Mike Tyson "weak" opposition

Thomas did well to survive the first round all things considered. I will give him that much.

 

Terrel is underrated, I think. It's pretty rare that contenders come off the kind of run he did leading up to Ali.

As you say, Tucker's only noteworthy win was over Douglas. Still, I struggle to come up with challengers during for example Holy's first reign that had better wins when challenging. Bowe, for example, had mostly feasted on the remains of Tyson's challengers. Old man Holmes might actually have been the most qualified on paper, with his win over Mercer.

 

I certainly agree with this. Larry earned that shot. Still, It kind of hurts Evander that his challenger was so old he lost a contact lense during their fight. Bert Cooper was a late sub. Foreman was seen as little more than a novelty. Moorer beat Alex Stewart and had a few fair wins but of course he beat Evander. Although I liked him, First time around Holyfield, Coming after Tyson, he was seen as a bit of a shakey champion. Later he beat Tyson and defended against Vaughn Bean(a kind of Tony Tucker record he had too) Nobody knew who Vaughn beat. At least In this reign he avenged Moorer. Then Lewis got the better of the Holy one. In fact, giving Lewis everything he could handle did as much for Holyfeilds Rep as anything else. It showed more resilience in defeat than many other champions.

 

Indulge me names, there really can't be that many of them.

 

Lennox Lewis, vitali Klitschko, Riddick Bowe, joe Frazier, Larry Holmes, Rocky Marciano, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis. Perhaps if he is on the same schedule and kept in training Sonny Liston should be a good candidate too. After all, There are no Cassius clays among them is there?

Ali himself won't be knocking those guys dead but in his 1960s carnation over a three year spell he stops all of the same guys that Tyson did in the kind of fashion he beat Foley and Patterson.

Come to think of it, as green as he was, Which of the guys Tyson knocked out don't you see George Foreman also knocking out?

 

I'll be back to carve into this hopefully within 24hrs.

 

Good luck with that.

 

Oh yes, I understand. Just choosing a fighter who came closest to looking as destructive as Tyson on their way up.

The correct answer is...no one would. Coke Lab picks Lennox but forgets how badly Lennox struggled with skilled boxers. It was the punchers he ate up.

Lennox certainly looked less than awesome against Bruno and Tucker.

 

And Tyson looked like a million dollars against a one handed Tucker, not........

 

If we say that Tyson's four best years were 1986-1989, we could say that Lewis four best were 1997-2000.

I think they're pretty similar, with Lewis wins over Holy (I don't accept the first as a draw) probably being better wins than any Tyson had, though.

You can find four years of similar dominance in Wlad's career as well. And in Louis's. Liston's best period, 1960-1963, probably falls a bit short of Tyson's, but not by very much. As does Holmes 1978-1981, imo, considering that a good number of the fights were quite hard fought. Holy's wins 1988-1991 similarly lack in dominance, imo, and doesn't contain as many of the top names of the period either. Foreman 1970-1973 has too many cans, I think, even though the Frazier destruction is mighty impressive.

Frazier's run 1968-1971 is probably the best of the lot with the Ali win as the crowning achievement.

EDIT: Oh, I forgot Ali's run 1964-1967. The best one imo, with dominating victories over Liston (yes, I think Ali picked Sonny apart in the first fight, no matter what the score cards said), Patterson and Terrell to go with most of the other relevant fighters of the time. I can see why some would say Frazier's was even better, though.

 

Frazier 68-71 generally fought worse opposition than Tyson with a better singular win.

 

Yes but how many would you put forth go thru Tysons actual opponents in as convincing a manner as Tyson did.

That was my ask of Chok.

 

Personally I'm not too fond of those hypotheticals. Boxing change, and it's hard to translate what a fighter did in his era to another era. That's why I looked at it that way.

But if I had to do it, I'd say that Liston and Louis probably wouldn't lovet it too face 220-230 lbs movers. Dempsey, forget about it, tbh. Ali on the other hand had a pretty easy time with the big upright guys and I can't see anyone do a Foreman on Frazier (but he will get caught with a good power shot or two coming in, and how he handles it from Smith and Bruno I don't know). Of course, they wouldn't win by all those early KO's.

Mature Lewis probably goes through them quite like Tyson, even though a Rahman KO could always lurk there. Mature Wlad should make it about as emphatic, but a lot more boring.

 

Vitali beats them all handily IMO, the only fighter that could make it interesting for a few rounds would be Spinks. He even beats the likes of Smith and Tucker more clearly than Tyson IMO.

 

I agree with all of this. What you say here really stands up in my opinion.