Did Mike Tyson in his prime only beat bums and over the hill fighters?

Its called common sense, My question to you is would you favour any modern LHW to beat Tysons featured opponents?

 

You mean a man like Michael Spinks?

 

I struggle to think of any heavyweight that had such as good a resume at age 22.

It's hard to take serious an argument that says Tyson wasn't that great, he was just lucky in the sense that 95% of the division was "tailor made" for him. That somehow includes boxers, sluggers, and swarmers.

Also the entire division for a decade was consumed by drugs and Mike just happened to be the last man standing. He basically Forrest Gump'ed his way into the title

 

Anyone that says yes is revising history .. he dominated a group at the time that was big, tough, talented and almost all in or near their prime .. that Tyson was an exceptional force.

 

Tyrell Biggs was an Olympic gold medalist. 6’5”, and defeated Lennox Lewis in Olympics. He was an undefeated prospect/contender when Tyson faced him. Tyson made short work of him and Biggs was never the same. I think Tyson had a very short prime which was derailed once he got caught up in the fast life and the **** accusation that led to his eventual conviction marked the end of his best.

 

YES. Although the actual number of fights he had leading up to & in his prime is respectable.
And just check out the record of those he fought then.
Better than the vast majority of HW champions, i do not know who might have exceeded him.
Before guys started cherry-picking so much to aboid any losses.

 

I’d have liked to have seen him face some real contenders on his way up. Tillis was a trial horse who had lost 4 of 5 and guys like Mitch Green and Jose Ribalta weren’t exactly top contenders. He’d have probably beaten them but he took an easy path.

Once champ, it would have been cool to see him fight Tim Witherspoon, who was relevant — the one-round loss to Bonecrusher was his only defeat from 1984-92, surely he could have gotten a date with Tyson somewhere in there.

Fact is, most of the guys around the time Tyson won the title were just fat, drugged-out leftovers from an era that had ended or was ending. Tyrell Biggs was at least not one of the retreads.

 

a very unfair accusation. He beat 8 former, current and future world champions plus an olympic gold medal winner in just over 2years. Nothing wrong with his competition. He was just that more ahead of the game than the rest

 

From recollection, Tyson didn't avoid anyone, fought & comfortably beat most.
It's probably fair to say Tyson was avoided by many, on his way up & whilst he was champion.

 

I thought so too, but if you notice its just energy thrown into a black hole. They aren't just ignorant, they are willingly and stubbornly ignorant...as you see from the recent Ali-Tyson thread. Knowledge is supposed to increase with time, not decrease,

No it wasn't...it was tangential to the thread's substance and should have been ignored. My mistake.

As is your prerogative. I guess we have very different assessments of Tucker's abilities...as expressed, I could see him losing to more than just today's upper echelon fighters. No reply necessary.

 

Ah.

 

Bruno was a live opponent but he was very inactive. He trained twice for this fight to Tysons once. So Frank was reasonably disadvantaged here.

Williams was active and had fought good guys. Sure he got tagged by Weaver, in hindsight Tyson was always going to do the same, but Tyson had to be pretty good to do that. Williams was tall and had a great jab. I think it’s a good win. It just went to plan.

This fight backfired mostly because Douglas was incredibly active and had more quality rounds experience over the last 12 months than Tyson had. Mike was coming off wins that had went easily for him. This was a wake up call.

I don’t think Razor was tailor made. This was a risky fight against a good opponent.

 

Yes, I think ecto might have been too dismissive about those opponents. They were all legitimate imo.

No offense, ecto.

 

You're point is absurdly incorrect ..

Trevor Berbick had just come off his biggest career win, a decision over undefeated Pinklon Thomas and Tyson crushed him.

Bonecrusher Smith had just KO'ed Tim Witherspoon in one round.

Pinklon Thomas was still in his twenties, lost only one fight to Berbick, had three comeback fights and came to fight ..

Tony Tucker had an outstanding amateur pedigree, had just defeated Douglas for the title and was undefeated in his twenties ..

Briggs was an undefeated , olympic gold medalist , highly touted contender in his twenties

Holmes was past his best for sure and not ready for the fight ..

Tubbs was still a terrific fighter, no worse than when he won the title .. he always partied and never was trim ..

Spinks was the other alphabet champ, undefeated, twice beat Holmes, an olympic gold medalist, a long term light heavyweight champ that moved up to defeat Holmes ..

The claim that Tyson's opposition was weak is complete amateur revisionism .. the reality was Tyson's opponents were much better that the contenders that almost any other heavyweight champ defended against .. surely much better than Dempsey's, Marciano's, Louis' and either Ali title reign .. Tyson in his short prime was a devastating force .. 86-88 he was an all-time top five heavyweight of all-time and perhaps the most dangerous H2H ... his prime was short but his record was exceptional in that time ..

 

No. Mike sometimes made them look like bums and over the hill fighters.

So did other greats throughout Heavyweight history.