Is Tyson's Top 10 HW Ranking Justifiable?

...Subjectivety will always creep in somewhere, I think. I'm fine with that, as long as those choices can be reasonably justified.

 

Agreed,

I have seen some people who rate him as high as top 5, while others don't even have him at 10. Neither are very justifiable in my honest opinion. I think anywhere between 8-10 is a fair rating. Frankly, I can't think of 10 heavyweights who deserve to be rated higher than Tyson.

 

I'm more stunned that people rank either of them ahead of Lewis.:huh

 

think he falls short. he maybe the most talented of all the hw greats but he couldnt sustain his greatness long enough. he had a nice little run though.

 

He was on top of the divsion as long or longer than men like Marciano, Liston, Jeffries, and Frazier. His title reign and dominance beat the **** out of Jack Dempsey's and he has claim to being the youngest unified champion in the game's history.

 

its definitely went that way with lennox lewis. he is more appreciated now than he was a few years ago

tyson has always been greatly aprreciated. he was once talked about as the best ever

 

thats all true but the competion wasnt stellar. the divison didnt get good till the early 90's, but tyson had already fallen off and sent to jail. had he stayed with rooney and stayed out of jail, not telling how things would have turned out.

 

True. Great as Tyson was, he will ever be the "woulda, coulda, shoulda" boxer :yep

 

I wouldnt agree with this at all. The division peaked in the early 90's. The crop in the 80's was solid all the way through. The mid 90's was where the decline started up until now. You had all the good technically skilled boxers, including, Bowe, Holyfield, and Tyson all winding down the prime of their careers. The new crop which emerged was not very good.
From 94 on, with exception to Lennox Lewis there was no fighter who could be categorized the same way. We had a flash of possible great fighters in Tua and Ibeabuchi, but Tua lost his conditioning and Ibeabuchi went nuts. The rest was garbage that Lewis feasted on. Was Lewis beating Tyson and Holyfield anymore special than Tyson beating Holmes and Spinks? Tyson went through better fighters quicker, unified the titles, and was the youngest heavyweight champion. He will always rank higher in my book than Lewis.

 

When we say the competition was stellar, it depends on which era you're talking about. Liston's only title victories came against Floyd Patterson who I don't rate very high in a head to head sense. A lot of fighters would have my vote to beat Patterson. Jeffries fought a slew of much smaller and older men, and Dempsey avoided black challengers as well as sat on the title for 3 years without a single defense. Frazier has the great claim to having beaten Ali, Quarry and Ellis, but also fought guys like Stander, Ramos, Daniels, and Zyglewitz. History may not credit Thomas, Berbick, Spinks, Williams, Bruno, Biggs or Tucker as being outstanding opponents, but most of them were solid challengers in the primes of their careers, and Tyson defeated them handely.

 

not in my top ten but its not nonsense for him to be there

 

No.

He had a horrible Glass Jaw and was brutally KOed by Danny Williams and Kevin McBride :rofl atsch






































Just joking.

I wouldn't have him in a top 10, ever.... but wouldn't argue that he is on the fringe. For him is that he blasted out pretty much everyone at his peak - but against him.... who the **** were most of them, he went on too long et al.

 

I'm not sure I've always bought this argument. I agree to a degree, however, the Jimmy Young fight was both fatigue and him changing his style to pace himself. So this "He can't beat movers" is exaggerated to me.

Moorer edged Holyfield. Moorer was the champ and certainly a great fighter and far more versatile than Mercer. Foreman losing doesn't matter. He got the punch, he set the guy up and won. Of course Foreman's win is more impressive, especially since he's older than Holmes was for his win. And as fore Moorer, I don't think he had the best of chins but the guy was only knocked out by David Tua and George Foreman. That certainly says something.

Ali put on a brilliant peformance using a brilliant strategy. I think Ali looks significantly better and faster here than in the Thrilla. Obviously it's not a prime Ali but so what. What do you mean boxer types? He could beat "boxer types." He had trouble with movers the most. When you're in your 40's that's justifable and when you're changing your style to pace then that can be understandable.

Are you seriously suggesting these names should be ahead of Foreman? Do I have to address each one? I do feel that the Frazier win was huge. It's his first lost, and it's one of those wins like Frazier beating Ali first that means a lot. Where do you have Frazier rated out of curoisity?

 

I think the biggest difference between the two is that Lewis was never given a sustained beating the way Tyson was against Douglas, Holyfield and Lewis. The Lewis one you can over look because he was way past him prime, but not the other two. And personally I think it's far worse in terms of a display of skills to get totally outboxed then to get caught with two punches while winning the fight. So one could almost say, that except for those two punches Lewis would likely have gone through his entire career undefeated. I'm not defending his losses, they are what they are, but if you view things in that context, Lewis came damn close to having an undefeated career.