Was Holyfield hitting harder than Tyson in 96?

About what you chose to respond to: I checked the video again, & besides this one showing Peter was no Mr. Charisma, I first saw the McNeeley vacant, avoidant look...Then here you can see a brief grin when the camera turns back to him-after the semi-famous Tyson is tracking his movements with his eyes.

I think he likely had some real fear, but anyway it did not effect his performance, & he was never gonna last any time.
It also shows how much quality of competition matters-McNeeley was superb in an only superfiscial analyses of his record, 36-1-0, mostly knocking everyone out.
But his competition was local Massachusetts cirduit fodder, the single guy he beat with a decent record "ROn rinkwater", also beat nobodies.
McNeeley never beat a very good fighter in his life.
He did step up bravely, but while he would be excellent compared to most any random tough guy caled out of a crowd, he was no elite fighter to put it mildly.

EDIT: it is subjective, but Peter does no seem confident to me.
I believe he talked big for upping his own confidence, but that it was empty bravado.
But he was certainly a game, completely overmatched fighter!

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Bruno also kind of “won” the staredown with Tyson at center ring when they first fought, as Tyson didn’t really maintain eye contact.

I generally don’t take too much stock into the prefight staredown, but I did notice during the Holyfield rematch that Tyson looked nervous and maybe a little intimidated. I remember questioning Tyson’s confidence when I saw that.

 

Well I don't put a huge amount of stock in staredowns, but I was simply addressing the argument that many of Tyson's opponents were defeated before the bell rang due to intimidation.

 

LOL Holyfield clearly hit harder than Tyson. Head to Head.. Holyfield pretty much gave him permanent brain damage at 0:07

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Leaving aside the Cruelty of seeming to relish someone supposedly given permanent brain damage...

Tyson's head & neck hardly budged at all from the shot you gloat about..
As the announcer said Holyfield landed many clean shots-one well after the bell-& could not even drop Tyson.

This is not evidence that Holyfeld hit harder than Tyson.
More effective against him then, given his strategy, clinching, determination, yes.
But even loaded with PEDs Evander was never a huge HW hitter.

 

It is delusional to think that Tyson was not also on performance enhancing drugs

 

I dont think cocaine and weed qualifies as performance enhancing drugs.

 

cocaine debatably could be seeing as how it was used in the 1910s-1920s as a ped, but regardless im talking about the anabolic steroids and hgh that tyson was very clearly on. No boxer or athlete at all reaches world class levels without them, especially in the weak, lackadaisical drug testing of the 1990s

 

There are several boxers who regularly submitted to drug testing and never came out dirty for example FMM.
Other than your assumption do u have any evidence or confessions that this is true?

 

Holyfield was not hitting harder than Tyson ever. One punch for one punch Tyson was always the KO man. What Tyson lost, is what Holyfield always had--timing, punch placement, and volume. Holyfield was always a stout hitter with excellent technique and perfect leverage. But he never had the "essence of KO" on his punches even though he would wrench them fully into his opponents. I think the Evan Fields supplements added to his overall ability to take punishment and hang in fights using his infighting and physicality. I don't think it preciptated an increase in his punching power, it just allowed for Holyfield to take the ethos and gameplan he applied in the CW division and apply it to the HW division.

A fully washed-up Tyson was still able to oneshot a tough Franz Botha, crush Clifford Etienne in a round and evaporate the last of Andrew Golota. He could hit, he just had heavy feet, bad balance, stopped torquing his lower body into his shots, and lost his timing and accuracy.

 

those drug tests ****ing suck, there are many designer drugs that get through the system, drug testing officials are paid off for convenient timings, and orals/propionate versions of anabolics have short half lives so they cycle out of your system quickly. Get with the times, drug tested has never once in history meant drug free

 

That's a pretty solid and well explained take i think.

 

Tyson was stopped on his feet. I thought the stoppage was somewhat debatable but that’s just me.

Have you seen what a 16 year old Tyson looked like? His physique in his mid 20s is not that of a guy I believe to be on PEDs. His body shape looked different when he fought Lewis and by that stage very possible he could have been juicing.

 

Huh Tyson fans still not over it, I guess...