Foreman replaces Douglas against Tyson

Tyson was a bum, any version of George Foreman smokes Tyson in 2 or less.

 

Yes you could argue i champion his cause, Im no nut hugger, I accept buster was flawed just like so many talented 80s beltholders who did not always keep the faith but I did my research on douglas and have felt he was a better fighter since he was the only one of those "lost generation" types to KO a great fighter. He also won more fights against tough contenders in make or break fights that he ever got the credit for.

 

maybe I have a buster weakness. maybe I just think he needs a break.

I agree with you, buster had a great performance but was not a great fighter. however, i subscribe to the notion he always had what it takes anyway. Had douglas never beat any other good fighters you could call the tyson fight a fluke, but that is not the case. douglas had turned a corner since the Tucker fight though. he was overlooked.

maybe with the right build up and matchmaking he would have been regarded as high as riddick bowe, as it stands I rate him above bowe anyway -outside the top 20.

Had Douglas been backed like bowe did he would have had the same career as bowe. No better, just the same. buster still would have become disillusioned and unmotivated but it would have happened at the time it did with bowe. you couldnt trust either of them but most rate bowe so much higher for not doing much more.

 

Affected

 

Nobody seems to really appreciate Douglas performance/achievement. It's all negatively focused on what Tyson wasn't that night, rather than what Douglas was (Which was special). Tokyo Douglas is one the most technically skilled and fluid Heavyweights of the last 25 years.

 

are you honestly being serious here? I don't think douglas even makes my top 50 let alone being in a top 20 discussion.

he didn't always have it in him. he had a night where everything fell into place, his conditioning was superb, his self belief was intact, tyson was over confident and them jap girls were pretty hot. combine all this and you get the greatest upset in history.

rahman knocked out sanders and clearly beat tua as well as one punching lewis. for one night he too was great, his jab was strong, his speed was above usual, his timing was better than ever, lewis was over confident and the ropes had a bit of extra bounce that increased the mopmentum of his right hand knockout shot.

what these two men did on that one night was great, no doubt about it. in terms of individual victories it's right up there.

but were they good enough to fight like that consistently we'd have seen it throughout their career. blame bad management if you want but once they got their shot and took it, both blew it in their own way. douglas never trained for holyfield (unless you count eating as muchpizza as possible) and rahman came up against the most motivated peak lewis in years (maybe the best Lewis ever, certainly up there with lewis from golota and briggs).

What these two showed was that under a set of circumstances they were able to pull it off. they both also showed over a career they wouldn't achieve enough to go down as great fighters, nor even very good fighters.

you can't just assume they'd have found greater success with the right team because both found their way to the top of the sport and both crumbled in the very next fight. a great fight makes not a great fighter. you need a full career for that.

 

so did many many champions. max baer, ingo, Liston, witherpoon, page, Tubbs, Bowe...the list goes on and on. All are considered greater fighters than buster Douglas. not one of them beat a champion like Tyson. Does Buster deserve to be rated as high as all of these? No. He deserves to be aknowledged though.

exactly. I agree with that, you make excellent points, all I am saying is the Douglas win is considered an outright fluke because the wins and consistent form he was recording from the Tucker fight was overlooked. He was a bad fighter who got lucky, he was not. Bad fighters don’t beat ex champs and undefeated fighters as "the opponent".

 

Acknowledged he is, he holds the greatest upset in boxing history within his legacy.

I don't think he was capable of ever doing better than he did. He's happy with what he achieved glorifying him serves no purpose.

 

The mistake some are making here is about George's age. His problem was his weight. George needed to get his weight to 240 AND GET USED TO IT. Yes, George fought once at 235 during his comeback but he felt weak and sluggish. George needed to adapt to a lighter weight. 257 was just too high. Foreman was not a ring worn boxer so the age thing didn't affect him. His weight did. This being said, George had a very good chance of beating Tyson from Tokyo.

 

Tyson would train for foreman...............he dint think he had to for douglas......that was tysons downfall

 

stylewise George is all wrong for Mike. I think George stops him in a few rounds, but I am not sure. The only question I have is maybe Mike's handspeed could land on George. But I would go with George, and the fact that Mike was not motivated at the time, although fighting George he would have been more motivated than fighting Douglas.

 

Comeback George Foreman gets way too much credit in these mythical match-ups. He was a limited guy, and he knew it. There was a reason that he fought such low-level comp on the comeback trail. He knew his limitations and didn't want to risk a big-money payday by taking on any credible opponents. Foreman was slow, ponderous, and easy to hit. His chances against Tyson, even the Tokyo Tyson, were mighty slim. Douglas, unlike Foreman, was fast, mobile, and capable of throwing and landing swift combinations. He had tools that Foreman did not have. Foreman talked his way into a big-money shot against Holyfield. Good for him. Foreman was broke when he came back to boxing, so that $12.5 million payday against Evander elevated George back to where he wanted to be: wealthy! But in that fight with Evander, George was hardly competitive. He was tenacious and tough, no doubt about that, but he didn't land many punches and he was outhustled and outworked all night long by the relatively light punching Holyfield. Tyson would have hurt George!

 

:good :dealIts all about levels. old george was simply not that level of a fighter. I remember how seriously old george was being taken until he beat moorer -not very! and with good reason.

He won the title with one punch in a fight he was losing (was stripped of his belt) and went on tour against fighters who were not world level. people changed their mind over night and decided old george was as good as ever off the back of that one punch in a shot he did not earn. It dosn't work like that. Old George over acheived, he knew his limitations, thats why he went the crawford grimsby route and failed to ever convincingly win a fight on points.

 

Tokyo Tyson was no aldison rodrigues!!

You cannot combine the attributes of old george and young george and create a fighter who never existed. OLd george was an old, heavy fighter who had to pace himself and Young george was a talent who didnt think he had to pace himself.