http://sports.yahoo.com/box/news;_ylt=AltOa37ZtNfBIYVl9V3RG8GUxLYF?slug=ap-halloffame

Where does Tyson rank among all-time heavyweight fighters?

Honestly, not very high. At the end of the day, here's my take on Tyson's career.

- Built a reputation early for destroying opponents, most of whom were tomato cans
- Beat Trevor Berbick to secure part of the heavyweight crown, without the benefit of retrospect to see that Berbick wasn't exactly an all-time great (further inflating the reputation)
- Consolidated the various titles by beating the champions of an era when boxing was suffering a marked decline in terms of caliber of fighter. He was fighting name guys or guys who had beaten name guys, but no one of top caliber was in their prime; they were all past it.
- Lost to Buster Douglas, Evander Holyfield twice, and Lennox Lewis. Lewis and Holyfield were basically true contemporaries, and Tyson's failure to win any of those three matches is telling.

Basically, he pummeled inferior opponents and couldn't beat those on a similar level. Had he faced Riddick Bowe, I don't know that Tyson wins that. I don't know that Tyson would have defeated Michael Moorer.

@NNN are you kidding me..Like the guy or not in reality he was one of the best ...He just got with bad management...Although I loved it when he lost to Gouglas ..that was a fluke ..all the stars lined up that night ..He is the polar opposite of George Forman ....MT could have been the all time best if he stayed with the right people ...When he got with Mr Heatmizer"Don King" AKA Satan himself that doomed him forever..Two carrers ..The young Tyson and Old Tyson ...Still has to be talked about as one of the best ...

NNN's post was on the money. Tyson is revered for brutal knockouts, being bat shit crazy with all of his wild antics and his controversial life/career. I don't have a problem with that. But his resume doesn't stack up because he pretty much beat up bums. And once his aura of invincibility was gone - he was toast.

He won a lot of fights before he even stepped in the ring due to lackluster opponents who were shitting their trunks before the opening bell.

Thinthickbigred;592145 wrote:@NNN are you kidding me..Like the guy or not in reality he was one of the best ...He just got with bad management...Although I loved it when he lost to Gouglas ..that was a fluke ..all the stars lined up that night ..He is the polar opposite of George Forman ....MT could have been the all time best if he stayed with the right people ...When he got with Mr Heatmizer"Don King" AKA Satan himself that doomed him forever..Two carrers ..The young Tyson and Old Tyson ...Still has to be talked about as one of the best ...

Wow. Horrible post.

I agree with NNN's assessment of Tyson as far as his place among the all-time greats goes.

However, he was once the undisputed, linear champ and he carried the sport on his shoulders for a while.......he is totally deserving of getting into the HOF on the first opportunity.
16 boxing pay per views have hit the million buy mark........................Tyson headlined six of them.
Spinks, Ruddock, Tubbs, Tucker and Holmes(yes, even the aged version Mike beat) were hardly tomato-cans but at the same time they are also not the kind of wins that move one high up the all-time great list.
Too bad Mike never faced Bowe, Moorer or Mercer................regardless of outcome they would have been big fights.


Glad to see JCC and Kostya Tzyu inducted too.

Top 5 Heavyweight Boxers

1. Joe Louis
2. Muhammad Ali
3. Jack Johnson
4. George Forman
5. Jack Dempsey.


And before someone bring up Rocky Marciano , he was overrated.

It's easy to say that Tyson didn't beat Holyfield or Lewis, however that was NOT the same Mike Tyson that was dominant in his early career and won the title.

Frankly put, if Cus D'Amato is alive 10-15 more years...we're talking about Tyson as possibly the best of all time.

And you can have your "opinion" on Marciano being "overrated". But an undefeated record including a win over the #1 guy on your list says otherwise.

Y-Town Steelhound;592360 wrote:Frankly put, if Cus D'Amato is alive 10-15 more years

I think this is a very good point. It seems like Tyson's career quickly plateaued when D'Amato died.

mallymal614;592344 wrote:Top 5 Heavyweight Boxers

1. Joe Louis
2. Muhammad Ali
3. Jack Johnson
4. George Forman
5. Jack Dempsey.


And before someone bring up Rocky Marciano , he was overrated.

LOL How do you know ?bet you cant remember seeing Joe Lewis ..or Jack Johnson and Jack Dempsy..How do you come up with your assumptions

Fact is old time boxers like any other sport are not up to speed to fighters of today ..Just like Football and Bsketball and others ,the sport has progressed..But naturally nobody is going to give Rocky M any credit aint going down that bias raod.... Ali is up near the top ..Frazier ..Lenox Lewis....Larry Holmes...along with Tyson ....Like I said before the young Tyson was a beast then he went with the wrong people and messed his life up ..But talent wise he is near the top

Y-Town Steelhound;592360 wrote:It's easy to say that Tyson didn't beat Holyfield or Lewis, however that was NOT the same Mike Tyson that was dominant in his early career and won the title.

Frankly put, if Cus D'Amato is alive 10-15 more years...we're talking about Tyson as possibly the best of all time.

And you can have your "opinion" on Marciano being "overrated". But an undefeated record including a win over the #1 guy on your list says otherwise.

Here's the thing though: Holyfield and Lewis are both older than Tyson. A boxer doesn't usually enter the scene and then continue to build to a crescendo; the prime years are normally between age 24 and 27, at which point natural physical changes and injuries (mainly to the head) serve to trigger a decline.

When Tyson fought both of them, he wasn't exactly past his prime and going against someone younger, quicker, and better. He was going against someone older, who was in the same career arc. And he also had that big gap from when he was in prison and wasn't fighting anyone, which meant that he wasn't sustaining the same physical toll as other fighters; when he got out, he had over a year to prepare for Holyfield the first time. After that, he had close to eight months before facing him the second time.

To me, Tyson is basically a glorified Razor Ruddock. Ruddock hammered a lot of guys early on, including some names who were past their prime, had some difficulty finding big names to fight, but lost every time against an equal opponent (for Ruddock, it was Tyson twice and Riddick Bowe).

NNN;592573 wrote:Here's the thing though: Holyfield and Lewis are both older than Tyson. A boxer doesn't usually enter the scene and then continue to build to a crescendo; the prime years are normally between age 24 and 27, at which point natural physical changes and injuries (mainly to the head) serve to trigger a decline.

When Tyson fought both of them, he wasn't exactly past his prime and going against someone younger, quicker, and better. He was going against someone older, who was in the same career arc. And he also had that big gap from when he was in prison and wasn't fighting anyone, which meant that he wasn't sustaining the same physical toll as other fighters; when he got out, he had over a year to prepare for Holyfield the first time. After that, he had close to eight months before facing him the second time.

To me, Tyson is basically a glorified Razor Ruddock. Ruddock hammered a lot of guys early on, including some names who were past their prime, had some difficulty finding big names to fight, but lost every time against an equal opponent (for Ruddock, it was Tyson twice and Riddick Bowe).

Like I said, the death of Cus D'Amato changed his career. He ended up in jail. His desire to fight withered and so did his physical conditioning as a result. His ENTIRE STYLE of boxing changed from a technically sound boxer who happened to put an incredible amount of speed and power behind his punches to a sloppy head-hunter which wouldn't work against quality opponents. Like I said, had D'Amato been alive Tyson's career would've panned out much differently. He would've had a much better chance of fulfilling the potential that made him "the baddest man on the planet". Lennox Lewis? When Tyson was training for the junior olympics, Lewis was his SPARRING PARTNER. Tyson was a more talented fight than either of those two, he just fell down the wrong path and his crazy antics kept his name in the news. The Tyson that fought Holyfield and Lewis were shells of the dynamite kid that ran through opponents and became the youngest heavyweight champ in history.

If you don't believe me, not only look at his life path after D'Amato died....listen to interviews with people around him that said he was never the same as a person or fighter. Watch the tapes of his fighting style from his early career compared to the middle and end of it. Mike Tyson will always be remembered as someone who never fulfilled his full potential.

Sly Stallone got elected may as well put Forrest Gump in the ping pong hall of fame.

Where a boxer rates among the greats is based on RESULTS not squandered talent and excuses.

You can literally pull the name of any decent boxer out of a hat and say "he could have been the greatest IF this had happened or IF that had happened"...

Cus didn't live 10-15 more years...................Tyson didn't beat Holyfield and Lewis..............................Tyson never beat anybody he couldn't dominate.

I'd agree that the "what if Cus hadn't died" question is, for me, one of the more intriguing ones as far as boxing goes.

Tyson was a dominant guy during a weak period for heavyweights. He crushed tomato cans, journeymen and past-their-prime former stars, but struggled against high-profile opponents. I'll never get tired of watching those early-career brutal knockouts, but I wouldn't call him an all-time super-elite. He was a giant among boys for a long while and gained a fearsome reputation because of that, but his performance against top-level competition was lacking.

mallymal614;592344 wrote: And before someone bring up Rocky Marciano , he was overrated.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVaYL_71CGk

Just reminded me of that scene lol

[video=youtube;KarsEeJkQ7A][/video]


It is my civic duty to post this on every boxing thread.

Im going to ignore the ignorant and stupid posts here thus far.

Tyson was a once in a LOOOONG time talen, akin to an Adrian Peterson or Lionel Messi or Lebron or Heyward or Lara. He transcended what was around him at the time. Do not fault him for what the competition of his time was, he had no control over that.

What he did was DOMINATE when he needed to, he was knocking grown ass men out when he was a teenager, he made grown men shit his pants. He was a ridiculous talent on the offensive and defensive side of boxing.

You cannot compare him to different eras because he wasnt around then, you can only go by what he did in his prime. And that was late 80s early 90s Iron Mike Tyson that had already beaten people by the staredown. He was a technician in his earlier year, he dismantled the "top" heavyweights of his time and thats all he could do since thats all that was around.

Post prison Tyson should never be brought up in intelligent discussion as he was a shell of his former self after he no longer had Cus.

Mike Tyson 100000% deserves to be in the Hall as he brough boxing to a new stage, he brought it mainstream, if it werent for him Im not sure boxing is even where it is now.

NNN;592573 wrote:Here's the thing though: Holyfield and Lewis are both older than Tyson. A boxer doesn't usually enter the scene and then continue to build to a crescendo; the prime years are normally between age 24 and 27, at which point natural physical changes and injuries (mainly to the head) serve to trigger a decline.

When Tyson fought both of them, he wasn't exactly past his prime and going against someone younger, quicker, and better. He was going against someone older, who was in the same career arc. And he also had that big gap from when he was in prison and wasn't fighting anyone, which meant that he wasn't sustaining the same physical toll as other fighters; when he got out, he had over a year to prepare for Holyfield the first time. After that, he had close to eight months before facing him the second time.

To me, Tyson is basically a glorified Razor Ruddock. Ruddock hammered a lot of guys early on, including some names who were past their prime, had some difficulty finding big names to fight, but lost every time against an equal opponent (for Ruddock, it was Tyson twice and Riddick Bowe).

Fighters peak at different times, it doesnt matter who was older. Allen Webb peaked when he was a teenager, yet hes nothing (relatively) now.

That is a terrible point.

Ender Wiggin;

Nobody has denied Mike's talent but results MUST come with that talent to make one an all-time great.
RESULTS not EXCUSES.

Plenty of boxers have had great careers despite having multiple trainers........................the with Cus/without Cus argument is nothing more than a convenient excuse.
A boxer not having the same trainer for all of his fights is hardly unique.
Cus did not give Mike the intimidating presence and amazing hand-speed he was born with both and still had them after Cus.
Tyson is not the only boxer who had fights won the second they faced-off at the weigh-in either.
When facing the other top heavyweights of his era.................the results aren't there so the excuses come in there place.
Forget birthdays, Holyfield was the one who was considered to be a spent bullet due to the rough fights when he and Mike fought............Mike was a 6-1 favorite stepping in the ring but people like to act like that part didn't happen.
Tyson did dominate a lot of fights...................and that was the only way he could win..................Mike never beat an opponent he couldn't dominate.


There is a difference between being great in a great era and being great in a weak era...........................................you can compare eras.

I haven't seen anybody bash his Hall of Fame induction either............................everybody knows he belongs there...............Leonardo asked about all-tme status not whether he is deserving of the HOF.

Mike with Cus isnt derailed by the parasite that is Don King, to say he would be the same either way is laughably silly as any person knowledgeable about boxing has said so.

The Tyson after all the legal trouble became a shell of his lat 80s self, he became a headhunter that abandoned what made him so feared. No one really talks about that version as everyone knows thats like someone out of their prime, for one reason or another.

These arent excuses, this is what happened, this is what EVERYONE says about mike. Lewis and Holyfield peaked after Mike, when they fought, Tyson was already passed his relative prime, if you will.

And wtf, no one though 31(i think)-3 Holyfield was spent before his fight, where in gods name did you get that? He was a heavy favorite in that fight.

Your post makes little sense.

So if Evander was a heavy favorite explain how his victory was named Upset of the Year by Ring magazine.

http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/boxing/news/story?id=4905674
^^^^ espn article listing the greatest boxing upset ever...............there are 20 fights on the list Holyfield/Tyson is one of them, it also points out that Evander was considered washed-up.

You have to have been a heavy underdog for the Ring to have called the fight the biggest upset of the year and to make a list like that a decade and a half later.
You are wrong, Tyson was indeed a heavy favorite he even held one of the title belts(wba) coming into the fight and Evander was considered washed up.
I suppose you're going to try to say holding one of the three major belts is a common thing for washed up fighters next.
That's another thing the Tyson apologists try to ignore............holding major belts actually meant something in that era and Tyson had one of them coming into the fight.
Evander had struggled with Bobby Czyz in his previous fight and was ko'd by Bowe in the fight before that.
Check Mike and Evander's wikis even those point out that Evander was a heavy underdog and seen as washed up.

I got the idea that Mike was heavily favored from the reality that he was indeed the favorite you are just making up crap.

Ya because they didnt fight 2 times or anything, I totally forgot the 2nd fight didnt actually happen and Holyfield wasnt the favorite after his earlier drubbing of Tyson, ya, totally forgot that fight didnt happen lol.

And did you say he struggled with Czyz? ROFL, ok, you dont know what youre talking about. And youre talking like losing to Bowe makes someone washed up rofl.

You need to just stop posting about this. You are pretty not smart about this..

Im not even sure you know what youre arguing about anymore, do you actually know anything or are you just grabbing your info from Wikipedia? And no you cant compare eras, you can only go by what was available, in his prime, late 80s early 90s, he was as dominate as could be. You can speculate how he wouldve done against others, but you cant make any concrete comparison because of his competition of the time, thats utterly ridiculous.

Ender if anyone isn't looking good it is you.

You said Holyfield was a heavy favorite I proved you wrong now you act like you were talking about a different fight nice try, nobody reading this thread is going to fall for it.
I didn't need to look at wiki I just searched a few things to back up my statements, that was among them.
You might want to look up some stuff since your posts have clearly proven you don't know what your talking about.
I'm going to assume you haven't seen the fight with Czyz.....based on your comment it's a safe assumption(try clicking the link I provided). I'm beginning to wonder if you are even old enough to remember the era, one of the biggest upsets in history should be hard to forget if you saw it.

Trying to go by his prime and just ignoring anything else is just stupid.
Ali was past his best when he beat Foreman....................Big George was well past him prime when he beat Moorer.............according to you those results should be ignored since they were past their prime.
A few years after being wiped out by Tyson Holmes still had enough to upend Mercer........by your logic both results should be ignored since Larry was past his best(if you look at my first post on this thread you will see I give MT credit for beating Holmes).
Many, many boxers have posted some of there best wins after their prime had come and gone.........there is a difference between being past your best and shot.
Mayweather is probably a little past his best but not many boxers in the near weight divisions would have any chance at beating him.
All of Hopkins best wins have come at age 36 and beyond......................Mosley had been cosidered past his best for years before upsetting Margarito last year.

Like I said above there is a difference between being great in a great era and being great in a weak era.
It may be unfair to the guy not born at the right time but a line has to be drawn somewhere.
On top of that Tyson did indeed have the opponents to make him one of the best ever had he beaten them on top of everyone else............. Holyfield and Lewis but he lost both fights......you can say he was past his best all you want but the fact is Tyson was still one of the top heavyweights in the world at the time of those fights and nothing had happened yet to show otherwise, lesser boxers still had no chance when in the ring with him.
Spare me any comments about Douglas it was and still is regarded as a fluke...............one of..... if not the biggest upset in boxing history and Buster wasn't a bum to begin with. Mike beat better fighters than Buster after that wake up call.