Best Mike Tyson win pre-Buster Douglas?

Tyson damaged guys, that is why some of them had bad careers after him, some damaged so bad they quit, realizing they would never have a chance at taking a title from him, "retiring" just sounded better than quitting, it would have been cruiser Holyfield coming in at barely 200 probably a catchweight and 88 Tyson would destroy him

 

I can say with confidence that you are a 120 pound Hype job with a glass jaw.

 

In terms of importance to his legacy ? Spinks

in terms of formidability at the time ? Probably Tucker

 

The bottom line is that he cleaned out the division.

We can argue till the cows come home how strong or weak the era was, but he didn't miss many relevant men of the day.

It is enough that he beat them, but the fact that he sometimes made them looked like scared journeymen, obviously doesn't hurt.

It might be worth your while, to look at these fighters, and look at how they performed against other name fighters of teh era.

For example a much older Larry Holmes woudl beat Ray Mercer, who took Lenox Lewis down to the wire.

 

Out of curiosity does anybody dispute the position, that the version of Holmes that Tyson knocked out, was better than the Holmes that beat Mercer?

If so, then why do you dispute it?

 

While I agree and all, you could have left off Muhammad Ali. Leon Spinks beat a much better version of Ali.

 

I'm tempted to say Thomas. Holmes was too rusty and Spinks wasn't exactly a particularly distinguished heavyweight imo. Tucker at his best wasn't Thomas at his.

 

They drink the Kool Aid about Holmes being inactive and not training, and see the proof in how Tyson kicked his ass.

 

Agreeing with most here.
Whatever one may think of the quality of the opponents, he beat who he had to as part of a tournament to unify the titles for the first time since the 70s. Every one of those fighters was holding a belt at the time or was a mandatory challenger from one of the governing bodies. After the unification he fought who he was required to fight.
Who else should he have fought prior to Douglas?
Witherspoon had been bombed out by Bonecrusher in the tournament. Holyfield didn’t secure a top heavyweight ranking until 89/90, and that fight was scheduled for June 90 before the big upset scuppered those plans. Ruddock didn’t happen because of an injury, but it was scheduled.
Not sure what else he should’ve, or could’ve done.
In terms of the best, I’d say Thomas, and he effectively finished him as a top opponent. He also flattened Berbick & Holmes in a way no-one else did before or after.
And as others have mentioned, the Spinks fight was huge at the time for a reason. It’s his biggest win but he did it so easily that people dismiss it unfairly.

 

I just like the way he hammered the body of Biggs. To me, it showed the direction he should have gone in as a two fisted Frazier, extending himself by pounding guys down with attrition. He admitted he enjoyed making Tyrell squeal like a girl.

 

Pinklon was pretty finished when Tyson fought him. I would say borderline shot. He got a worse pounding from Holyfield when he tried coming back a while after. Just looked like a shot fighter.

 

I disagree. He fought a smart fight for several rounds against Tyson until his lack of defense caught up with him. And he didn't have much defense on his best night.

 

I don't dispute it as such, because I don't know, but I have cause to doubt it.

The Holmes that beat Mercer was 4 years older than when he lost to Tyson, but he'd had 5 x fights in the previous year as opposed to none in almost 2 years. I think I recall he had c.4 weeks notice for the Tyson fight, but am not certain.

Regardless, Tyson was as dominant over the field as any HW in history during his short peak.

 

Perfect.

The points you made Greg have always been and remain the disputes. They are also very reasonable points of dispute imo.