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Originally Posted by DBlack
Wow! At first glance at Mike, a statement like this may seem utterly true. But if you take the time to learn about Mike, his life, you will quickly recant this innacurate characterization.
Plagued with problems from mental issues, betrayals by so many close to him, to abandonment by his closest family, Tyson is nothing but a fighter. In my book, he's both a human tragedy and success story.
But I know it's so very AMerikkkan to spit on those we know so little about. It's human Amerikkkan nature.
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I look at Mike Tyson, as a fighter, and strictly as a fighter, I don't know the man, so I'd hate to get into things in his life. Nobody knows Tyson's true whole story except Mike Tyson, I know the things which have been written, certainly. I kind of consider myself somewhat of a boxing historian, I could tell you stories about Black Ajax and Bill Richmond and all those old great fighters, Peter Jackson, etc.
Greater fighters have had harder and more tragic lives and done more than Tyson (i.e. Jack Johnson), and again, I strictly look at the fighter, and as a fighter he's overrated, in my opinion only. Here's a fighter who hasnt had a significant victory in about 17 years, I mean okay, maybe you consider Razor Ruddock significant (and I dont) then we can go 14 years. Regardless, take that fighter and call him FIGHTER A and he's now headlining a ppv card fighting KEVIN MCBRIDE (who got knocked out by a fighter who got knocked out by Butterbean).
He lost to Buster Douglas in his prime who might be the worst heavyweight champion ever, or at least the worst since Primo Carnera and it wasn't a one punch deal, he got worn down and stopped. He fought 4 fighters in his career who will be greatly remembered in 5 bouts and went 2-3 and 2 of the loses were by knockouts in fights where he was being dominated and one of the wins was over a 37-38 year old Larry Holmes. He never got dropped or badly hurt and got up to win a fight. He reigned during one of the worst eras ever of the heavyweight division (and I cant necessarily fault him for the quality of his competition, unless he lost to one of them)(and he did) the Pinklon Thomas' and Tony Tubbs' of the world aren't exactly running the Jack Johnsons and Joe Louis' out of the record books. His prime ended with a lost to a fighter who himself had been knocked out 3 times before that night. Whenever a good fighter stood up to him he lost and while I dont fault him for losing to the fighters he has late in his career, thats what happens to fighters on the upper echelon late in their careers, he QUIT in his last fight and that is unacceptable, and I would suspect you'd agree with me there.
Tyson is a story about what if. If he hadn't had his trainer and father figure pass away when he did, what would have happen? If he had come from a better background what would have been? If he hadn't had this or that, what would have happen?
Until we start affording the same passages to fighters who do not need them to be called great, then Tyson does not qualify.
What if Jack Johnson didn't have to wait until he was 30 to fight for the championship. What if Peter Jackson, Sam Langford, Harry Wills, Joe Jeanette, Sam McVey or Jack Blackburn had actually gotten an opportunity to fight for a championship in their careers? What if Muhammad Ali didn't have to submit 3 and a half years of his prime because of his troubles?
We don't ask those questions about those fighters generally, because they are not necessary. We don't point to the hardships and miseries of their lives as reasons why maybe they weren't able to succeed to their potential. We dont ask those questions because regardless of what horrible stories lie in their pasts, they did succeed, in the ring, as real true warriors. And they did it honorably. And still I could walk out of my house in the morning and go to the school and ask the children how many know about Mike Tyson and there wouldnt be a single hand down, and ask about how many know about Jack Johnson, and maybe only a few if any would rise.
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