When exactly was Tyson's prime?

It might as well be what I said, because you obviously can't comprehend a single word someone says.

 

Your right, I dont comprehend double talk.

 

to be honest. I dont see much of a difference between the whole lot.There were all sporatic at condition. Thomas looked to be a talent and then Back on smack. Tim seemed to be a young talent but then he would appear with man boobs and fight lazy, Tubbs was another talent who can in the ring undertrained. Smith was green and did not know his own strength but gun shy and afraid to bleed or take a thumb, Page looked brilliant and packed a wallop and then in some fights had a leaning contest and Dokes another talent who was hot and cold. Coetzee was a one dimentional Right hand bomber. Snipes was inexperienced. It was the fatness era...could gag a maggot, I hate to even read the reports the next day, it took the excitment out of boxing. Funny thing on a good night(in shape) Thomas, Page,Dokes,Coetzee, had a good shot at beating Holmes ( Larry navigated away from the land mines...a 15 fight Witherspoon gave Larry an even fight but what Suzie says is true, anyone of the others may have upset Larry. There was talent in the 80's but it was plagued by drugs, inconsistant training, lack of dedication and corrupt politics. As far as who was the best at there best IMO Page,Thomas,Dokes,Weaver,Coetzee, Witherspoon,Tubbs,Smith, all had there moments but overall it was a cavalry charge.

 

The conversation began with a response that I directed at SuzieQ. See below.

You then chimed in with this:

I then performed the task of showing you this :

TIM WITHERSPOON:
1. Tony Tubbs
2. Greg Page
3. Frank Bruno
4. Jose Ribalta
5. James Smith
6. James Broad
7. James Tillis
8. Carl Williams
9. Renaldo Snipes
10. Jorge Luis Gonzalez
11. Alfred Cole
12 Arguably Ray Mercer ( robbery )

TONY TUBBS:

1. Greg Page
2. James Smith

PINKLON THOMAS

1. Tim Witherspoon
2. Mike Weaver
3. James Tillis


As you can see, my position has been fairly consistent. Where in any of all this did I change that? The bottom line is, you obviously don't read posts in their entirety, and what little you DO read, you misunderstand. Putting words in people's mouth, changing stories, making irrelevant comparisons, using factually incorrect information, and then at the end of the day accusing people of personal bias is not how meaningful debates are conducted. And it sure as hell does nothing to support your feable position that Pinklon Thomas or Tony Tubbs were better than Tim Witherspoon. You've only managed to discredit yourself. Sorry, but that's just the way it is. No If's, and's or but's about it.

Although I have no proof, I also get the impression that you've lied about fights that you've claimed to have seen, ie. Tubbs vs Zolkin, Witherspoon vs Mercer, etc.. Nothing you say ads up... Now, in a vein effort to storm out of here, you try and sneak in the last comment of " now you're just covering your arse" ??? If you had any dignity whatsover, you would either:

A. Admit your mistakes, and acknowledge EVERYTHING that I've said, rather than ignoring when you're called on your errors.

or

B. Quietly fade away.

You chose to do neither. You think that you're going to overwhelm posters here with shear will power and comments like " you obviously have never seen Tyson fight. " Not gonna work. In the classic section, it takes a working knowledge of history as well as the ability to apply a little common sense once in a while.......

I leave you with these thoughts.

-Magoo-

 

My take on the whole bit is that Tyson never ducked anyone... he beat ass and all contenders who faced him before he went to prison besides Douglas... the best post i saw was the one that described Holyfield and Bowe were not ready to fight Tyson in the early 90's Spoon had his chance to fight Tyson but lost to Smith... several conspiracy theories are involved in his defeat to Bonecrusher. Spoon had the hardest punch of the three men so defiantly defended by some of the posters... Spoon's longevity and impact on the heavyweight divison lasted much longer than Thomas or Tubbs... Orlin Norris is a good victory for Tubbs no matter the case of marijuana in the blood system..the fight took place.... Spoon for whatever reason had more victories over big names than anyone else of the 80's champs mentioned in this thread besides Tyson and Holmes....

 

Magoo, you're such a putz. I can see the steam coming out of your bagpipes as you type your response. Since its so easy to get you riled up, lets continue! You can spend your entire day cooking up another response. Actually it started with the Tyson tidbit you were wrong on. What you were right on was it did start with me saying "wins" but you failed to mention the other three pages of discussion which was summed up basically with this, which is basically what I believe is the general consensus view of Witherspoon.
"I think its pretty clear he fits nicely in the mix with all those guys who held the title and lost it without having any sort of dominance. He was no better than a fighter on the level of Tubbs, Tucker, Berbick, Thomas, Smith, Page, Douglas, etc. Thats not too shabby, but hardly some dynamo that was avoided and ducked, especially considering he had his shot in the Acefield tournament and blew it against James Smith. He could have easily been the one fighting Tyson in the second round of the unfication series. "
Its also funny how you can say that Tubbs win against Zolkin was a robbery, yet you fail to give any credit to him for his performance against Riddick Bowe, saying only that Bowe was green and a few fights from the title? He already had two knockout wins over former champs and a former top contender.
A lot of people actually felt Tubbs was robbed in the Bowe fight. This alone would eclipse a win over Mercer at that time had he got the decision, especially considering the direction Mercer and Bowe's careers took after the fight.
Same goes for Jorge Luiz Gonzalez. Inflating that win is meaningless, both Gonzalez and Spoon showed what they had in future fights. Nothing
Putting all your conspiracy theories aside let the fighters win loss records speak for themselves, there is confliction with both Tubbs and Witherspoon, but that goes for every fighter. If you want to combine Tubbs and Thomas records wins against Spoons with a little subjectivity you will still come up short. Have a nice day.:hi:

 

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I think people make too many excuses for him. I think everything between 1986 and all the way up to 1997 he was close enough to being the "real Tyson".
But he was certainly more prone to coming to fights in less than superb condition and focus after 1988.

He actually looked about the same in the 2nd Bruno fight (1996) to what he did in the 1st Bruno fight (1989), though he wasn't at his best for either. Still, I'd say he was still close to his prime.

If you look at his fights against Ribalta (1986), Smith (1987), Thomas (1987) and Tucker (1987) it explodes the myth that he never exhibited the "bad habits" (eg. neglecting to duck and weave for long periods, going for the one big punch, resorting to antics when he gets frustrated etc.) in his prime.
Sure, in those years he had a degree more intensity and focus, and the biggest difference was he was always in great physical shape. But the stylistic errors and a propensity for frustration were always there. It wasn't so much his style changed, just his flaws came out more when his intensity ebbed.

He was quite carefully matched before his title shot against Berbick but I dont think he was carefully matched between Nov. 1986 up to his loss to Douglas in 1990.
It was just a case that there weren't better opponents around. Don King might have steered him around Holyfield for one unjustified fight (v.Douglas) but that backfired anyway. And in 1991 he fought Razor Ruddock twice, who was the highest rated contender available.
Peter McNeeley was obviously a fraudulent match (not as fraudulent as his corner's quick retirement of their fighter though !). In 1996 he took on Frank Bruno and Bruce Seldon for world title belts, so again that's reasonable to match him that way.
Just a case of not having an awful lot of good fighters around at the time though.

After the losses to Holyfield he came back from a ban for biting with that awful showing against Botha in 1999 and he actually looked severely past it by then. He fought 6 handpicked opponents all the way up to Lennox Lewis in 2002, and in 2001 he looked heavy and sluggish against Nielsen. I think 1999 was when he proved to be truly over-the-hill, before that he was still a good 80-90% of what he'd been in his best years.

His absolute best peak run was the Biggs-Holmes-Tubbs-Spinks fight fun from October '87 to June '88.

 

The best we ever saw of Tyson was circa 1986-88. Because of lifestyle,out of the ring problems etc. he was already on the slide from 1989 onwards.

 

I think Tyson's absolute boxing peak was the stretch of Biggs, Holmes, Tubbs, and Spinks. Biggs was at the most relevant point of his career (an undefeated gold medalist with high expectations, and seemingly all the right traits), Holmes had never been knocked out before, Tubbs had never been knocked out before, and Spinks was the undefeated, recognized champ. Pretty impressive, especially when you look at what fashion these men were dispatched with.

I choose this stretch because I think he learned a lot through his belt acquiring fights, and then lost technique once Rooney was gone after the Spinks fight.

His physical prime was obviously much longer, but the outside forces were not there throughout it.
In my opinion there is more to someone's prime than just physicality. You need desire and inner discipline as well as talent. I wonder how much personal discipline Tyson ever really had. He seemed underdeveloped/child-like, who needed a parental figure to guide him.

Tyson's natural tendency was to head-hunt. He liked to be entertaining, and wanted to knock people out. Rooney, on the other hand, encouraged technique. They would go back and forth between the two during fights. This Yin-Yang relationship was part of what made Tyson so successful. And because Rooney was a connection to Cus and the ways Tyson was originally schooled with, he would listen to him (most of the time). But even with this close connection, it was still difficult for Rooney to contain Tyson.

Once Rooney was gone, it was clear nobody was there to encourage technique....or at least no one Tyson cared to listen to.

 

his prime was 1986-1992 (the day he wen't to jail) he may have lost to Douglas in 1990 but I don't think a defeat like that ended his prime. had they fought in a rematch, Tyson who for exaple took out Steward would destroy him. So I take it as a momentary setback. until 1992 it is.

 

Agreed. They all cancelled each other out,really.

 

I'm not qualified to comment on resume or how to weight certain wins, but I will always be a Spoon fan. Man, that lad could box.

 

The thing is,it was n't just the Douglas defeat that indicated that he'd prematurely passed his prime. Study the two Ruddock fights from '91. His late 80's variety had vanished. Just loading up on shots. Mike was still quite formidable at this stage,but passed his best.

 

yes that's true he was past his supreme best of the Holmes and Spinks fight but I still think these were prime/best years.