Why is Tyson so overrated H2H?

It's all relative. Who is doing the rating? Big name fighters are always going to have a lot of people who overrate them and a lot who underrate them.

I actually see less of the overrating nowadays then before, with the whole "he was unbeatable with Rooney" junk (I think 'unbeatable' is nonsense anyway). Once in awhile I'll read it on boxing forums, but not as often as before.

It's hard to find weaknesses with someone who was as dominant as Tyson was in the 80s, but they were there, and just showed more later on. Like many short swarmers, he could be vulnerable to the uppercut. The right kind of movement could bother him (but you couldn't simply move, you had to stand your ground and get his respect). He could be pretty lazy and inactive on the inside. Because of his height and frame, he sometimes gets mischaracterized as an inside fighter, but he was really most effective at mid range or when he was in the motion of getting inside. That's different than actually what he did on the inside. He had some instances where he could do serious damage up close (Ferguson, the final barrage against Thomas was preceded a few seconds earlier but his famous combo up close), but a lot of times, he just did nothing on the inside. He certainly was not a polished in-fighter like a Rid**** Bowe, who knew so many of the nuances and subtleties of in-fighting.

The real simplistic, and rather dumb, criticism that is often repeated is "everyone who stood up to Tyson and didn't show fear beat him". Geez, all 37 opponents before Buster Douglas were scared of Mike and didn't stand up to him? In 58 pro fights, only 6 of them weren't paralyzed by fear? That's some pretty amazing aura that you can make so many world class boxers so fearful and unable to stand up to you.

It's a lot more than that. You have to have the tools to right gameplan to take advantage of Tyson being a frontrunner. Trevor Berbick came right at Tyson and showed a lot of guts. He got knocked down 3 times by one punch for his troubles. Peter McNeeley, whose effort I respect WAY more than some HW titleholders like Bonecrusher Smith, Bruce Seldon, and Frank Bruno (referring to the rematch as he actually gave a good effort in the first fight), "stood up" to Tyson and came right at him (even throwing some obvious headbutts), knowing it was his only shot at winning. Razor Ruddock went into a bit of a defensive shell in the first fight, then showed too much heart for his own good in the rematch as he just took a grotesque beating. One false misconception is that Tyson became a headhunter after he was no longer with Rooney. He absolutely destroyed Ruddock to the body.

But if you had enough talent and skills and a good gameplan, then you could take advantage of some mental weaknesses of Tyson and win. Against Douglas, Tyson kept doing the same thing over and over again. His corner obviously was infamously bad that night, although I find it interesting that Aaron Snowell went on to become a pretty solid trainer, more successful than Teddy Atlas and Kevin Rooney. Rooney and Tyson had good chemistry, but you can only put so much on that. Tyson was the one fighting in there, and he showed little imagination. His "adjustment" tactic was basically "catch him with a bomb". Maybe he did sucker Douglas into the uppercut in the 8th, I don't know, all the credit to him if he did, but still the point remains, he would just get desperate and look for one shot.

Both Douglas and Holyfield 1: minimal head movement, not enough of a jab or body work to set up the bigger shots, he just looked too often for an unlikely bomb. Some fighters and athletes get praise for being "unflappable", being hard to discourage as their confidence remains high. This definition does not apply to Tyson here.

 

tyson would beat the hell out of liston, i don't think he's overrated, the footage from early in his career was absolutely terrifying. the douglas fight doesn't take away from how good tyson was due to the fact that he wasn't at his 100% in that point in his career. focused tyson is arguably the best heavyweight ever next to ali.

 

i said the same thing when i saw this thread. bet you're one of those guys who thinks dempsey would beat him just because he was "tough"

 

What ****ing bull****.

So Holyfield and Douglas are conveniently the only guys to "stand up" to Tyson?

How about Ruddock? Bruno? Berbick? Tucker?

God, Tyson must have the most ignorant detractors on the planet. atsch

 

I guess I would seem like an animal to someone as gifted as yourself. We all see through your agenda, we all read it on braile it's so obvious. Do us all a favor, Abdel, and stick to the General. You're liking sodomization far too much here.

 

Williams couldn't beat Liston but a 180lb journeyman who lost or drew nearly half his fights could? Right.

Liston never had the fight taken to him by a lightning fast, skilful, 220lb KO puncher. The best heavyweight Liston ever beat was little 195lb Floyd Patterson. Tyson would be several levels up from that.

 

I'll be straight with you,I basically think you're a clown.

 

Teddy Atlas is a bitter, biased hypocrite.