According to former heavyweight champion George Foreman, there were serious negotiations - more than once - to have a fight with Mike Tyson, but Big George is claiming that Iron Mike never wanted to follow through with the match.

When Foreman snapped a 10 year layoff in 1987, he was knocking out the competition with ease. But he was never able to get division ruler and undisputed world champion, Tyson, in the ring.

Foreman racked in 24 wins and 23 by knockouts before he was able to secure a world title shot at Evander Holyfield in 1991. Holyfield was a better man that night, and it wasn't until 1994 when Foreman pulled off his historic knockout to beat Michael Moorer for the IBF/WBA heavyweight crown.

Foreman believes Tyson's original trainer, Cus D'Amato warned him with stories of Foreman's power from when Big George was blasting out guys like Joe Frazier.

"There were a couple of times, serious negotiations were going on with the Mike Tyson fight. Mike Tyson just didn’t want to fight me. Not to say he couldn’t have beaten me. I mean, this guy could punch. The bigger they are the harder they’d fall as far as Mike Tyson was concerned," Foreman told On The Ropes Boxing Radio. 

"I guess that I have a feeling, his first original trainer and manager, Cus D’Amato, must have told him about George Foreman’s punching power as though I would never comeback. So sometimes when you come back and a guy remembers those stories, he says to himself, ‘Look, leave that guy alone’. But I don’t think I would have been that much problems to him. I had a good left jab and I’d always do better when guys come to me, but Tyson was pretty smart with his footwork and hand speed. That would have been a tough fight for me. "