Tyson became The World Heavyweight Champion, the biggest prize in sports, by beating Spinks, he stayed WBA/WBC/IBF title holder, I know what I would prefer to be called! Spinks with the stronger claim going in, would of come out with the scalp of his biggest challenger and final rival title claimant.
The lineal title is held in higher esteem than a unified title (which Tyson won by fighting the 3 titleholders, unlike Spinks). I don't particularly understand that bit Spinks beat a faded Holmes then hand picked his opponents so as not to lose, before taking the $$$ in a fight where Spinks was scared shitless and knew he would lose. Full credit to him for taking the fight but he gets no credit for selling out his responsibiliies as the lineal champ p.s. I was hoping Spinks would beat Tyson
What did he sell out? Spinks was champ for three years, gave Holmes a rematch and made two other defences, before fighting the generally recognized #1 contender. Compared to some other Champions, Spinks was more active and fought top opposition. No one questioned Dempsey's claim, and he never fought his top contender and was inactive for three years!
Michael Spinks only because he never lost the title in the ring before he got the $13 million to hand it to Mike Tyson
Well. Like you know i am not the biggest tyson fan but about this topic i must say that tyson proved that he was the "real" champ, is not matter if spinks took the title from "the real" champ holmes, because holmes in 1985-86 was almost finished, he was not the holmes who faced norton,shavers ,berbick or even spoon. And tyson destroyed spinks like an insect. The only champ was tyson, simply they never fought earlier and he could not prove it. But he was always the real champ at this time. The only 2 men who might beat tyson 88-90 at this time. Were holyfield and old foreman 88-90(because his style)
The facts going into the bout on that evening: 1. Tyson had all the belts. Spinks had no belts 2. Tyson was announced as the undisputed champion. Spinks was announced as the challenger That's enough for me.
Yeah, Spinks and Foreman II are probably the best examples of how worthless the "lineal Champion" claim can be. Tyson cleaned out every major contender in the division, while Spinks was in exile. The fight was a symbolic gesture but Tyson didn't need Spinks to be recognized.
It was shown Spinks was announced as being recognized as champion by amongst others The Ring, Boxing Illustrated... So Tyson could not be the Undisputed Champion, because his claim was clearly disputed!
If Spinks had defended the lineal title 10 times against duds like Tangstad would he still have been seen as the true champion? What would the worth had been, of the lineal championship in that case? Tyson absolutely cleaned the joint out barring Witherspoon. Spinks cleaned out absolutely nothing Lineal V Actual
It does not matter, lineage is lineage. The beauty of it, is it is black and white, there is no grey area. Corbett, Fitzsimmons, Jeffries, Johnson, Dempsey and Tunney all missed out fighting great waves of deserving contenders because of skin colour. Even Louis to a point missed out on a couple of interesting matches. Marciano fought for money which meant a few less financially viable contenders were avoided. Patterson's management avoided some worthy contenders for years. Frazier took it easy for a couple years after beating Ali... Even Tyson after beating Spinks fought Bruno, Williams and Douglas, when the likes of Witherspoon and Ruddock would of been more intriguing, and more worthy challengers...