...Takes me back, reading that. It's funny how a fight in 1988 was seen as a 50/50 (or at best, a majority predicting a Tyson victory) but here in anno 2014 everyone (blessed with hindsight of course) seems to have bet the house on Tyson. This win is passed over much more than it should be I believe. For me this is Tyson at the absolute peak of his powers. Spinks was not a bad heavyweight at all, but on this night he 'shoulda stayed in bed.'
Butch Lewis himself said no-one has ever fought THAT version of Tyson ever, none of the amateurs, none of the pros, Tyson was focused on Spinks, his whole life had been trained for that moment.
Agreed. It was the most anticipated fight of the 1980's, probably even more so than Holmes - Cooney, and while Tyson was favored, there were many who gave Spinks a live chance.
Ring Magazine said Spinks was the true champion, not Tyson. Theres actually a story in the Tyson book, on how Butch Lewis carefully manipulated the media to make it seem that Tyson was ducking Spinks. People began to approach Tyson all the time asking him why hes ducking Spinks and if/when thes going to man up and fight him. All of this annoyed Tyson a great deal. Tyson also used to skip training on purpose to play psychological games with himself, to make himself fear Spinks, this then gave him the incentive to work twice as hard in the gym
ali picked spinks to win based on the tactic jab and moving, the problem is that ali did think that anyone could do what he did with sonny liston, but ali was ali....just one, ali picked comeback 91 foreman to knock tyson out after mike lost vs buster douglas. and yes, holmes picked tyson early, you have the video on youtube , holmes is debating with sugar ray leonard in a ring and they are emulating the fight, leonard emulating the style of tyson. i think that some people had the hope that anyone could end the reign of terror of tyson but i think that honestly at that point everybody did think that tyson would destroy him. and i think that foreman would have beaten him in 1991 if he got the oportunity before of holyfield
and holyfield would have beaten tyson in 1991 hands down, he was in another level at that point, 88 tyson vs 91 holyfield would have been a competitive colse fight , i pick evander 55-45. but in 1991 tyson was not the same( overrated version of mike just because he fought 2 competitive fights with the overrated ruddock)
There was an incident just a few months before the fight was signed, where Tyson was driving one time with Robin Givens in the car, and as they approached a traffic light and slowed down, a bystander started screaming "Why are you ducking Spinks?" Apparently he seemed really angry at Tyson. Nothing happened because apparently Tyson was not in the mood to get into a fight (especially in front of his wife) but it does illustrate that at the time, plenty thought he was ducking Spinks.
i would not use the word scared or ducking.. but i guarantee you that tyson would have been much more happy facing larry holmes,spinks and another guys what tyson had stylistical advantage against. he knew that foreman 90-91 was a big risk and he would not have nothing to win with this fight against a 40 years old former champ. i would not pick this fight for him, he would have much to lose and nothing to win, and foreman was a big big risk for him stylistically talking
Read the red parts in the same order they appeared originally. All the quotes above are from the same thread and just less than a week apart between the first and the last. This person used the words liar and hypocrite referring to someone else in another thread: And the target of these words was even stating the obvious truth in a clear manner there.