Rate Mike Tyson with another resume

Exactly, its actual Sonny Listons resume ("frame") with Mike Tysons opposition. Since Mike Tyson rarely fought journeyman after his comeback like Liston did after Ali, I exchanged the resume with some other journeyman from the 80s/90s + one title fight.

Before this comes up, I´m not on a Anti-Liston agenda here, just trying to picture how a Mike Tyson (or Liston) resume would look like in the 80s, if he boxed the same performance like Liston did.

What stands out here:

1) There are fare less quick knockouts in the beginning of the resume, Bill Cayton would not be able to sell Tyson early on like the knockout killer artist he was, especially with that loss in fight 8. There are far too much UD und PTS wins there anyway to promote this Mike Tyson as something everybody has to see.

2) Mike Tyson with Listons resume beat far less Heavyweight Title holders: Just two times (Spinks = Patterson). Real Tyson resume had Berbick, Smith, Thomas, Tucker, Holmes, Tubbs, Spinks, Bruno (x2), Seldon (10) and two Cruiserweight Holders.

3) It astonishing how thin this resume in the 80s would actually look like. Even if you exchange one of the upcoming opponents for the first title fight with Carl Williams (non-beld holder), and rate the Lewis KO1 highly dubious, it doesn´t change much. Of course you have to rate Lewis H2H as high as young Clay here, in defense of Liston. Its two wins vs one beld holder (Patterson = Spinks here), then the run is over. The other fighters prior that title fight were just contenders.


54 Win 50–4 Ken Lakusta RTD 9 (10) (2005)
53 Loss 49-4 Adilson Rodrigues KO 9 (12) For vacant NABF heavyweight title
52 Win 49–3 Tim Anderson KO 3 (10)
51 Win 48–3 Jimmy Ellis TKO 7 (10)
50 Win 47–3 Everett Martin UD 10 (10)
49 Win 46–3 Bert Cooper KO 2 (10)
48 Win 45–3 J. B. Williamson KO 3 (10)
47 Win 44–3 Ladislao Mijangos KO 2 (10)
46 Win 43–3 Manoel De Almeida TKO 3 (10)
45 Win 42–3 Guido Trane TKO 7 (10)
44 Win 41–3 Tom Trimm RTD 7 (10)
43 Win 40–3 Tony Fulilangi TKO 4 (10)
42 Win 39–3 Bobby Hitz TKO 6 (10)
41 Win 38–3 Terry Anderson KO 1 (10)
40 Win 37–3 Carlos Hernández KO 3 (10)
39 Win 36–3 Frank Lux KO 7 (10) (1995)
38 Loss 35-3 Lennox Lewis KO 1 (15) (1991) For WBC, The Ring, and world heavyweight titles
37 Loss 35-2 Lennox Lewis RTD 6 (15) (1990) Lost WBC, The Ring, and world heavyweight titles
36 Win 35–1 Michael Spinks KO 1 (12) (1989) Retained The Ring and world heavyweight titles; Won vacant WBC heavyweight title
35 Win 34–1 Michael Spinks KO 1 (12) (1988) Won The Ring and world heavyweight titles
34 Win 33-1 Willie Driver KO 1 (10)
33 Win 32–1 Jesse Ferguson TKO 3 (10)
32 Win 31–1 Tyrell Biggs UD 12 (12)
31 Win 30–1 José Ribalta KO 3 (12)
30 Win 29–1 Alfonso Ratliff TKO 1 (10)
29 Win 28–1 Marvis Frazier (or Carl Williams) TKO 2 (10)
28 Win 27–1 Jesse Ferguson RTD 7 (10)
27 Win 26–1 Lorenzo Boyd RTD 6 (10)
26 Win 25–1 Reggie Gross KO 3 (10)
25 Win 24–1 Marvis Frazier (or Carl Williams) TKO 3 (10)
24 Win 23–1 William Hosea TKO 6 (10)
23 Win 22–1 Lorenzo Canady RTD 7 (10)
22 Win 21-1 James Tillis UD 10 (10)
21 Win 20–1 David Jaco KO 1 (10)
20 Win 19–1 Steve Zouski TKO 3 (10)
19 Win 18–1 Mike Jameson RTD 2 (10)
18 Win 17-1 James Tillis PTS 10 (10)
17 Win 16–1 Mark Young TKO 4 (10)
16 Win 15–1 Sammy Scaff TKO 2 (6)
15 Win 14–1 Michael Johnson UD 10 (10)
14 Win 13–1 Conroy Nelson TKO 4 (10)
13 Win 12–1 Eddie Richardson KO 6 (10)
12 Win 11–1 Sterling Benjamin TKO 2 (8)
11 Win 10–1 Robert Colay TKO 5 (8)
10 Win 9–1 Michael Johnson TKO 6 (8)
9 Win 8–1 Donnie Long PTS 8 (8)
8 Loss 7–1 Michael Johnson SD 8 (8)
7 Win 7–0 Larry Sims SD 8 (8)
6 Win 6–0 Larry Sims UD 8 (8)
5 Win 5–0 John Alderson PTS 6 (6)
4 Win 4–0 Ricardo Spain TKO 6 (6)
3 Win 3–0 Don Halpin SD 6 (6)
2 Win 2–0 Trent Singleton PTS 4 (4)
1 Win 1–0 Hector Mercedes TKO 1 (4) (1985)

 

Its obvious, yes.

Try to do a Liston-Resume with the men Tyson fought (which are most comparable to the fighters Liston fought), and you can easily see how bad Tysons resume would look like. Easy thing.

No title defenses. No high KO-ratio. Nobody fought after the layoff. More time needed for the KOs. No youngest champ by the age of 20. "KO-artist status" mainly build on bad chinned guy who was beaten twice.

The only thing you can give Liston is that he lost to a young Clay instead of Buster Douglas. But therefore Liston lost to a total bum most users here don´t even know.

 

Ali?
To perform the same KOs you would need an offensive fighter with punching power. Liston obviously did not achieve it in his era. Foreman comes to mind. Wilder and Joshua as well, maybe Tua and Ibeabuchi.

 

In therms of that, sure thing for the young Clay.

 

Exactly. Cleveland can be excluded with Carl here too. I was trying to exclude these fighters H2H as comparable as possible. Thats why you rarely´t see any Berbicks or Thomas here, since fighters like King, Besmanoff and Valdes had tons of losses.

You are right, King should be Ferguson, not Green (who is not comparable in height, weight and durability).

I think the better fighters he fought were Machen, Williams, Folley (not that good) and Patterson. I think Spinks and Patterson can swap pretty perfect. Of course you might change this list if you want to make a comparison for yourself, this is just my version.
Machen = Biggs, Williams = Williams or Frazier, Folley = Ribalta (adjustable), Patterson = Spinks.
I have no idea why Liston fought a total bum like 5´7" Westphal in his fight prior the title, so I tried to find a short guy as well (here Driver). Lewis of course can be changed to Douglas, like it happened.
Listons career after Ali wasn´t that serious, so its also not that relevant here. For rating both Liston and Tyson H2H, their career afters the layoff are pretty much irrelevant anyway.

Another thing is: Even if you would exchange some of the fighters Liston fought with Thomas, Berbick, Tubbs, Smith, Tucker and Bruno, the resume can still not acquire the same dominance as it did with much more KOs under Tysons real resume.