Mike Tyson: One of the GOATs or Overrated Fighter

Tyson a GOAT or Overrated?

  • One of the GOAT

  • Overrated Boxer

Results are only viewable after voting.
Mike said:
The thing that bugs me when this topic comes up, is people act like Tyson would just one punch Ali. Hell no Ali had an iron chin, and rarely even got hit hard in his prime. While Tyson was known to get discouraged when guys weren't scared of him, or could take his shots and fire back.

He didn't knock out Lewis or Holyfield but he'd 100% ko Ali? I dunno about that.
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Ali lost 5 times in his career. None by KO. Only 1 stoppage by quitting on the stool at 38 years old against a beast in Larry Holmes. He even fought through a broken jaw to finish the fight again Ken Norton. Tyson would have came out strong but faded and Ali would put it on him. Ali was a master technician and had a godly chin. That Joe Frazier left hook would have most people drinking out of a tube and he got up by like the count of freakin' 3

I get it though. Tyson is an enigma and an icon. He's arguably the biggest star boxing has ever had. He also attracts casuals that think "damn he'd definitely KO Ali no sweat". The Rousey effect.
 
He's neither. I don't think he's that close to the GOAT, probably a top 10 HW but he's not overrated by boxing fans, if anything he's underrated. The general public might rate him right behind Ali though which would not be correct. I think on any given night he could have beaten anyone in history though.
 
Not sure honestly. I was only a kid at the time and I can't really tell how good his competition was at the time.
 
Morning Star said:
Ali lost 5 times in his career. None by KO. Only 1 stoppage by quitting on the stool at 38 years old against a beast in Larry Holmes. He even fought through a broken jaw to finish the fight again Ken Norton. Tyson would have came out strong but faded and Ali would put it on him. Ali was a master technician and had a godly chin. That Joe Frazier left hook would have most people drinking out of a tube and he got up by like the count of freakin' 3

I get it though. Tyson is an enigma and an icon. He's arguably the biggest star boxing has ever had. He also attracts casuals that think "damn he'd definitely KO Ali no sweat". The Rousey effect.
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This is so true. Quick finishes win hearts and minds. He never got a quick finish over top tier guys he fought, and even some of the lesser comp he fought. But you bring that up and there's a flood of information about his personal life.

<Fedor23>


Ali was tough as nails, and never even had to show that toughness until he got old. Ali was much stronger mentally than Tyson, tougher, faster, and while he didn't have the same level of power he definitely hit hard. I'd give him the edge head to head, and he had the better career by far without question.
 
Top 10ish ATG. Not the best but once you list 3 or 4 great HWs in history, it starts getting hard to make a case against Tyson being on the list.
 
Revolver said:
Tyson was great at beating scrubs and has been fighters.
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Revisionist history.

Tyson cleaned out the HW division as it stood at the time and it wasn't just a bunch of scrubs. Sure, it wasn't the deepest era of HWs but he beat everyone who was there and unified all the belts. Tony Tucker was an underrated win. Tubbs, Spinks, Bruno... those are all credible wins against top ranked HWs.

The thing with Tyson is that he only gets judged on his failings. If you judged Ali like that, then he'd seem like a lesser fighter too. Ali lost to a club fighter who shouldn't have even been in the ring with him, actually getting outboxed by an unknown. Oh but no, Ken Norton was an ATG, he beat Ali! I see. So what were Oliver McCall and Buster Douglas?

What if the only things people talked about when they talked about Joe Louis was him getting KO'd by Schmelling and getting worked over by Marciano when he was old?

Yes, Tyson is lesser than Ali, Louis, Lewis etc. But he's great based on his own accomplishments.
 
Seano said:
Revisionist history.

Tyson cleaned out the HW division as it stood at the time and it wasn't just a bunch of scrubs. Sure, it wasn't the deepest era of HWs but he beat everyone who was there and unified all the belts. Tony Tucker was an underrated win. Tubbs, Spinks, Bruno... those are all credible wins against top ranked HWs.

The thing with Tyson is that he only gets judged on his failings. If you judged Ali like that, then he'd seem like a lesser fighter too. Ali lost to a club fighter who shouldn't have even been in the ring with him, actually getting outboxed by an unknown. Oh but no, Ken Norton was an ATG, he beat Ali! I see. So what were Oliver McCall and Buster Douglas?

What if the only things people talked about when they talked about Joe Louis was him getting KO'd by Schmelling and getting worked over by Marciano when he was old?

Yes, Tyson is lesser than Ali, Louis, Lewis etc. But he's great based on his own accomplishments.
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Shut the hell up
 
Revolver said:
Lmao. I didn't even bother to read your novel. It probably screamed white knight lmao.
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It sounded like I knew what I was talking about, which is more than I could say for your post. Don't speak on things you're ignorant of if you're going to respond like that when someone calls you on it.
 
{<jimmies}
Seano said:
It sounded like I knew what I was talking about, which is more than I could say for your post. Don't speak on things you're ignorant of if you're going to respond like that when someone calls you on it.
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I wonder if there was ever a heavyweight in history that had the combination of blinding speed and power that Mike had. I know he had his shortcomings, but he was so unusually fast for a heavyweight, and combined with his power was very scary.
 
Like others have said, he cleaned out his division with ease. He beat the best at the the time and then ran into some bad luck. GOAT? Absolutely.
 
Krav McGraw said:
Like others have said, he cleaned out his division with ease. He beat the best at the the time and then ran into some bad luck. GOAT? Absolutely.
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How is he goat over a lot of other boxers that had longer primes and better resumes? Because he got flashy kos?
 
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Under Cus? Greatest
Under King? Disaster
 
Re-watched some of Tyson's fights. If you are talking about Tyson 86-88, he was one of the GOAT. Like I said in an earlier post, I think he was better than Frazier at that time. If you are talking about what he accomplished over his career, he is overrated. The Buster Douglas fight was an aberration. Tyson had a horrible camp and it was one of the very few times that Douglas trained hard for a fight. Holyfield fought an excellent fight against Tyson. Holyfield did an excellent job in-fighting with Tyson. By the 90s, Tyson couldn't bully people in the clinch. Holyfield did an excellent job smothering his combinations with clinching and threw in a few headbutts too.

I heard that Tyson didn't start lifting weights until the 90s. The bigger guys were better at smothering him and clinching him. I think that was one reason he started lifting.
 
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