Did Mike Tyson in his prime only beat bums and over the hill fighters?

I know, but this was still considered part of his prime, which was very worthy re: match work rate.
But we have to count this against him to at least some extent. Losing 4 of the last 5, & his last 3 fights before Tyson & still running Tyson very close is significant.

Still I always say that Tyson was great & his competition relatively excellent running up to & during his prime.
Anyone doubts that, do a deep dive into the records & primeness & number of fights of you other favorite HWs coming up.
Compare with Tyson.

 

Yes. He also had the youngest and shortest "Prime" I have ever seen from any fighter, or any athlete in history. If 23 years old isn't a fighter's prime I don't know what is.

 

The Holmes who schooled Mercer had like 6 prior tune-up fights and had been in serious training for a while. The Holmes who Tyson beat had been retired, no tune-ups, very little time to train.

The way Holmes tells it (at least, as he did when sitting next to Tyson and joking around), he knew he was going to lose because of the no time to train, but the money was too much to turn down so he was like screw it.

The retelling from that appearance was basically:
Don King: I want you to fight Mike Tyson.
Larry: no way, I'm retired, I can't beat him.
Don King: $3,000,000
Larry: where Mike at?!

 

So true. As some would have it, Kid Dynamite was “green” for Tillis but past prime for Douglas. There is a correlate for Tillis’ relative success and Douglas’ emphatic triumph, a distinct lack of fear and a commitment to actually fight and not just survive. Douglas had better size, skills and power than Tillis and actually presented as the prototype that some said would have the best chance of beating Mike. The biggest shock was the intestinal fortitude and commitment to win that Buster took into the ring, that wasn’t expected of him, however the fundamental skill set and style to get the job done were always there.

As to the feeling AT THE TIME, Douglas was a 42-1 underdog, in most peoples eyes, including Merchant and Lampley, who gave Douglas’ 90 secs tops, Tyson was as prime as prime could be.

Many of Tysons victims had their own back stories as to why they themselves might not have been up to par but Mike absorbed absolute and full credit for beating them. The aura of invincibility grew without abate. When Mike’s own time came….well, there was every excuse under the sun.

Tyson gained good advantage from the intimidation factor, the Spinks fight being the most acute example and that fight was nominated by many as representing Mike at his absolute pinnacle. The advantage gained from intimidation was lost in equal proportion against opposition who came to fight and who were not at all leery

It seems Mike’s “prime” always had a built in, fail safe automatic demarcation as to when his peak had finished, that demarcation being triggered by the event of his first loss. I mean, Mike was “invincible” so, if he was beaten, that could only mean that Mike had to be well beneath his best, right? Quite the circular argument and thus the impossibly brief prime.

 

The thing is Tyson didn't get so much experience from those 19 fights. Every fight was a knockout and 12 of them were in the first round, that is not much at all compared to Tillis. You also got to remember Tyson had not fought anyone on the level of Tillis before the fight so it is actually very surprising that Tyson did so well.

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Here is the Exhibition, and you can see how dominant Tyson was here.

 

I'm talking about how people are saying Holmes was washed and old and that was the reason for Tyson winning. And in 1986 Holmes was discussing with Jim Jacobs to have a fight on HBO around September so to say that Holmes didn't know he would fight Tyson in the future was wrong.

 

Context acknowledged but I think Tyson saw off the 1988 version of Holmes as impressively as anyone could expect. Cutting to the chase, how do people think the 92 version of Holmes (as he was v Mercer) would’ve fared against the same 88 version of Tyson?

 

Better.

 

Thanks for the video!

Tyson had less experience than Tillis true. But still a man who lost 4 of his last 5 & all 4 of his last fights should not have run Tyson so close.
People give Louis flack for say maybe losing the first time against Godoy, & needing a 13th round KO against Conn-both when he was absolutely prime.

You made 2 statements that I am going to guess you will likely be the fairly rare ESB poster not to recant upon closer examination lol!
Because I guess your ego is strong enough to admit obvious truths...

1) Tyson fought someone who seemed clearly BETTER than Tillis was at that stage.
The Boogeyman, 13-1 Jesse Ferguson.
Who had recent beaten both James "Buster" Douglas AND Carl WIlliams. Both of whom had 3 losses between them. Both of whom ha more fights than Ferguson then. And Williams only loss was to ATG Holmes-& it is likely "The Truth" deserved that decision!

2) Logically if it was "very surprising" Tyson did that well in a very close fight, that *has to mean* that it should have been expected that Tyson would at least lose a lopsided decision, if not get knocked out.
No it was surprising Tyson did not do BETTER.

And I always say how great Tyson was in his prime.
Still this had gotta be a knock against him.

 

Pugguy you done write real purrdey-like & make some good points, but are off or unsupportable for a couple of them.

1) If a boxer fails to live up to his potential even when physically & experientially prime, he gets the blame, but it is reasonabe to say that was not his prime.
2) It was not excuses & only that Douglas came to fight-many others had before, & other boxers had intimidation factors, if they act legally, that is part of what made them legitimately dominant.
The evidence of Tyson's habits with training, drinking, whoring, & getting iced in sparring is overwhelming.
As is the video evidence that Tyson's head & general movements & combos were reduced.
3( The biggest mistake is that Tyson's prime was "impossibly brief".
If you take it from Mitch Green (another big bone hugger who thus does not get knocked out but Tyson dominated on the cars should never count against him or anyone). onto the fight *before Douglas, that is a prime of a little over 3 years.

If it was "impossibly" brief, everyone of note would be having primes of 6 years at minimum, correct?
When in reality the average prime is not much longer than Mike's.
And that time period represented 17 fights!
That if anything is likely *more* than the average fighter.

 

I dont think so.

 

No Tyson did not only beat bums and over the hill fighters but he had a considerable advantage over 99% of them because he was so much more active than any of his opponents.

As good as Tyson was, it made him look so many times better. But he was still great.

Eventually he ran into Douglas who had fought just as often, and against just as good fighters.

Douglas had fought on the same card as Tyson in his last few fights. That really helped Buster prepare enough to give his best.

In hindsight, A lot of Tyson opponents were really not that well prepared. Very few of them had beaten ranked guys recently enough. Tubbs,Thomas, Holmes, Spinks and Bruno couldn’t be expected to do themselves justice going by their recent results.

Even Williams and Biggs had not been as active.

This leaves only Berbick, Tucker and Smith as decent wins.

 

That may be true, but all the postponements and location changes helped Tyson a lot more than it helped Frank. Bruno went into training at least twice for that fight.

As champion, Tyson was matched to win all the time.

Tyson was a great talent. But he had the whole industry falling over itself to work for him. Not with him. For him. The governing bodies. The promoters. The TV. It was unprecedented. No other champion had so much stacked in his favour.

The challengers didn’t have a chance.