when you say tyson didn't beat a "great" fighter in their prime, who do you mean? you talking about holyfield who went 1-2 against bowe, 0-2 against lewis and 1-1 against michael moorer?...is that the "great" fighter in his prime you're talking about? the same holy who struggled with vaughn bean and came thisclose to getting stopped by bert cooper?
This may come as a surprise to you, but at the time tyson faced holyfield for the first time, holy was considered over-the-hill, basically a fighter past his prime who had suffered health-issues with his heart and didn't really stand a chance against tyson. holyfield was supposed to be a stepping stone for a tyson-bowe fight. but holy upset the odds against tyson and for that win, is considered a great fighter.... however, if the fight had gone as expected, with tyson stopping holy in the mid-rounds, you and everybody would be saying tyson beat an old cruiserwt. so, tyson wouldn't have got any credit for that win over the fighter you now consider to be a “great”...the irony here is that holyfield's legacy as a great fighter is based largely on his wins over tyson...but if tyson was not a great fighter himself, why would those wins matter? i'm just saying, holy is not considered a great, great fighter for beating alex stewart, is he?
secondly, you’re probably referring to lennox lewis...the OTHER great fighter tyson lost to.... i have lennox #3 on my list, so i do consider him a great fighter, but let's be honest...this is lennox lews, the guy who got ko'd by hasim rahman for crying out loud...and oliver mccall, one of tony tucker's victims. lennox who fought life and death with mercer...and vitali. yeah, the tyson who fought lennox was way past his prime...
But let's look at the guys tyson DID beat. So, he wiped out the 3 champs at hw, tucker, bonecrusher and berbick. All three were deserving champs. tucker beat the man who eventually beat tyson...he also beat james broad, orlin norris and oliver mccall, the guy who ko’d your “great” lewis. Berbick was probably the best of the three...went 15 hard rounds with larry holmes, ko'd john tate and beat pinklon thomas who was, at the time, considered the best hw in the world. bonecrusher smith ko'd mike weaver, tim witherspoond and frank bruno...he also gave the great larry holmes a helluva scare and came close to stopping larry.
Well, none of those guys won even a round against tyson...tyson became the first man to unify the title since ali. that by itself makes him a great fighter...what other hw in modern times has repeated tyson’s feat? tyson restored order to the chaos and confusion of the hw div in the 80's by dominating HIS era.
Now, lets talk about spinks and ruddock and holmes.... spinks had beaten the great larry holmes twice....if spinks was nothing more than undersized lhw, how did he manage that? i have holmes #4 all time. clearly spinks was a legit hw champ..he may have been small for a hw, but that didn’t stop him from annihilating Gerry cooney and Stefan tangstad, two MUCH bigger, stronger hws. Spinks had significant advantages in height, reach and experience over tyson…tyson blew him out in 91 seconds.
Holmes came back from retirement to lose to Tyson, but the idea that holmes was an old, washed up fighter, is disproven by the fact he LATER gave holyfield one of holy’s toughest fights and he also BEAT mercer, who was considered a top hw of the 90's era which is considered second only to the 70's in terms of quality fighters….so, to discount tyson’s blowout of holmes is blatant cherry-picking.
Next, we have razor Ruddock…granted ruddock’s resume after Tyson wasn’t that great, but BEFORE Tyson, Ruddock was considered to be one of the scariest fighters around. He damn near killed Michael dokes…he damn near killed bonecrusher…holyfield and the rest of the how div ducked him…If you watched boxing in the late 80’s, Ruddock was the guy who was supposed to beat the great mike Tyson and people made it seem like Tyson was ducking him…Tyson and Ruddock had two of the most violent fights I’ve ever seen…and Ruddock was never the same again…Ruddock was an incredible specimen and Tyson literally destroyed him, broke his bones and all.
But what makes Tyson really special was the fact that he was in jail for 4 years....and came back out and went about unifying the hw title that had split apart in three after he lost the title!...he did this by stopping Bruno and seldon…name me another fighter who could go to jail for FOUR years of his prime and come out and unify the hw title. The only one who came close was ali…he was in exile for 3 years. But not complete exile, because he was allowed to box exhibitions during his ban. Tyson was in jail the entire time…do you know what an absence of that long a period does to a fighter? ali wasn't the same after his 3-year exile...tyson came back from not fighting for FOUR years of his prime and UNIFIED the hw title. Yeah, he lost to holyfield, but lemme ask you this…if holyfield had spent FOUR YEARS in jail and wasn’t allowed to fight even ONCE during that period, what makes you think holy would be able to come back after 4 years and become hw champ again? Not gonna happen…if the tables were turned and Tyson had stayed active, growing and developing as a pro and holy was in jail for 4 years, came out and faced any of the champs, much less tyson, he’d get ktfo.
I read the same story as you did that appeared in SI many years ago about Tyson never beating a great fighter…the dude who wrote that article was entirely misinformed and just wrong. For example, who did larry holmes beat that was a great fighter? Who did joe louis beat that was a great fighter? The answer is NOBODY…ali fought great fighters and struggled with them, such as frazier and Norton…lewis never faced a great fighter in that fighter's prime…holyfield has a LOSING record against the fighters who could be considered standouts of his era... and he's tied with a lhw who moved up to hw and beat him for the title. But people wanna forget the great stuff Tyson did and judge him ONLY on the portion of his career that happened AFTER the 4 years in jail.
And don’t go popping off and stating the obvious about how this is a long dissertation-type post. I wrote it, so I know how long it is…but somebody has to be fair and set the record straight about tyson’s career and we all know it aint you.
