The Most Intimidating Boxers In History

Liston, Langford, Tyson and Foreman are all generally on the same level for me where intimidation is concerned. I love all of them.

 

They're both extremely intimidating but Tyson is even more "modern" than Foreman is, so I'm not really seeing you're point.

Sonny Liston was 6'1, 215lbs and arguably as intimdating as Foreman and Tyson.

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The day Tyson becomes outdated is when it's no longer human beings stepping into the ring to compete. If Joe Louis is the gold standard of power combined with accuracy and technique, Tyson is such for power and speed. Heavyweights simply shouldn't have that kind of speed or even move in the way Tyson did. The fact that his power was such was just sickening.

 

According to his sparring partners, this guy.

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How about this one?

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George Foreman wasn't considered all that intimidating until he beat Frazier. His intimidation factor was pretty much stripped by Ali. After that you didn't see fighters quaking in their boots so much.

So basically GF was only "intimidating" for about 22 months.

Compare that with Sam Langford, Mike Tyson or Sonny Liston. Those guys were scaring people for years.

 

Liston/Tyson for me.

Foreman, as stated above, wasnt really even known until he destroyed Frazier.

Whereas Tyson was pretty much hyped and scaring people shitless as soon as he turned pro, with Tyson it was just a matter of when, he fought for the title.

Most people were saying Foreman was tailor made for Frazier and Frazier would do this and do that to Foreman

 

its got to be tyson because he is genuinely crazy and could do anything e.g. bite your ear off.

 

Joe Louis

 

That was in '97, Tyson had been scaring people shitless since '85

 

Great point, Tyson basically terrified opponents from 1985 to 2000. :scaredas:

(Obviously he wasn't active in 1992, 1993, 1994 & 1998, but still that's a long time!)

 

a lot of these "intimidating" fighters are being matched against unworthy opponents, that's often the problem.

I have to give Tyson some credit for intimidating Spinks, Liston for intimidating Patterson, or Louis for intimidating Baer (if it's true), because those were legit championship-level opponents.

but most of the other opponents who were shitting their pants were simply not particularly good fighters. They were just ham-and-eggers waiting to get KO'd in meaningless mismatches, or guys like Bruno and Seldon and Golota who made careers out of being mentally weak.

 

Remember Joe Louis's opponents -- on their ring walk - looked like they were going to the electric chair.

In the amateurs, that's how Mark Breland's opponents looked

 

I always think my man Lennox Lewis is as intimidating as, when he was 'on'. That mad intimidating serenity pre fight when he's entirely in the zone, knowing that he's in full on destruction and destroy mode; and you simply can't dent his concentration. Scary, scary stuff.

 

The C level opponents Foreman fought when he first came back look pretty helpless.

 

James Scott. Although location added a lot to his intimidation factor.