Why did Larry Merchant accuse Tyson of fighting a carnival parade of handpicked opponents?

hes 93 alive and kicking

 

If Julius Francis and Savarese were in the top 10, that tells me more about Don King’s ability to manipulate the ratings with a few bags of cash than it does about Tyson fighting real opposition.

Larry was just telling the truth. Mike was slumming with setups — hand-picked guys. They were propped up to look like real opposition to a gullible public, but you should know better.

(Don’t forget Mike admitted last year that some of his fights were fixed in his favor … the opponents didn’t know it, Mike said, but the ref was in on it.)

 

That and enough shillings will buy you a cup of coffee at a British pub, but that doesn’t mean he was anything but a hand-picked pushover.

The guy literally sold advertising on the bottom of his shoes to a sponsor who knew those soles would get full coverage when he got KTFO with those feet sticking up. If that doesn’t tell you he’s pathetic, what does?

There are career hookers who spent less time on their backs.

EDIT: He won the prestigious Brit title from a guy named Pele Reid (anyone ever heard of him?) and lost it to a guy with a 7-4 record. SMFH.

 

I think it meant that he highly respects Tyson and all of his opposition at all periods in his career and that fighters generally all deserve respect for showing up to fight and that he wishes he could be one of them.

 

In his day this was called a "newspaper columnist."

He was good at coming up with pithy, attention-grabbing soundbites like "Lennox Lewis has drowned in Ocean's Eleven!" You know, the kind of lines that a newspaperman is always trying to think of to begin his column. Aside from that, Merchant would offer one or two stray thoughts per round, and for this he was more or less the preeminent color commentator in American boxing. I can't say that I understand what HBO saw in him, but he got a career of more than twenty years out of it, so good for him.

 

Merchant said it in commentary relating to Tyson being a challenger for the heavyweight title vs. Lewis. He was pointing out that Mike hadn’t been fighting top guys, Regardless of what any other fighter in history had done later in their career, is Larry not allowed to tell the truth?

You yourself just mentioned that other fighters have taken the ‘easy route’ opponent-wise … why is it oK for you to say that but not for Merchant — a guy being paid to talk about the fight and to put it in context for viewers — to say it about Tyson?

 

I see your point of view.
But who was he supposed to face ? Francis was the British and Commonwealth champion, and as bogus as those titles can sound to you, they had some weight in the ratings, which made him WBC top 12 fighter. Francis was also in the best run of his career (against very average opposition, no doubt), and given the context (European tour for Mike Tyson because of his problems in the USA), he wasn't that bad of a opponent. Bar Lewis, who was the best British heavyweight available ?

Savarese went the distance with ancient Foreman and Michael Grant, so not that bad of an opponent for a comebacking Tyson who needed to be active.

Tyson was slowly getting in the mix, as he stepped up in the end of the year against Golota.

 

Obviously he didn’t have to fight Euro/Brit fighters when fighting overseas (Savarese was from New York, right)?

Yes he had reasons to fight lesser opposition. Mostly to make him marketable and prop him up for a big payday vs. Lewis.

But this thread is about why Larry Merchant said he’d been fighting hand-picked opponents. You underscored that — he fought Francis because he wasn’t very good but had a rating, etc. Larry was just spitting truth, which when it comes to Tyson seems to make his worshippers defensive.

 

Don King didn't promote Mike Tyson after the second Holyfield fight.

Mike Tyson's last 10 fights ... from Botha to McBride (including the Lewis fight) were not promoted by Don King.

King wasn't picking any of Tyson's opponents leading up to the Lewis fight. King wasn't manipulating the ratings to get Savarese and Golota and Francis and all them ranked.

King was not Tyson's promoter after the Holyfield rematch..

America Presents was Tyson's new promoter as of the Botha fight. Shelley Finkel was his manager. Tommy Brooks trained him for that one.

If anyone was "cooking toast" ... or manipulating ratings to get Tyson's opponents in that era rated ... it was Shelley Finkel.

 

If the "ref" was fixing Tyson fights during that time, Shelley Finkel was doing the fixing. Shelley Finkel was in charge of Tyson's career at that point.

King had nothing to do with supporting Tyson's career after the second fight with Holyfield. They were done.

 

I think Tyson's comeback opponents were fine.

Lou Savarese had stood toe to toe with Foreman going the distance and taking his best shots in a slugfest coming close to beating him. Savarese's form coming into the Tyson fight wasn't that bad either, Savarese had beaten Buster Douglas who was on the comeback trail on a 6 win streak. Savarese had also beaten Lance Whitaker who was 6'8 undefeated and a fairly big puncher. Savarese did lose to Michael Grant via decision but Grant was really hyped up at that time. For Tyson to stop Savarese in 1 round I think is an underrated scalp.

There was a couple of soft touches like Julius Francis, Brian Nielsen. But Francois Botha, Andrew Golota, Orlin Norris, are all very solid names.

 

Hasim Rahman, Oleg Maskaev, David Tua, Chris Byrd.

Would be interesting fights I think.

 

1) Mike never said the ref fixed the fight. He said the ref was in on it: “They were fighting me and the referee. They didn’t know it and I didn’t know it at the time. That’s something you’d find out later.”

2) Guys who shouldn’t have been ranked being ranked wasn’t part of a fix (although the fights themselves may have been fixed). I referred to Don King and ratings manipulation. You are correct that King was no longer Tyson’s promoter, but he was almost certainly involved in ratings manipulations when Tyson was with him. And probably fixes.

So maybe it was Frank Warren who helped make sure the Francis and Savarese types got ratings to make it look like Mike was fighting a legit contender. Looks better on the poster and to the commission to say he’s fighting a top 10 or 15 guy than unranked. Or Shelly. Or someone.

3) Mike didn’t specify what period of his career the fights were fixed. He does allege the Douglas fight was stacked against him with the ref in on it.