Quote:
Originally Posted by SmashingMachine
He was in/out of juvenile hall growing up. He was in trouble all of the time. He was a talented fighter who beat up on a bunch of bums or has beens. Anybody, who ever got Tyson a little out of his game plan frustrated him and made it a long night for him. Don't believe me? Go back and watch his fight with James "Quick" Tillis. Tillis had Tyson out of his game and took him to the cards. Tyson was frustrated and out of sync all night. By the way, who the heck is James Tillis? He was the same person Buster Douglas was before he took Mike out of his game plan...a nobody. The only difference with Douglas was that Douglas had more size and better tools to carry out the game plan. Oh, by the way, James Tillis was before Robin Givens too. Had Mike gotten in the ring with Lennox Lewis back in the 80's or early 90's, his rep as a bad ass would've been scrubbed out long ago. If you're looking at someone to blame for Mike's demise start by looking at Mike first. I mean, c'mon, get real. Next thing you know you guys will be accusing Evander Holyfield of putting BBQ sauce on his ear or something. Mike Tyson is responsible for Mike Tyson...PERIOD!
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Remember that all there were, were has beens back when he was king. There was nobody of any consequence. I agree with you on a lot of points and believe he would have become unraveled at some point (even Teddy Atlas saw that coming and got out early), but to his credit, he fought all the champions at that time and unified the belts, typically destroying his opponent. He also beat Michael Spinks who was thought to be the guy who could beat him at the time knocking him out in 91 seconds. He also had some good offense and defense pre-Douglas. Once he got out of prison, he was a shadow of himself throwing one hail mary punch at a time with no defense. I'm surprised he was as popular for so long when he sucked for so long. I really liked him in the 80's, but time has made me and others like yourself realize one thing, he would of snapped with or without Robin and Don. I stopped kidding myself long ago thinking if they never entered his life, he would of been the greatest of all time. He didn't have the psyche for it.