If rahman had managed to somehow avoid a rematch against Lewis and defended the HW title against Tyson. Lets say Tyson comes in at 223 ish, about the same shape he was in for golota and savarese. Rahman comes in the shape he was in for the Lewis rematch. Who wins? He had the Power to gain tysons respect and even stop him late but im not sure he had the chin and stamina himself to get that far, because he made too many fundamental mistakes to keep away from tysons bombs
tyson was faded after prison, an a caricature of himself was evident from holyfield onward. rahmant kos him late, if he isnt stopped very early.
I agree with the first part, but i think despite his loss of speed and stamina he still showed some of the old technical ability against golota. I think rahman is Maybe better than savarese, etienne and mathis jr but not better than golota and botha
Tyson circa 1996 KOs Rahman early. Tyson 2001 - I'm not so sure. He looked awful vs Nielsen after just 3 rounds. Fortunately, Nielsen was fat, out of shape and gassed too.
Yes he was grossly out of shape, id back rahman to beat tyson if tyson came in that fat. He looked much better just one year earlier against golota. For the sake of the argument lets assume he tried to get in shape since he would be challengig rahman for the HW title
In that case I favor Tyson, Rahman wasn't able to stop 40+ y.o. former Tyson victims Berbick and Ferguson. He was powerful guy, but too slow and predictable even for Tyson from Golota fight.
I think everyone was well aware that Tyson was going to beat Rahman if Rahman defended against him, that's why there were court battles trying to block it and get Lewis the rematch first. King even offered Rahman the chance to defend against someone like David Izon or Brian Nielsen before fighting Tyson, so Hasim could make one defense and make some money before fighting Tyson, and people at the time were wondering if Rahman could even beat them. Had Lewis lost his court case, and Rahman fought Tyson, IMO Tyson wins. The Tyson who fought Golota and Savarese would've mopped the floor with Rahman. Tyson was in shape and dangerous and on a mission at that point. It would've been a very short night. When he lost the court case and then had to go to Denmark after a year off to fight Nielsen, he had zero interest.
Interesting fight. Even a very faded Tyson had a legit chance to score an early KO here but he has to do it in the first 2 rounds or he's toast, Rahman was a decent heavyweight and as others have said Tyson looked like **** against Nielsen and couldn't KO an upright and scared Golota despite hitting him with everything he had. If Rahman survives the first two rounds he wins this by the 7th or 8th round.
I disagree, golota was calm in the first round and tyson looked pretty good, his movement was fluid. He set up the Knockdown with the right hand to the body. Golota was scared after the first round but thats also when he stopped standing upright and started bobbing and weaving and managed to avoid getting finished off. He did look like **** against Nielsen but was also very fat in that fight, he had lost control of his life(again) at that point judging by the weight gain but i'd wager that he would still try to come in in decent shape for the HW championship. Rahman does have the power to stop tyson if he 1. Manages to get his respect early and tyson becomes an easy target standing around at long range. Rahman has a 82 inch reach Or 2. He manages to survive long enough until tyson starts tiring and then he can start dropping the right hand on him.
Tyson beats the stiff glass chinned zero ring IQ Rahman every day of the week, he is tailor made for him , the ultimate made to order guy, 2-3 round stoppage and I am being generous, Rahman would make Tyson look way better than he actually was at that time. Everybody would scream Tyson is back but in essence he just blew out a pretender on the world level. Tyson was Ghetto A dog.....Rahman was thug/Ghetto B dog...and that same scenerio would unfold in the Ring. On a side note, he would wax another flash in the pan, Sanders,in the same time frame, in quick order too, another guy coming to trade to get ko'ed.
One thing is for certain, Rahman is not stopping or knocking out Tyson in the manner he knocked out Lenni. Tyson has to get the knock out in the first 2 rounds otherwise he will quit on his stool