Will we ever see another Mike Tyson?

[SBleeder]

there is not a huge difference between 5'11 and 5'9". there are two inches.


is it some conspiracy that every major media outlet that measured him said he was 5'11" when he stood up straight?


stocky dudes do not have terrific posture. larry merchant / jim lampley go over this in a broadcast, citing tyson as being 5'11" when he stands up straight, but when walking around being much shorter. he slouches.


and no, there are boatloads of college running backs in division 1 who are 5'9" or less. and guess what, they've probably got bad posture given their builds. that doesn't matter anyway, as mike tyson was measured in his prime at 5'11"


and most of the major division one players have no shot at going pro. there are more than 50 players on a football roster. you think all of those guys have a shot at going pro? that's ridiculous. there are hundreds of division one programs, and 32 NFL teams.

There is a huge gap when it comes to recruiting between 5'9" and 5'11".

I didn't say they all have a shot; I just said that pretty much every player at a major D1 program has at least some pro aspirations, however unrealistic they may be.

Regardless, your argument is that all the short stocky athletes are going to football instead. As my link showed, very few short guys end up in the League. A guy who is 5'9" has a better chance of making it to the big time in boxing than he does in football.

The skill-set needed to be a good football player doesn't greatly overlap the skill-set needed to be a good fighter. I don't think all the great potential fighters are making it in football. I think far more are dealing drugs- Crack hit the sport hard.

And someone needs to whack Tyson with a ruler to tell him to stand up straight, because he looks like a freaking midget in person.

[NVSemin]

Do you mean another Dan Florio?

Cus D'Amato was a boxing manager.

you got me curious, who was Dan Florio?

[SBleeder]

Brandon Jacobs ex running back for the NY Giants was an outstanding Amateur Boxer and chose Football because he could get a degree and college scholarship playing football a talented 6'4" 265lbs very low body fat who could run a 10.5 100 meters and a 4.56 40 yard he chose football for an education even though he loved boxing and football was just to keep in shape he would have been an absolute killer in the ring the major problem is the amount of time put in the gym at young ages Jacobs started boxing at 8 years old and was 35-2 and twice the Louisiana state AAU champ

He actually just re-signed with the Giants. They could use him.

[violaandme]

I've stood beside Mike Tyson. If he's 5'11 then I'm 6'5". (I'm only 6'2" without shoes. Mke Tyson is 5'9" at best. There's a huge difference between 5'9" and 5'11". If you're 5'9" you'd better be a phenom.

I brought up the NFL because very few major Div I.players don't have at least some hope of going to the league.

I think you are overlooking the free College degree most Div 1 athletes are not even going to have a shot

There are 249 Div 1 football schools about 120 of them have 85 scholarships and another 120 have 63 scholarships about 18000 scholarship football players and a total of around 1300 NfL players the college athlete's turn over every 4 years and the average Career of an NFL player is about seven years so basically 36,000 Div 1 athletes are going for 1,300 spots I would say most are there for an education

[joeandthebums]

you got me curious, who was Dan Florio?

Floyd Patterson's trainer.

D'Amato was his manager.

[violaandme]

though the drug epidemic in the US and the world has taken a toll on the sporting world for sure

[Ray Corso]

.....grammer schools, high school and college football games, gyms???

The next Tysn will come from where he came from........being incarserated!!!

Their in the prisons, youth camps and jails! Thats where Mike was when Cus signed for him, he was a ward of the state of New York!
In my early days in boxing I used my gym as Cus did, we were aligned with police youth divisuons and once a kid got 2 strikes against him from shop lifting to assaults we had a chance to help!
I worked youth divisoion for New Haven, Hamden, Easty Haven and West Haven. Cus also was involved with the Indian reservations and the Aderondak kids that were germain to that area!
Tysons don't come searching for help someone arrests them and brings them to your attention!

...really Tyson at 5'9" I thought he was 6' 4"!!!! HA!!! Ray

[Anthony342]

this argument has nothing to do with race, even if you find many of the talented americans of that size to be black.
african american isn't an appropriate term, as most blacks i know have never been to africa. just call them black. it's not offensive.

the proliferation of blacks in sports has a lot to do with the economy. athletic talent can be a way out of poverty. many of the great athletes grew up without much to spare, and cite that as a motivation.


eastern euros used to get their butts kicked in the amateurs by the great american HW.



you can't expect anybody who refutes the idea that these leagues rob the division of talent to know what he's talking about. it's absurd to think taht these guys would not make for talented HW, or to account for their participation in boxing in generations past.


here's a list of the HW champions of all time.
i don't even expect you to click this link, but here it is.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...xing_champions
notice the american flags. no other country has that kind of history with any division.

keep talking, though. i enjoy the british struggle.

Plus a lot of "African Americans" aren't even from there, but rather from places like England and Jamaica and that term also isn't accurate because a white guy from South Africa who becomes an American citizen would also technically be "African American." Hell Lennox Lewis grew up in England and became a Canadian citizen.

[New England]

There is a huge gap when it comes to recruiting between 5'9" and 5'11".

I didn't say they all have a shot; I just said that pretty much every player at a major D1 program has at least some pro aspirations, however unrealistic they may be.

Regardless, your argument is that all the short stocky athletes are going to football instead. As my link showed, very few short guys end up in the League. A guy who is 5'9" has a better chance of making it to the big time in boxing than he does in football.

The skill-set needed to be a good football player doesn't greatly overlap the skill-set needed to be a good fighter. I don't think all the great potential fighters are making it in football. I think far more are dealing drugs- Crack hit the sport hard.

And someone needs to whack Tyson with a ruler to tell him to stand up straight, because he looks like a freaking midget in person.

that link showed 10 short guys, not the only 10 short guys in the league. it means nothing. the steelers have a guy who is 5'6.5", and a bunch of guys who are 5'9" or below. several between 5'9" and 5'11", too. the bucks have jeff demps, who is 5'7" [and a world class sprinter,] and that martin kid who rushed well against the pats yesterday. they have other guys who are 5'9" or less in addition to those two. they list doug martin at 5'9", but he's 5'8" at best.



there are tons of 5'9" inch guys in the league, and this is a league that embellishes height. height is often embellished in college recruiting. i don't know why i'm even bothering, as tyson would be 6'0" on an nfl roster, and in reality was 5'11" tall.

he's not too small to be a runningback. in fact, he would be a big runningback, especially in college.

[Anthony342]

Brandon Jacobs ex running back for the NY Giants was an outstanding Amateur Boxer and chose Football because he could get a degree and college scholarship playing football a talented 6'4" 265lbs very low body fat who could run a 10.5 100 meters and a 4.56 40 yard he chose football for an education even though he loved boxing and football was just to keep in shape he would have been an absolute killer in the ring the major problem is the amount of time put in the gym at young ages Jacobs started boxing at 8 years old and was 35-2 and twice the Louisiana state AAU champ

Jacobs is actually back with the Giants now, for the record.