Is it surprising to you that Tyson was never busy in the clinch?

Some good points have already been made regarding why he wasn’t busy inside. I’ll add to the fact that while he wasn’t ‘Afraid’ to get countered back, he did his best to avoid it when he could. There were guys that didn’t even think too much about it and were nasty on the inside. Riddick Bowe and Marciano for example. Bowe especially got right in there against good smaller Heavyweights like Holyfield.

I think it was Atlas that pointed to the fact that when opponents fired back without fear, Tyson kind of froze a bit.

 

Patterson was decent inside. At the closer range Floyd would go southpaw to get more on the front hand. I think he even dropped guys from there.

I think You are right to suggest Tyson often looked impatient for clinch to be broken up. Oftentimes he would just rest rather than work in a clinch. However, we all remember the Botha fight right? Mike had definitely planned and trained to use those dirty tactics inside that time. Nothing spontaneous about what he was doing when ge was trying to break Bothas arm.

 

There is nothing standard about inside fighters attempting jiu jutsu arm breaking tactics. I don't recall seeing Duran, Frazier, etc doing something like that. It was simply Tyson being a jerk, planned or not.

 

I agree. It was another despicable attempt from Tyson to create terror when he was going through one of his troubled periods. Tyson feared losing his intimidation factor. And he was desperate to instil it again by any means.

 

No , what happened here is Tyson was able to sustain a close quarters battle while Mathis wilted and got knocked out. They both made each other miss a lot of punches. Tyson came through because he was the better man in close , simple as that.

 

No that was definitely proof Tyson wasn't a very good inside fighter and his power bailed him out.

 

What, that Mathis just got lazy? That's excuse making. Tyson ground and pounded him standing up

 

I didn't say anything about Mathis losing because he got lazy. I said Mathis lost because Tyson simply overpowered him. At no point was Tyson "outboxing" Mathis on the inside or proving to be the superior inside fight, he just knocked him out. If you want to prove Tyson had good inside skills, that is the LAST fight you want to bring up.

 

I never said anything about "out boxing"
What I say is that fight didn't make him look good inside but it didn't make him look bad either. There's other fights that shows him to be perfectly capable on the inside

 

He did look bad. He missed by several feet with multiple punches across multiple rounds against a chunky C level opponent. He had no idea how to set up punches when he was chest to chest or shoulder to shoulder with someone.

 

No

His style wasnt John Ruiz like

He had awesome speed and power and stellar defense.

He slipped jabs, got in range, and pummelled his opponents, thus negating the usual reach disadvantage.

He wanted the cllinches broken so he could set up again

 

So, Evander Holyfield?

 

I never understood why Tyson was so useless in a clinch. First, given the muscle density he must have to be lean at 215 and 5'10", and given those tree trunk legs, I don't get why he wasn't more effective at clinching/shoving. Second, for a fighter blessed with the ability to generate big power any way he threw a punch, he didn't take advantage of what he could do up close. Why wasn't he throwing uppercuts and hooks out of the clinch?

It's like he was never taught and no trainer of his ever bothered working on it. Crazy. When Tyson was at his peak, Joe Frazier was still around, working as a trainer, generally hurting for money. Spending some cash to bring Frazier on to teach in-fighting would have been worth whatever Frazier asked.

 

If he had learned to work on the inside like Henry Armstrong, he could have been darn near unbeatable.

 

Yea that's what I'm remembering as well. I thought he was trained to get in quick, land a combo and if not clinch, reset, and try again, not wanting to waste energy with bigger guys on the inside. Someone should ask Mike.