Why does Tyson get a pass?

He was scheduled to face Bruno in September '88, so that would have been his fourth fight in '88 if it wasn't postponed. So in '88 he still held to a fight every 2,5 months until things cama in the way.

And after the fight with Bruno, WBC and WBA nr 1, the Ring nr. 2 was up next.

That he didn't keep a tempo that no HW champ has held since Louis doesn't surprise me. He had collected the belts and the lineal title, made a silly amount of money, and the only one out there who was thought to be anything close to a challenge was Holy. And he signed to fight him.

I can just for the last time say that I see absolutely nothing here. Well, he did change management to King, and he might have had a different view than the previous one. He definitely was going to pair Tyson up with one of his own fighters like Douglas instead of, say, Witherspoon every day of the week. That's for sure.

I'll leave it at that since I'm only repeating myself.

 

So, no one is denying that there's talent there. What's done is to add the context that's added to Tyson. It's strange why this is so controversial. They were in their prime age, yes, but so was Tyson. That's the simple point that honestly gets stonewalled by some here. Why is it only alright to mention Tyson's life style issues but not the others? Fairly weird tbh.

Tubbs had a clause in his contract that he would receive a bonus if he came in under a certain weight. And he didn't make it. Despite the bonus and the effing HW world title on the line. That's pretty much the definition of being undisciplined. But we're supposed to ignore that and only focus on what Tyson might or might not have done in training for Douglas? Why?

 

You’re saying you do see it but you chalk it up to ‘he was making enough money.’

I don’t know where Joe Louis comes into this — we’re talking about four title defenses a year, basically — Larry Holmes did it a couple of years, Ali did it a couple of years and I think one year with five. That’s closer to the norm for a dominant champion in those days (look at guys in other weight classes and you’ll see it often), which are basically the time leading up to Tyson … the two-fights-a-year reclining champion era came later.

But as for the money … Mike signed his life (and career) over to Don King. I’m trying to imagine Don King in a meeting with his top people saying, ‘OK guys, Mike’s fighting a bit too often so we’re making too much money, let’s ease off so we can make less,’ lol. HBO’s spigot was wide open and they’d have been more than happy to have Mike fight four times a year, with one maybe being a PPV blockbuster, and they’d have thrown whatever money it would take to make it happen.

Again, Mike wasn’t taking any damage in these fights. He wasn’t breaking a sweat in some of them. It wasn’t beating him down. It was knock a guy out in a couple rounds and collect a check stuff.

We, of course, have no idea what would have happened the rest of the year if Mike had beaten Buster easily as expected.

So whatever the reason, I think there is a shift here. I’d rather take a deeper dive like this into this part of Mike’s career than just shrug and say ‘he was awesome, he was great, he slipped on a banana peel vs Douglas so that doesn’t really count, he was great again after.’

 

Was Douglas under trained or not focus for Tyson ?

Berbick wasn't.
Smith wasn't
Thomas wasn't
Tucker wasn't
Briggs wasn't
Holmes clearly was not prime.
Tubbs was six pounds lighter than he was when he lost a close decision to Witherspoon
Spinks wasn't

I'm not even sure the point you're making .. are you thinking you believe Buster was the better fighter straight up ?

 

Never said Douglas wasn't in good shape, just that that 80's HWs had a tendency to be undisciplined. Which of course alo related to Douglas, but for Tyson he seemed very much on. That was his night.

As for Thomas, it seemed his life style and drug use had caught up with him. He had his last good win in '85 and would be KO'd by Holy in his next fight. There was nothing that said he was anything very special in '87. For what it's worth he said went into the fight with a broken shoulder.

Berbick was in his early 30's which were around the time when fighters was seen as getting old. But I don't think he was anything very special. A corpse of Ali gave a younger Berbick a good fight. He was a consistent performer, though, which is probably why he managed to beat more talented but less disciplined fighters like Thomas.

Smith, pretty much the same as Berbick. Strong and powerful, but limited. Had Witherspoon held his head screwed on for their rematch, I believe Tyson would be facing him instead.

Tucker to me might be Tyson's best defence. Good fighter at his peak. Had a recorded hand injury going into the fight, but personaly I don't make too much out of that.

Are we even arguing Tubbs, a fighter who had a weight clause he couldn't even fulfill? If we're talking commitment to training, how is that not lack of it?

As for Biggs, he had had 15 pro fights. There has been talk about his drug problems, but don't know when they started. Don't think he was much special, though. Beat Tillis, Bey and Snipes on the slide, but not much else.


So if we're talking good contender in prime and good shape (bar in injured hand), I'd say Tucker. Berbick, Smith and Briggs more in the decent category, and Thomas and Tubbs as talented fighters on the slide.

 

So no one reads me wrong, there is plenty to celebrate about Tyson in terms of his material successes and achievements. No question.

Rather than critique him and attempt to use it as evidence for something being remiss with Mike, I’m probably alone in thinking that he actually fought a very good fight against Bruno the first time around.

Frank was big, strong with a powerful punch. He also came into the fight to be pointedly rough and not so legal. I don’t know that Mike had necessarily dealt with that type of resistance before and it did naturally **** him off for a bit.

Mike was also stunned by Bruno and that happens to the best of them but he collected himself and got back to the job at hand and ultimately saw Bruno off in an abbreviated fight.

Also, Mike nearly had big Frank gone not long after the first bell - it could’ve easily been another first round wipe out under Mike’s belt but Frank knew to hold and hang on for dear life as and when necessary to get through.

 

respect your knowledge but you have a strange obsession with Tyson.

Here is The Ring's ratings from 1986, when Tyson won his first HW title:

https://boxrec.com/wiki/index.php/The_Ring_Magazine's_Annual_Ratings:_1986

Michael Spinks, Champion

1. Mike Tyson
2. James (Bonecrusher) Smith
3. Pinklon Thomas
4. Tim Witherspoon
5. Tony Tubbs
6. Trevor Berbick
7. James (Buster) Douglas
8. Tony Tucker
9. Frank Bruno
10. Tyrell Biggs

In just 3 years Tyson fought literally EVERYONE except Tim Whitearspoon who was knocked out by James Smith in the 1st round. So Tyson fought Smith.

1. Which HW boxer since Ali, i.e. in half a century, has fought 8 out of 10 fighters classified by The Ring?

2. Which HW boxer has defended the unified title more times than Tyson since the creation of the 3rd federation, i.e. in about 40 years?

3. Which HW boxer has been ranked #1 since The Ring's P4P classification in 1989?

Can you respond to these questions?

 

Of course. The day before the fight Douglas had been injected with penicillin to combat bronchitis, the flu and swollen tonsils. On top of that the mother of his son had recently been admitted to an American hospital with a potentially fatal kidney ailment. Everybody also knows his mom died 3 weeks before the fight. If all these things happened to Tyson it would be another batch of excuses why he lost. But Douglas won and winners don't need excuses. Just like Tyson didn't need excuses when he beat Berbick while having gonorrhea.

 

Tyson was banging Geisha's but that was his choice.
Ali was in bed with 2 hookers a couple of hours before the 1st Norton fight,again that was his choice.
Result both men were defeated fairly and squarely,prime versions of both would probably have not been,but that's boxing.

 

There's a similar story about Ali before FOTC (think it was the night before).

 

And Morrison before Bentt.

 

The post was mostly directed to @Saintpat, not to you.
I actually agreed with your first post on this subject.

 

So I say this to the OP. It is not an either-or situation. One can argue Tyson was not 100 percent for Douglas, while at the same time acknowledging that most of his title victims were also not at their peak.

 

1) You’re more or less agreeing with me — Tyson was fighting a busy schedule against top guys, then he tapered off fighting a less busy schedule against guys who weren’t all top guys. That’s what was interesting to me.

Tyson’s comet-like peak was remarkable, but it was a shooting star.

You can frame a question in which you’re tailoring it to a certain guy, which this is: Pick a certain year where the rankings reflect guys a champion (in this case Tyson) who would beat the vast majority over a period of time.

You could also do this: pick a five-year period where a heavyweight boxer defeated five or more of the top 10 over the course of his run (not all in the same year, which your Tyson question doesn’t require either) with at least six in four of those years: Larry Holmes, 1978-82. He was down to four in ‘83 and back up to five in the ‘84 rankings. Larry also had seven in one of those years, and he was one of the 10.

One points to an extremely bright flash in the pan; Larry points to consistency over a longer period of time (and if you wanna add the asterisk/explanation like you did for Ruddock, we can also include that Larry twice signed to fight Coetzee but the financing fell through both times, which gives him a chance to add one to those years).

What Tyson did was impressive, but look at the Ring ranking a just a couple years later and he’s not still lining them up and knocking them down.

2. I don’t know, but I’d think Wlad defended three belts more times than Mike? Maybe Joshua? I don’t give extra credit for proliferation of belts. I value the lineal title more than I do someone collecting belts — in some cases, the extra belts give a champion the freedom to actually get more easy mandatory defenses as this, that or the other organization pushes not the most worthy contender but the one who has most ties ($$$) to the honchos getting rich — this forum is full of references to favored WBA contenders who kept getting recycled and such.

Louis and Holmes are tops for lineal defenses and there’s a fairly long list of guys who made more successful lineal heavyweight championship defenses than Tyson. Him winning three belts was meaningless until he beat Michael Spinks, who was rightful heavyweight champion at the time.

What Tyson had aligned behind him with HBO’s investment (and later, to a degree, Showtime’s) was opportunity to unify belts that did not exist in the previous decade. Nobody was putting up enough money to make unifications at the heavyweight level attainable (hence Holmes-Coetzee falling apart twice). HBO put its money behind Tyson and made it possible. It did not put its money behind Tony Tubbs or Tim Witherspoon, etc, previous to the network going all in on Tyson.

It also made it possible for a lot of big JC Chavez fights to get made that might not have been made without that bankroll, same for a lot of its house fighters.

3. Again, I don’t keep up with Ring P4P rankings. There’s probably a brief period where making Tyson P4P No. 1 is justified (til Buster busted it).

Mike Tyson had a moment, so to speak, where he was at the summit for sure. I think unifying a bunch of junk belts (pre-Spinks) was a nice shiny thing for HBO to point at and make it look like he was something historic — and a lot of people bought in, including people who are on this forum today who lived through that time.

But under the closer examination of whom he beat and what they were when he beat them, I don’t think it stands up as well. If you do, that’s fine, we just disagree.

Jim Lampley points out (it’s linked somewhere on this thread, I think) that the flaws were always there. He would get into slogs with bigger guys and after a few rounds settle into ‘throw two punches and clinch.’ I don’t think he has a 12-round sustained performance (or even a 10-round one) that lives up to how some regard him. Lampley said Tyson always knew it (I have no insight into how true that is, but it’s interesting how many giant leaps back in opposition he had to take after he lost). Evander wasn’t even a big heavyweight and was shot to bits and he exposed them all over against a later version of Tyson.

My post that seems to have riled up some people was just looking at Tyson’s record and saying ‘wow, he went from fighting everyone and fighting all the time (yes, as champion, not his bum-of-the-week beginnings) to more cherry-picking and fighting less frequently.’ I stand by it. There’s a downshift there — subtle because it all came crashing down soon into that phase with Buster, but that loss makes me suspect that Don King & Co saw they had a bit of a fragile commodity so they wanted to preserve it.

That is 100% evident in the post-prison version, where Mike was VERY carefully maneuvered and kept away from some top guys (until he finally cashed in and took the Lennox beating).

 

Funny how Buster said his mother's death motivated him to fight his best but I guess you clearly know better.