Why did Teddy Atlas leave training Mike Tyson?

them two need to patch up whatever differences they had and let it be...

 

Cus through him out because he wanted to steal Tyson, which was crazy, since he was only with Tyson for short period. Mike Tyson said so in interview that was on here few months ago. That story about gun to head is true, but reason for it given by Atlas all these years is a lie. Cus was pissed, and trying to get to bottom of what Teddy was up to, gun to head made Cus decision easier.

Anyone have link to that Tyson interview video, or know what thread it was on?
I knew of this years ago, interview with Tyson would be nice to post just to show some who don't know of it. Tyson also mentions how Atlas tried to intimidate him by telling of his Mafia connections. Atlas told Tyson his uncle was gangster too.

 

You have to look at it from Tyson's point of view.
You have an adult male, a "teacher," who talks a big game but in the end, has to face off against a 15 year old with a gun because he knows he will get his ass kicked if he doesn't. And not only does he threaten Tyson's life, but he doesn't even have the balls to take it. To Tyson, it seems; Teddy was just a ***** with a Gun; nothing more.


And I can't recall the exact story, but Rooney talked about the other side to it which was that afterwards, Tyson was going to hunt Teddy down and______let's just say that Tyson would have done to Teddy what Teddy couldn't do to Tyson. And that's why Tyson was quickly tied up and brought back to the house and Teddy was gone. To much time and money spent on Tyson for him to wind up back in jail.

Teddy does come off as a bully. He talks a lot of **** about Tyson but he needs to look at himself in the mirror.
Tyson was a Pro fighter. Atlas wasn't. So who has the bigger balls?
Tyson was a teenager facing off against Adult Males that were bigger than him and more experienced.
What did Teddy do other than brag about how he once faced off against three Titans on Mount Olympus?

He pulls a gun on Tyson; he talks about wanting to kill another one of his fighters; and he pushes Big George Foreman at a press conference because he knows all to well that Big George, this version, the nice guy version, isn't going to ruin his reputation over a nutcase like Teddy who wouldn't have the balls to do it in a room alone with him.

Why is Teddy even a tough guy?
He was raised in a middle-class family, his Dad a Doctor, but he chose to run on the streets like some ghetto kid who had no parental guidance and was living in poverty.

Tyson on the other hand was the real deal: Broken home and poor in his youth. Basically a ***** as a kid, who was bullied, who wound up sticking up for himself (finally) and fell into the wrong crowd and then himself became a bully when he felt accepted. While Atlas seemed to throw himself into that life-style.

Tyson's fault was reverting back to being an ******* from the streets instead of taking the opportunity given to him, a new life-style, and using it for the better. Tyson himself even admits that his life is only a tragedy up until he wound up in Catskill. After that; life was decent. He was given a chance to have a good life. And he blew it.

Or maybe I have that wrong. I Could be. :-D

All that said, going back, if Atlas's point with the gun was to show Tyson that this is how the girl felt when Tyson grabbed her ass___that she was helpless___OK____I'm with ya___but Atlas bragged about the story to everyone who would listen like it was a big deal to hold a pistol to a 15 year old "Mike Tyson" head.


I think Tyson would have respected Atlas more if he would have stood toe to toe with Tyson. Win or Lose; Tyson may have respected that more.
The Old Man, Cus, once got pissed off at Tyson, looked him dead in the eye, and told him to fight him. Tyson smiled, and walked away. He respected him. The Old Man had some balls even if he probably knew Tyson wasn't going to attack.

But yeah; bringing a gun to face off against Tyson, even if he was 15, was a smart move. But let's just not brag about it.





Teddy talks in the third person and is a legend in his own mind.

 

BT: Were you there the night Teddy Atlas pulled a gun on Mike Tyson?
Kevin Rooney: No.
BT: How did you hear about that?
Kevin
Rooney: Its all bull****. Its all bull**** as far as Im
concerned. You dont brag about pulling a gun on somebody.
If you pull a gun, youre going to shoot somebody. Hes a jerk
off. He pulled the gun on Tyson. Now, youve never heard
this part. No one knows this. He pulled the gun on
Tyson. Tyson walks into the gym, then out the front door and into
Cus house, and tells Cus what happened. Then Teddy tells me hes
not working my corner in Scranton, Pennsylvania after my first
loss. And I say, why?? Is that your final answer? He
said yeah. Okay, **** you. Now Im getting the
bull****. So he pulls the gun on Tyson, then Atlas fires the gun
in the air. And so then Tyson just looked at him, walked into the
gym, walked out of the Gym, went back to Cus house and told Cus, Im
going down to Brooklyn, Im going to kill him.
Nobody
knows that. So, Cus threw him back into Tryon up in Troy, New
York with Bobby Stewart. So he stayed up there for a few days,
and I had my fight. I had a friend, whos dead now, tells Atlas,
whats wrong with you? Whats all this with Kevin? What
does this have to do with anything? So, the mother****er called
me up. And Ive had about 8 fights up in Scranton, he knew where
it was. And he says, oh I dont know where it is, blah blah this,
blah blah that. So I said, Ive already hired someone, and that
was that. He talks nothing but bull****.




http://tysontalk.com/article416.html

 

I came on this thread to post something completely different to what I'm now thinking after reading your post.
That's the mark of an excellent,thought provoking post.:good
What I will add though,was that Teddy said he resented the way Cus allowed Mike to behave inappropriately around girls and less talented boxers were turfed out for minor infractions.
I loved Teddy's book but I've learned not to believe everything I read.

 

I could believe that. Tyson probably did get "special" treatment because unlike before, when Cus was known as a no none-sense guy (according to Atlas), he was desperate for one last great success.

Plus, I do recall an excerpt from one of the books written about Tyson that D'Amato basically had his back against the wall because Jacobs/Cayton had invested money into Tyson already. If that was true, if that was his thinking, it is interesting.

People tend to over-look that part. Tyson was great because of his natural ability; because of Cus teaching him; but it was also about MONEY that supported his training. He had top level sparring partners come in to spar with him to get him better and ready for the future. That costs money. As well as anything else he needed.

However, the problem with Atlas is that he does give out his opinions about Tyson's life-style during the time when he was no longer there. And that's where the original team disagrees with Atlas.

Even when Atlas views Tyson the fighter, he seems to keep thinking of the version that he had. The inexperienced boy who was still learning to fight. Still trying to find himself.

Atlas should know full well that if Tyson was the same fighter he had, Tyson would have NEVER been Champion__let alone at such a young age.

The fact is, Tyson, matured as a fighter: Mentally, Physically and Technically without him.
Now did Tyson revert back___regress after he left Catskill? YES. We all know the story. But for a time, he had it all together (for the most part).

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GM: Cus D?Amato is viewed by most as a nice old man that took in troubled youth and built their characters for the mere satisfaction of helping people. There is another group that believes that his character is in question with the way that he handled Mike Tyson. Even Teddy Atlas has questioned the motives of D?Amato in his book, basically stating that he was in it for himself and didn?t? act out of love as most believe. What is your take on this?

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don?t expect you to believe anything that I say. I don?t expect you to believe anything that Teddy says. All we have to do is to go back in history and examine each period of time very carefully to see what happened. Now we both know that Mike Tyson was a horrible kid when he grew up in Brooklyn, and I?m sure he was a horrible kid in Cus? house during the time period that Teddy was there. Let?s even give Teddy the benefit of the doubt and say that Tyson wasn?t horrible, he was beyond horrible.
Now, let?s examine the period of time after Teddy left: 1984, 1985, 1986, 1987, 1988. If you went to any social worker, or any psychiatrist, or any psychologist, and ask them to review that time period carefully, they would look at you and say that this kid Mike couldn?t have been a bad kid. He was by himself with no Mom, no Dad, no sisters, and under the pressure of being the Heavyweight Champion of the World. Show me a series of events during that time that proves that Teddy Atlas is correct.
If in 1985, after Mike turns pro, he gets into a fight in the streets, two weeks later, he steals a car, and then he slaps somebody a week later in a bar, and then he?s convicted of drug running, and then you could say: Whoa, Cus really screwed up. But, if you look at the time period, you don?t see anything remotely like that. Let?s suppose that his career ended in 1988 and never fought again?he just retired. We?d be saying that Cus should have gotten a Nobel Prize.
If you would go to any social worker and say: I can take a kid off the street that is an absolute thug, and make him into a nuclear rocket scientist in six years, they?d say that you?re crazy. That?s what Cus did with Mike. It wasn?t nuclear science, but it was boxing, and Mike became the world?s most knowledgeable boxing historian.
Now, what Teddy is doing, is very sneaky. He never mentioned in the book that in 1988, there is a huge change in Mike that had nothing to do with what Cus had done to Mike. It had to do with maybe, Robin Givens? After Robin fell away, there was another huge change in Mike, and maybe, it was Don King? He never said that. The reason that he cannot say that is because he made a choice to leave at that time and that was his choice. He went to Mike and said whatever happened between him and Mike and the girl. I give Teddy the benefit of the doubt that whatever he said that Mike did, I believe him. Now, Teddy has to make a choice. Does he put Mike and Cus to the test, or does he listen to Cus D?Amato that has 20 billion years more experience than he does? He didn?t. He thought that he was the boss. That?s fine, but what he can?t say now is: ?Hey, gee, Mike turned out to be a superstar and Cus told me that he was going to be a superstar. Cus not only told me that he was going to be a superstar, but that he was going to outgrow all of those bad habits. How do I deal with the press now that I blew it? Not only did I blow it, but I blew sixty million dollars of purses that I could have had. I better just say that it was Cus D?Amato?s fault.?
You know that 99% of the people that read that book have no idea of what you and I just discussed. They are going to assume that Cus was out for the money, but I?d like to see somebody show me something in Tyson?s demeanor during that time period that shows Teddy was correct.


GM: Did Mike Tyson have any brushes with the law during that period that you spoke of?

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want to go on record and say that I remember two. I know that he got into trouble in Albany with Rory Halloway at a mall. He sort of threw some clothes around when he was eighteen, or something like that. Then, in a parking lot, in L.A., during the time when he faced Pinklon Thomas, he slapped a parking attendant. Baseball players that go to college have more problems than that! Football players that you see on T.V. have more problems than that! That shows that Mike has a psychological problem? I defy any psychiatrist to tell me that those two instances, three years apart, means that Mike is psychologically impaired. It?s not going to happen.
By the way, Teddy is not the only person that doesn?t want to acknowledge that time period. Mike doesn?t want to acknowledge it either. Have you ever read the reports from the psychiatrist review panel? I had found it one day and started to read it and it was shocking. Mike, himself, didn?t tell him the truth. They asked Mike to tell them about his childhood, and he said that he was a bad kid and that he was always a bad kid, and that?s the way that it is. Now, not one of these psychologists or psychiatrists said: ?Okay, I will speak to you tomorrow. Thank you very much.?
Now, after Mike leaves the room, one of these psychologists says that he remembers Mike being with some people in New York before all of this and I?m just going to give them a buzz, just to see if they have any information that could help. So, they call here and say: ?Steve, we have you on speaker phone. We have a dozen of the PHDs here and we would like to ask you some questions.? So, I say ?sure.? They said that: ?Mike said that he was a bad kid and that he was always a bad kid. What do you have to say about that?? I told them that Mike was lying to them. Mike couldn?t tell them the truth. Mike was the world?s most popular athlete. He was the most happy kid in the world from 1984 -1988. I told them that it is easier for Mike to tell them that he is a thug, a killer, and a bum, then to say that he is a stupid guy that made the biggest mistake in the world, leaving Cayton and Jacobs.
They would say: ?Steve, you?re right. It?s harder for somebody to say that they?re sorry.? It?s easier for him to say he?s a bum, a killer, a bad guy, then for him to say I?m sorry. So, not only does Teddy not address it, but the doctors can?t even see it. Mike Tyson doesn?t want people to remember that he was a hero. It is tough enough for him to live like he is now. Definitely, Teddy Atlas doesn?t want everyone to know that he made a horrible mistake, leaving at that time period. He could have gotten all of those purses. So, it was just sad set of circumstances.

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Tough Guy Teddy Atlas disrespected Big George Foreman. An actually "PRO FIGHTER" and Future "Hall of Famer." Who was once a street thug who turned his life around and became Champion of the World. Lost his way only to regain his life and work his way on the long road back to becoming "Champion."

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VxSo0pj_jg[/ame]




_________

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUmSR6SgpRo[/ame]

 

Superb posts, great read. :good

& those articles too, I hadn't read that particular one with Steve Lott before.

 

Teddy watches to many movies on how to inspire people.

He did that b.s. tactic with Povetkin.

Let's also remember he ridiculed Michael Grant after a fight in front of everyone when he should have just shut his mouth and said what he had to say in the locker-room. But it's all about "Teddy."

He would not have traded places with Moorer. Moorer was also a great fighter before he even got with Teddy.

 

I forgot how bad Evander looked without a shaved head.:yikes

 

READ:

The full Teddy Atlas - Donny Lalonde "Murder" story:

Interview with Donny LaLonde about Teddy

http://www.eastsideboxing.com/forum/showthread.php?t=267825

 

Brilliant read.:good
Bang on with the thought provoking posts today mate.

 

Cuse Teddy has a glass heart, Cus got some good fights for Teddy and was going to the goldern gloves (I think) and Teddy's glass heart , hum , i mean back got injured and he never fought, Cus always knew.

Teddy is a media ***** , he is not a trainer or a boxer , he would rather sit on the side lines and critices the actual boxers and claim that they are all mentally weak when it was him that did not have the balls to fight. He has a gangsta mentality , he will only fight if he has all the advatages or he will pull a gun.

 

I haven't read the whole thread yet (looks like a lot of nice info) but I don't think the gun incident was the whole story.
I've always found it a bit strange that Atlas has never forgiven Tyson for an incident that happened when Mike was what? 14? That's a long time ago.

I've read that Atlas was pissed at Cus because Cus was allowing Tyson to cut certain corners, overlooking certain behaviour of Tyson's. There seems to be a big conflict of interest between Cus and Teddy as to certain things that Cus would let Tyson get away with. (Outside the ring.)

Things got worse and worse, and then Tyson made a move on Atlas' niece. (Or so the story goes.) That seemed to be the tipping point. Atlas pulled the gun, Atlas was fired, and Rooney took over.