Was M Tyson Up For Fighting Old Foreman IYO?

Mike Tyson to Don King when King kept bringing up how much they would make, "YOU fight that mother ****er if you love him so much. Not me."

 

I don't think Tyson wanted the fight. It was a lose-lose situation. If he beat him in the early 90's people would just dismiss the win as proof Foreman coming back was a mistake and a sideshow attraction. If he lost, Tyson's stock would plummet and it would be hard to explain it.

However, after Foreman gave Holyfield a tough fight and beat Moorer, people had to take him seriously as a credible heavyweight. However, by that point Tyson was nowhere near the intimidating force of nature he was in the 90's. He did ok for a bit beating guys like Seldon and Bruno but then Holyfield knocked the apple cart over. His only focus after getting out of prison was the Hoylfield fights for all the belts and big money but it didn't work out. It couldn't happen then.

In the late 90's Tyson was a shot fighter and had no belts. Foreman meanwhile was as old as a fossil and barely getting by with close decisions. A fight during this time period would be pretty disappointing and underwhelming with Tyson likely gassing early after looking good for only 3 rounds and Foreman mostly just jabbing and pushing before eventually getting an ugly stoppage.

Basically, there were very few moments in either man's career when it would have been ideal.

However, you could substitute Douglas with Foreman. Or if Tyson didn't go to prison, have a tune up after the Ruddock fights then face Foreman for a mega showdown of big punchers. I think around 89-91 there was a very small window when it could have worked and did good numbers.

I don't think Tyson was scared of him, but he might have been very wary of him knowing how brutal he was back in the 70's. Tyson thoroughly studied footage of all the old champs with Cus D Amato. On the other hand, this could give him an edge as the new generation who took time to learn about previous eras. Foreman meanwhile was very confident and even predicted a 2nd round KO, but after Douglas beat Tyson and then Hoylfield bear Douglas he focused on Hoylfield and never really mentioned Tyson again.

 

I don't think Tyson was up for it, but not for the reasons some claim. After trouncing 38 year old Larry Holmes in 4 rounds, I'm sure trouncing a 40 something year old Foreman wouldn't be favored by Mike Tyson. But if he had to fight Foreman before rigor mortis set in, so be it.

Cayton had a world tour set up for Tyson after he beat Spinks in 91 seconds. Foreman was on the radar for a fight in China (or was it Japan) in either 89 or 90. I forgot the order but it would've played out like this:

Frank Bruno in England
Francesco Damiani in Italy
Adilson Rodriguez in Brazil
Razor Ruddock in Canada
Evander Holyfield in Las Vegas
George Foreman in China or Japan

 

I think this pretty much covers it. A fight with Foreman was a lose-lose for Mike; but I tend to favor George here, most especially during the early post-Rooney (which would have been the conceivable time frame). Not neccessariy for the reasons and suspected myths quoted here.

First off, Mike was going through mega problems in his personal life, the same stuff that contributed to his Douglas defeat. He'd fired Rooney (very bad move), was partying hard, dealing with the aftermatch of a piece of **** ex-wife, etc.

Setting aside the possible myth of Mike calling George an "animal", etc, I doubt Mike would have gotten up as much as he should for old fat George. Why should he? It would have been before the Holy fight, right around the time of the kinda so-what Cooney fight.

Mike might have scored a knockdown early, but as Glass said, Foreman would have bullied him around with his size and height, jabbed his chin half off, and forced an ugly stoppage (if not outright knockout) in the middle rounds.

Keep in mind, I'm talking about the 1990 Mike, I imagine the Mike of the Ruddock fights would have had a much stronger possibility to win.

I know this has been mentioned to death, but it must be reinforced how Mike had exactly ONE way of fighting, and that one way plays right into even old fat Foreman's hands. How many flush shots could Mike have taken from George (and tet's face it. Mike would have been open for that right hand, uppercut especially, all day).

The 1990 Mike gets stopped...no, knocked unconscious in 7 at the very latest by old George.

 

"In late April of 1990, it was announced that Foreman and Tyson would be fighting a co-main event on June 16 to be broadcast on HBO. Foreman's opponent was Adilson Rodrigues, who was ranked in the top ten by two of the major sanctioning bodies. Tyson's opponent was the unranked Henry Tillman. Tillman was best known for beating Tyson twice in the 1984 Olympic trials.

At this time, Evander Holyfield was getting ready for his sixth fight as a heavyweight against Seamus McDonagh on June 1 in Atlantic City. On the day of the Holyfield-McDonagh fight, I went to grab something to eat with Georgie Benton, Lou Duva and Bobby Goodman. At the time, Goodman was, and still is, Don King's matchmaker. I've known Benton for many years, through him I met Duva, and was introduced to Goodman a couple weeks before Tyson fought Larry Holmes at the Convention Center in Atlantic City in January 1988.

While we were eating, Benton said, “Bobby, what's up with Foreman and Tyson, how come they're not fighting each other on the 16th? Isn't that the fight that King was trying to make?” He said, ” Georgie,You'll never believe this but, Fucgin' Tyson is scared shiit less of Foreman and wants no part of him. I was there when Don was trying to make the fight. He was telling Tyson that Foreman represented huge money, plus he was old and slow and would be no problem. Tyson got up and screamed at King saying, 'I'm not fight in' that Fucgin' animal, if you love the motherfugger so much, you fight him!'
Goodman stated that Tyson said Foreman was much better than people thought, and was a dangerous fight for any of the top heavyweights. Goodman proceeded to explain how Tyson was calling Foreman a big con man, and explained that the grandpop act was just a front. He said Tyson saw Foreman as trying to set up the boxing world into thinking he was a pushover, knowing that he really wasn't. Tyson said Foreman was a wolf in sheep's clothing. Goodman continued to say that after seeing Tyson's response to King trying to push him into a fight with Foreman, he had no doubt that Tyson had fear of Foreman. He also said that from that point on, he felt that if Foreman and Tyson ever fought, Foreman would knock Tyson out!

Throughout the lunch Goodman, Duva, Benton, and myself shared stories and thoughts on the fight game. Out of the blue Goodman said, “Oh I remember why else Tyson wanted no parts of Foreman. He said that King had found out from Steve Lott that Tyson and Cus D'Amato used to watch the Frazier-Foreman fight over and over.” He continued saying that Tyson loved that fight because he was awed by Foreman's power and Frazier's toughness and how he kept getting up after every knockdown. He also said that Lott told King that Cus sat alongside Tyson saying, “It's suicide against Foreman if you're short and fight a swarming attacking style like Marciano or Frazier,” never figuring that Foreman could be a possible Tyson opponent down the road. He said that Cus said the only fighters who had a chance against Foreman were, tall rangy fighters who could fight him from a distance while moving away from him, and no way any swarmer could beat Foreman by going to him."
Frank Lotierzo.

 

Tyson ducking Foreman is based on nothing but hearsay.

 

I think Tyson told two times in interviews about Foreman, who made some rumors around that time too (early 90s).

As stated in earlier posts, Tyson wouldn´t recieve too much faith of fighting Foreman pre prison other than money and the danger of hurting one of his former punching idols. Foreman on the other hand made a very calculated comeback and was wary of his good healthy situation after the 70s. Until now he stated tons and tons of times on twitter, interviews and co. that he didn´t want a piece of Mike Tyson. Thats beyond any respect, I believe he is just plain honest about questions today. Not just these interviews, I think he´s one of the most faithful boxing tellers out there. If you´d ask him about a bout with Larry Holmes, I believe he´d give a very respectful comment for that one too.
Not sure if the story of Ali warning George about the fight in the 80s was true.
After Tyson fought Ruddock and Holyfield (no prison scenario), there might have been a short window of the bout.

 

Tyson had a fear of Foreman instilled in him from a young age from Cus D'AMato. .

He knew how dangerous he was in his comeback , called him a "wolf in sheeps clothing"

You would have seen how dangerous Foreman 2 really was if he fought flat footed come forward challengers that came around in the post Lewis era.
In the 80s and 90s mostly all of the challengers could move and use their feet

 

Yup, we saw that in his bouts with tall moving fighters like Dwight Qawi and Everett Martin as well as Ali clones Alex Stewart and Tommy Morrison. Dunno if thats too far away from "prime" comeback George

 

He mangled the first two and the last two ran all over the ring. Had they not they would have also gotten mangled , which was kinda my point to begin with

 

I give 90s George more credit to his style versatility, good jab and high ring iq rather than his overrated power. For how slow he was, he did very good with that chin of his also. Check my 70s vs 90s George power comparison, its lightyears apart.

 

Thats always one thing i thought about, in addition to having a better chin, 90s Foreman potentially could have had more thudding power because Foreman always threw his bodyweight into his punches and instead of weighing 220lb, he weighed over 250 in his comeback and power is the last thing to go anyway. Although he was even slower because of the extra weight

 

For the record, Cus never told Mike he didn't stand a chance against Foreman. This is absolute bollocks.

I've tried to get a hold of Kevin Rooney to no avail but I did have long conversations with Steve Lott and he's stated that Cus never discussed Foreman with Mike. Cus never told Mike to be afraid of Foreman's style or that Foreman was all wrong for him.

And that Lotierzo article needs to be put to death already. Monte Cox admitted he copied that article and has since disbanded it after Steve Lott said the above on Facebook a few years ago. Lott's name was in the Lotierzo article under "Ronnie Lott", the football player for the San Francisco 49ers. That should say how pathetic the article really is.