Lennox Lewis: How I Beat Mike Tyson

4 low quality tune ups ????? Frank Bruno was a decent world class fighter even at that point and Bruce seldon by definition would be a good tune up. Mike Tyson ran through these guys and proved he could still operate at world level. Buster Mathis jr was also an undefeated contender that Mike Tyson sent to the shadow relm. Excuses Excuses

 

You know I don't know where this idea stems from. Douglas was beating Tyson all night no matter what he never thought twice about trying to walk through fire and bring the fight to Bus. He was drummed hard without blinking by Holyfield and never hesitated to engage he was fed uppercuts all night from Lennox knowing full well he was only gonna win on a lucky punch he still gambled every round right up until he ran out of chips how does none of that show heart? FFS he was trying to put his mouthguard back in while he was desperately scrambling to his feet seeing double in Tokyo.

 

Bruce Sheldon took a dive. Bruno was coming in with an impaired eye, the injury forced him to quit boxing permanently. Watch the Buster Mathis Jr fight and see Tyson's timing and accuracy all over the place, McNeely was a joke of an opponent, these are a total of 8 rounds which will not prepare for an active Holyfield.

 

LOL THE EXCUSES. Seldon took a dive, ok, he would have lost anyway and Tysons performace against Bruno shows that. Ah yea ah well these world level tune ups couldn't prepare him for an "active" Holyfield that retired for a year due to a heart condition and had been brutally knocked out by Riddick Bowe, had lost to Moorer and had looked terrible against Czyz. Bruno was still a good fighter as shown in the Mccall fight even when it was confirmed at that point that he had an eye injury. Tyson probably damaged him more and forced him into retirement.

You're underrating Lewis's performances and then letting Mike Tyson run with every excuse under the sun. Bias

 

You just named three very important instances of Mike showing heart. Another one might be the Ruddock fights...he took some incredible shots from Razor more than a few times during those fights.

 

Not really you have to be very biased with ulterior motives to not take into account that a 4 year prison sentence is not going to erode your skills significantly

 

He was past it but looked sound and destructive against Bruno so yeah.

 

Its not a good comparison, Bruno didn't even come to fight, he came into the ring with an impaired eye, he must have crossed himself a hundred times, he was terrified of Tyson and has even commented i would rather fight Lennox Lewis every week rather than Mike Tyson once a year

 

LOL most people Tyson face are scared of him. He's had an eye injury since 1991 but that didn't stop him from beat Mccall lmao. Excuses Excuses.

 

Mccall was Tyson's sparring partner, just because he chinned chinny Lenny does not make him a great fighter. Fact is Bruno's doctor had been begging him to stop fighting and Bruno retired after the Tyson fight to save his eye. Bruno's been offered $10 million right now for an exhibition and he turned it down saying his eye sight is more important.

 

McCall's not elite but he's not a bad fighter. In addition to beating Lewis he also beat past it Holmes, the same Holmes that schooled Mercer and went the distance with prime Holyfield in a competitive fight. He also KO'd Akinwande and Bruce Seldon

Also LOL at mentioning a old ass 60 year old Bruno turning down an exhibition offer. Obviously the injury would be far worse now due to age

 

I agree Tyson was well, well past his sell-by date.

But nobody much laid a glove on him in his first 37 fights before Tokyo Douglas. After that, one fight with Evander (the second didn’t last long enough for him to get beat up) and two physical affairs with Donovan Ruddock … and that’s pretty much it.

An argument can be made that Lennox had more miles on his tires as far as ring wear in actual fights than Tyson by the time they met.

 

I think its a question of styles, high work rate, fitness, reflex dependent pressure fighters like Marciano, Frazier, Henry Armstrong, Tyson usually tend to decline by mid 20's and have usually retired by 30-31 and Tyson fought Lewis when he was 36 and he was already too busy partying it up in Cuba, Hawai and entered camp at 280 lbs for the Lewis fight. He was desperately fighting for money at that stage of his life. I even read the $20 million he received for the Lewis fight, vast majority of it went to his creditors.

 

Lol, he was suppossed to beat a past it Holmes. Akinwande (another fighter who had knocked down Lewis) and Bruce Seldon were not great fighters. Just because he badly embarrassed Lewis with that punch to the face does not mean he was much of a fighter, he was Tyson's sparring partner.

 

I probably didn’t explain my point, but you hit on it pretty well: I think Tyson’s decline was almost entirely self-inflicted rather than by ring wear. He only had a handful of fights before Lewis where he took any punishment.

All those guys you mention took more punishment than Mike that contributed to their decline.

If Tyson chose not to take care of himself outside the ring out of self-loathing or for some other reason, that’s on him.

I personally think he just found boxing a lot less fun once opponents stopped being afraid of him and made him earn it every time out. Some simply weren’t able to stand up for him but for the most part starting with Ruddock they didn’t cower or quake in fear and fought him. Hell, even Franz Botha and Brien Nielsen made him work for the wins.

When you blow through guys for most of your career just by showing up and glaring at them and then you reach a phase where you have to earn it every time out (and do the work in the gym to be able to do so), it’s a different kettle of fish.