlike some other heavy champs, tyson proved himself by far the best heavyweight of his era and dominated it for a 4 year stretch and in those 4 years wiped out all the best fighters in easy fashion. he may have not beat the best quality fighters but he beat a very long line of very good depth even in the biggest fight of his career vs a top 30 heavyweight of all time, he knocked spinx out in 1.


i believe tysons post prison career and 80s title reign matches alot of title reigns in heavyweight history. it was a great reign


and if u look at tysons whole career,

u will find he beat very good competition. though it lacks all time great heavies( which was not his fault because he didnt have a frazier type fighter in late 80s), he did beat a good heavyeight champ in spinx and mike beat a very good quality of depth


tony tucker
pinklon thomas
tony tubbs
carl williams
trevor berbick
bonecrusher smith
razor ruddock
marvis frazier
tyrell biggs
old larry holmes
frank bruno
Michael Spinx
Andrew Golota
Francois Botha
Alonzo Ratliff


thats some very good depth of contenders right there


Tyson also beat some good B level guys like


jesse fergusson
jose ribalta
James Tillis
Mitch Blood Green
Lou Savarese
Bruce Seldon
Brian Neilson




I still think mike would have knocked out holy had they fought in when both were in there prime say late 80s, but we will never know cause the fight didnt happen. u can say mike didnt fight holy cause he lost his title to a 2nd rate buster douglas who holy beat. but just remember, mike never got to rematch buster or fight holy in the early 90s and holy in what was considered his prime lost more than once and struggled far more against 2nd rate heavies and was much less dominating in his reign. i also might add, buster was a much different fight vs mike than when buster fought holy.




no one in heavyweight history had the combination of power, speed, defense mike tyson had. no one did.


and those that rank liston in the top 10 but not tyson because tyson didn have heart or stamina are fooling themselves because tyson showed just as much stamina as liston did, and just as much heart. difference is, mike was even more skilled and powerful than liston.

BB you have some pretty good arguements. However these days when I go over Tyson's victim list I'm not as impressed as I once was. I was hypnotized by the hype. Even you must agree that the names you've put up even though still fresh in our memories are not as impressive in hindsight.

How many of his opponents were semi-psyched by the same razzle dazzle that the rest of us were in? He rode a media wave of hysteria (to some degree earned). But those who could not be intimidated did fare better than others...Smith is an example. His early string of easy targets may have made for a "fear factor" that he oppotunistically rode.

If Cus would have been around longer I'm thinking Tyson may have had a chance to "seal the deal" with some doubters. But now it is going to be a harder sell. Funny how the same guy who probably put self doubt in Patterson was the guy who put the feeling of invincibility in Tyson. But when he was gone that feeling apparently went with him.

I know I'm sort of rambling here but with Tyson it's like we're through the looking glass. There was a time when we were all united in our belief that the guy may be the best of all time, and many many of us now are having a hard time placing him in the top 10. No other fighter has gone through such a drastic re-appraisal in the history of boxing. But those same people assumed a certain "momentum" that really failed to materialize.

This one is going to take another decade to sort out I'm afraid.

Excellent post, Brocky. That is good enough to appear in any of the boxing magazines I have read. Seriously, mate, it is a very good read. You are the only person on here, myself included, who I believe could make a career out of sports journalism.