Could prime Tyson handle Prime Foreman?

Tysons footwork was not better than ali or holyfield.

 

Not entirely true, Azz. Tyson actually said "I'll fight Foreman before he dies of rigor mortis!" Brilliant comment.

 

Something like that.

What we know is, Foreman was given a contract for a guy he'd been running his mouth about, and then he refused to sign using a very poor excuse.

Tyson was a cash cow, I wonder what kind of reason Foreman had for not signing.

 

Show me the contract then will you, you know nothing flower......

 

Not wanting to work with don king is a completely legitimate argument. Foreman was right there in the 70's watching king rob people left and right. He was in the news all throughout the 80's and 90's for going to court against witherspoon, holmes, lewis, and tyson himself. Why the hell would foreman want any parts of that? Only a fool would trust don king.

 

Foreman had his own set of lawyers, I'm sure he could work something out with King. Plus, to get to Tyson you had to go through Don King. Holyfield did it. Why couldn't Foreman?

 

Holyfield was a fool. He was content to get played as long as he could have the belt.

As for foremans lawyers, he didnt start getting serious money again till he regained the title from moore and got the grill endorsements. By then tyson was just a journeyman with a big name and it wouldnt have made much business or boxing sense for a shot tyson with no defense to fight even an old foreman.

You have to understand the timeline:

-86 tyson tears through the division and kos berbick to win the title

-87 tyson pursues the other big names. On the other hand foreman had JUST started his comeback after a 10 year retirement. He made it explicitly clear he wasnt going to rush toward a shot at the big names and treated his 2nd career as if he was a brand new boxing rookie. This proves to be a wise approach considering his age and how many previous champs utterly failed coming back.

-by the end of 87 tyson is 21 years old, undedeated, knocking everyone out, the unified champ. Foreman is a chubby 38 year old man with 5 fights!

-88-89, tyson has his biggest tests against spinx, holmes, tubns, biggs, and bruno. He demolishes them all, but by now his life is unraveling with court cases, marriage issues, partying, etc. He fires his best trainer rooney. King wastes no time seeing the young champion unravel and swoops in.

-in contrast 88-89 foreman was still moving slow but steady against d and c level competition. He finally steps up against a decent name in former cruiserweight dwight muhammad qawi. He beats him along with a few other decent journeymen in bobby hitz and tony fililangi. He ends the year koing bert cooper who is his best opponent by far and beating everret martin.

-1990 was the turning point for both men. Foreman fights gerry cooney in a somewhat big event and brutally stops him, which got the attention of the press, promoters, and other fighters. They knew his comeback was serious and not just a circus act for cash. He went on the david letterman show and anounced for the first time he would like to fight tyson. He went as far as to state he didnt fear the young man at all and even promised a ko within 2 rounds "just like cooney". Foreman says his only concern is don king.

Tyson continues goofing around and looks horrible in training camp. Greg page knocked him down in a public spar. He loses to douglass in the upset of the century. He was scheduled to meet holyfield but with such a big loss holyfield fought douglass instead and won the title.

-by 91 tyson fought dangerous punchers alex stewart and back to back fights with ruddock. He was looking good again, but then he was charged with **** and out of the ring 3 yeas...foreman meanwhile, stated busy and pariently wait for a shot. Holyfield gave it to him. Foreman didnt care who had the title, he just wanted it and needed the money bad (something like 10 kids plus a church and community center to pay for). Foreman used to be in the ghetto mugging people, sparred with cleveland williams and sonny liston, not to mention his previous career fighting some of the toughest guys in the division (frazier, lyle, etc). No way in hell he was scared of mike.

So in hindsight there was never really a "perfect moment" for either man to fight. When tyson was "the guy to beat", foreman was on his comeback fighting complete bums to shake off ring rust. Literally as soon as foreman stepped up in competition, tyson fell off the map and then fell in jail. Tyson had to rebuild his image and his rank, he wasnt going to risk even a 10% chance of losing to a dangerous iron chinned puncher like foreman even if he was 40 yeas old.

The Tyson/holyfield fight was THE biggest fight in history up to that point (equivalent of mayweather vs pacquiao today). Team tyson and don king absolutely couldnt risk screwing up such a big payday. Yet at the same time it was obvious to everyone tyson wasnt who he used to be. Its totally understandable if tyson did indeed not want to face foreman and that foreman did not want to do business with king after the guy was sued by lennox lewis, tim witherspoon, and tyson himself.

After the holyfield fights, by 1998 tyson was pretty much done. He was a short, flat footed swarmer with leaky defense and poor stamina. All he had was the "punchers chance" against any A level fighter. Again, totally understandable if he wasnt interested in fighting foreman who was still knocking out guys half his age and won the title again against moore in 94. Tyson wasnt even out of prison and fighting again till 95, let alone fighting for a title.

 

One is a multi-millionare, the other is taking bit-parts in silly comedies, that's why Foreman had the brains to fcuk Don King off....

 

Liston died when Foreman was about 20 years old. Kind of makes it hard to believe the rest of the story.

 

Everyone in the know apart from Tyson who told Don King to fight that animal instead of himself.....

 

I.P.'s don't lie ... Gotcha

 

Why bother, look how he retired Tim Witherspoon, King is a festering leach...Tyson loves him!

 

Why call out Tyson (who was with Don King) with the condition that you refuse to work with Don King?

Did Foreman not deal with King at all in his second career?

Last time I checked, Foreman got a record breaking $5m in Zaire wholly because of Don King.

 

Yes.

 

The zaire fight happened waaay before all the crazy news about don king became public. Most people had no idea how slimey he was back then (or chose to remain silent). During the 80's and 90's he was at his peak and thus more and more stuff started getting out about him and his tactics. Foreman wasnt even boxing when all this was going on but im sure he heard about it, i think they did a 60 minutes piece on king.

When tyson exploded on the scene, won the title, yada yada foreman mentioned him in his inteview with david letterman. Look at the timeline, as soon as foreman stepped up in class (beating cooper, cooney, etc) tysons career starting going downhill and more and more stuff started coming put about king. Tyson literally brawled with king in public after confronting him about money issues.

Again, foreman mentioned tyson because he had the belt and thats where the money was. When tyson unraveled and went to jail, holyfield got the belt so foreman targeted holyfield. He didnt care who had the belt, he just wanted to fight for it and get the big paydays. Back then you werent going to earn big blockbuster paydays unless it was a title shot. Thus if you wanted big money, you needed to fight the champ.

Thus, if money is your main objective, youre going to be cautious after hearing that the champions promoter is a scum bag.