As long as you stand up to Mike Tyson you can beat him

True, if Mike is afforded such allowances, all others should be afforded similar allowances. It very much seems that few people want to go there.

I can't think of any other fighter who's had so many excuses offered for their less outstanding performances and/or outright failures.

But you know, the perspective can be flipped over even more appropriately and just as equitably to - ALL fighters simply be measured by what they ACTUALLY did do, not what they woulda, shoulda or coulda done ( being projected achievements wholly in the realm of pure speculation of course), leaving out all the excuses - which is how all other fighters are generally rated. All except for Mike.

 

Especially when you take into consideration that Tucker also had relative success early on fighting in a similar manner, and that his injured hand might have played a part in why he couldn't keep it up as well as Douglas did.

These were after all quite possibly the only two prime quality opponents with such a combination of skill and size that Tyson faced.

 

You know exactly what i meant. By all means play stupid tho bud.

You're on record as saying Douglas' weight didn't matter or words to that effect. Blind Freddy knows he was in disgusting shape and in no condition to mount his best challenge but "i respect how you can be so openly biased and how you advocate favouritism so strongly Ithough, XXXXXXXXXX"

Over 150k was bet after Douglas weighed in and 90% of it was on Holyfield but hey the weight didn't matter.

I'm willing to take on board any and all intangibles and you of all people should know it. Thomas was never the same from the time he stepped into the ring against Berbick and i will be on record as saying it rest assured. I may have even been challenged. Tucker broke his hand, do you give Hearns the same respect??!?!?!?!?! Yeah didn't think so

Tubbs was offered weight incentives but was still of such a mentality it didn't matter. He knew.

Game on Unforgiven, game on. I look forward to you telling us Matt Skelton is on the same level as Dillian Whyte, getting blown out of the water again and again and again then doubling down on your position because you simply couldn't concede.

I stayed out of that one due to respect for you i really did.

 

Cheers. I'll try to behave myself, I'll just have to watch out for you old guard fellas baiting me and then playing the seniority card. Haha.

 

Bwahahahahaha!!! I won't be baiting you mate.......well unless you disagree with me!

 

Couldn't agree more. Fighters should be rated on what they did. Any allowances made should be applied equally.

Personally, I'd tend to make only two normal allowances for fighters when looking at careers:
1. Inexperience, at the early stages of career, which may vary a little in length, depending on their level when turning pro, and whether they had already achieved a high position.
2. Old age, or 'past prime' which might vary according to the each fighter.

These things are true for all fighters. We tend not to judge too much an early loss before they became established, and we tend not to judge too much those losses they pick up when they are old and worn out.

 

You're not making sense.
I give Holyfield credit for beating Douglas.
I give winners the credit, that's my argument. Douglas over Tyson, crediting the winner, not excusing the loser or taking credit away.
So what are you on about?

If i was making excuses for Douglas losing, you'd have a point.
You seem confused, old boy.

I don't care about Tucker's injured hand, but if I was caring about Tyson's "bad prep" I'd care about a well documented (pre fight reported) hand on injury of Tucker too, to be fair.

I guess you are refering to Hagler v Hearns.
As far as I know Hearns never claimed to have entered the ring with a bad hand. It occurred when he hit Hagler.

I didn't get blown out of any water. Most people on this forum have no idea about British heavyweights, and believe Whyte is something special. They have no knowledge, they are naive. Whyte is same level as Skelton. If he beats Fury or someone like that, I will re-evaluate my rating of him.

 

When in human history did people ever discuss a polarizing figure like Tyson and wrapped up the discussion quickly without any extensive back-and-forth?

 

Welcome back btw i didn't think they'd let you back.

 

I have no doubt that McNeely would have made a better fight against Tyson than Rademacher (whose career as a self-promoter/boxer I greatly admire), but the best McNeely never could have defeated the best Tyson. Certainly, as Tyson's skills declined, the best McNeely at some point might have been able to defeat Mike, i. e., the best McNeely could probably have defeated the worst Tyson. Timing is everything. But the mere fact of standing up to Mike would not have been enough for Peter to defeat Tyson at his best. That is how I interpreted the question posed by your thread.

 

Tyson threads have a tendency to do that. Not like Marciano threads, mind you, but still.

 

This is a very good point and the Louis Schmeling fight is an excellent example to use here. Schmeling, like Douglas, just fought the perfect fight. I credit Schmeling for beating a prime Louis and I credit Douglas beating the prime Tyson. If your good enough to stop the other guy doing what he wants to do you can beat the better fighter.

this is correct. Douglas beating Tyson didn’t just come out of nowhere. His record shows time and time again that when Douglas was in form he could beat good fighters just about as well as any of the best guys out there. We all overlooked how seasoned and in form Douglas was for that fight. For the first time Tyson was defending his title to a guy who was fighting more rounds a year than he was against good opponents.

yes. Douglas had the key because he was active, seasoned and in form.

All those other tall guys Tyson was wiping the floor with were not coming off wins over the likes of Berbick, McCall and Mike Williams as frequently as Buster had been.

Douglas was overlooked.

we didn’t know it then, but together, Tyson, Tucker and Douglas were most likely the best three heavyweights in the world between 1986 and 1990.

The whole boxing industry. The TV companies and governing bodies were that sold on deciding that only Tyson was getting to be the next big thing that the other two were kind of cast aside and overlooked.


I would have like to have seen the same men lined up for Tucker and Douglas over that period that were hand picked for Tyson. They probably would have done almost as good.

I am not saying Berbick, Thomas, Smith, Biggs, Holmes, Tubbs and Bruno were not still good fighters.. But Douglas and Tucker likely beat all of them when Tyson did. I think they were the next best.

make Tyson that bit less active, have him tread water, languishing in marking time fights and he won’t look so good.

 

No confusion at all. You will notice i quoted your openly biased and favoritism and threw them back. Downplaying Buster's woeful shape against Holyfield while also minimizing his differences against Tyson both plays down Tyson and casts a better light in Holyfield who you just happen to big up consistently while playing down the likes of Tyson and Lewis. You are far from immune to blatant favoritism.

You fail to concede an inch for Tyson yet John Mugabi got an exemption for virtually identical stuff- "Truth is though, Mugabi was known to party, drink, gamble etc. Lifestyle probably ruined him."

I take note of as much as what gets reported and balance it out from there. Hearns broken hand IMO did not stop him from winning the fight and nor did Tucker's.

It was a slaughter but you did have some top level posters coming at you. The guys that toasted you most certainly had an idea about British heavies as well as a host of others. I'll give you one thing - you tried extremely hard from a position that was utterly terrible from the get go.

 

Holyfield beat Douglas.
If Douglas had been lighter he would gave fought better, but he would have lost.
Holyfield caught him with a planned counter punch against a long range uppercut that Douglas always threw. If Douglas was at his best he would have got up and fought back and gone a few more rounds. Or it would have taken Holyfield a little longer to catch him, and it would have been a more competitive fight. But Holyfield would have won.
That's my opinion.
I am not at all sure how you interpret this as favouritism.

You often claim I big up Holyfield consistently. But I don't. I don't judge him on his losses to Ruiz or Toney or whatever and I defend the underhand 'over achiever' tag put on him. Holyfield was highly rated in boxing circles from 1984 to the end of the last century, based on his performances. You probably rate Holyfield just as high as I do, so I am unsure why you bring it up.

But I was wrong about Mugabi.
Mugabi I overrated quite severely.
I was trying to work out how he gave Hagler such a hard fight then went and folded against lesser fighters.
I look at the evidence. I listen to counter arguments. I changed my position on Mugabi. He was never as good as the hype made out. And he caught a significantly faded Hagler. Yes, Hagler did likely knock a bit out of Mugabi, but the truth is Mugabi was overrated.
And I overrated him for years on this forum.

I agree 100%,
And the only thing that prevented Tyson from winning against Douglas was Buster Douglas.

Even if you believe that, the relevance to this discussion is nil.

It comes across as a slightly childish little attempted swipe at me personally.
You're better than that surely.

"top level posters" is a bit silly. This is just a forum. I don't care about your poster ratings. Arguments are won and lost on their own merit. If you feel I lost an argument, fair enough. That's your opinion.

I don't rate Dillian Whyte as better than Matt Skelton. If I change my opinion, I'll let you know, since it seems to be of interest to you.