Why did Mike Tyson duck Ray Mercer?

[robertzimmerman]

I lived through the period and remember it well. There were multiple moving parts. Tyson was already long a superstar and in rebuild mode after Douglas. Holyfield held the crown and the expectation was that Tyson and he would clash. Meanwhile, there was a mild clamor for Bowe/Mercer which fizzled and gave way to Mercer/Morrison. While this was happening you had Ruddock decapitating 80's names like Dokes and Lewis steadily gaining experience defeating Mike Weaver. Larry Holmes seemed revived with his surprise win over Mercer, about the time Tyson gave us two high stakes wins over the streaking and dangerous Razor Ruddock. Back then nobody was crying about Tyson's path to redemption, nor was there any call for a Mercer bout. Enter Desiree Washington and Jesse Ferguson.

Great post.

Mike’s 3 years in prison made a huge impact in the division.

Look at all of the relevant fights that happened in the division between late 1991-1995.

If Mike hadn’t been inside, he’d have been in the early 90’s mix with Evander, Mercer, Lewis, Morrison and Bowe etc.

[robertzimmerman]

So you are trashing Tyson for not fighting Mercer,Moorer,Cooper,Tau and Morrison. That's 5 guys he supposedly ducked FFS. How do you know he ducked Mercer? Maybe Mercer ducked him. Did any heavyweight fight all 5 of those guys? No. There is no heavyweight that fought all 5 of those guys. Lewis did not fight all 5 of them and neither did Holyfield and Mercer did not fight all of the other 4. So why single Tyson out? Tyson fought both Lewis and Holyfield who were better than Mercer and Tyson fought lots of other tough guys. Nobody can fight every damn contender that ever fought in their era. A boxer only has so many fights in a career and he can't fight everybody. I am no big Tyson fan but you are nit picking and trashing him in an unfair manner.

Great post.

[BKM-]

Mercer, Tua and Vitali could all have beaten him. I’m certain that Vitali would have beaten him. But it’s ridiculous to criticise him for missing lots of guys when he was in prison for 3 years and he fought Evander twice before fighting Lennox. Those 2 were the best opponents of the era.

You're speaking nonsense and missing a lot of information. I will just repeat the post I made earlier in this thread. Try to learn if you can:

So Tyson fans don't believe he ducked opponents in the 90s. Lets look a little deeper into his 90s record. He went 9-3.

He lost to Douglas and Holyfield. The only other good fighters(debatable btw) he faced were Ruddock, Bruno and in 2000 against Golota which was a NC. Only the latter 2 were after prison, when Don King clearly paved an easy road for Tyson even with the Holyfield fights which they only accepted because they thought Evander was way past it and an easy win.

Looking at all the scrubs he faced inbetween you're gonna say he couldn't have faced Tua, Ike, Bowe, Wlad & Vitali, Mercer, Byrd, Foreman, Moorer? Who were all good/great fighters, all held a title at some point and almost all of them were a bad stylistic matchup for him.

But Mike was instead content with taking out scrubs like Savarese, Francis, Nielsen, Seldon, Mathis Jr, Norris, Botha etc. Good lord.

Tyson was the biggest name in boxing, everybody wanted to fight him plus this was after Douglas and Holyfield ruined his aura. It wasn't a coincidence. Tyson ducked dangerous opponents. He faced a bunch of scrubs(save Golota who was a known mental case) to get a title shot against the undisputed HW champion FFS.

It was already well known that Tyson ducked a young prime Holyfield and an old Foreman and later Lewis. Why not more? Because the 90s were filled with dangerous HW boxers and Tyson was insecure in and out of the ring.

[robertzimmerman]

So Tyson fans don't believe he ducked opponents in the 90s. Lets look a little deeper into his 90s record. He went 9-3.

He lost to Douglas and Holyfield. The only other good fighters(debatable btw) he faced were Ruddock, Bruno and in 2000 against Golota which was a NC. Only the latter 2 were after prison, when Don King clearly paved an easy road for Tyson even with the Holyfield fights which they only accepted because they thought Evander was way past it and an easy win.

Looking at all the scrubs he faced inbetween you're gonna say he couldn't have faced Tua, Ike, Bowe, Wlad & Vitali, Mercer, Byrd, Foreman, Moorer? Who were all good/great fighters, all held a title at some point and almost all of them were a bad stylistic matchup for him.

But Mike was instead content with taking out scrubs like Savarese, Francis, Nielsen, Norris, Botha etc. Good lord.

Tyson was the biggest name in boxing, everybody wanted to fight him plus this was after Douglas and Holyfield ruined his aura. It wasn't a coincidence. Tyson ducked dangerous opponents. He faced a bunch of scrubs(save Golota who was a known mental case) to get a title shot against the undisputed HW champion FFS.

It was already well known that Tyson ducked a young prime Holyfield and an old Foreman and later Lewis. Why not more? Because the 90s were filled with dangerous HW boxers and Tyson was insecure in and out of the ring.

You are being way too harsh here.

His 3 year exodus was huge with regards to who he missed.

In the late 90’s-early 00’s, yes, he was definitely steered away from the top fighters in order to cash out against Lennox. There’s no doubt about that. There’s a reason he fought guys like Julius Francis.

Yes, in the 90’s, he missed lots of guys. But most of the timelines didn’t match up. Again, his 3 year absence was huge. Upon his release, he was then built back up into title contention before fighting Evander. The fight with Evander should have happened in 1991.

If Mike hadn’t have gone to prison, then I’m sure he’d have fought most of those guys. Likewise, if he’d have beaten Evander in 1996 and 1997, I’m sure we’d have seen the Lewis fight earlier amongst others.

You can’t hold it against him for missing guys like Foreman and Bowe when he fought Evander twice, before both of them went on to retire shortly afterwards.

[BKM-]

You are being way too harsh here.

His 3 year exodus was huge with regards to who he missed.

In the late 90’s-early 00’s, yes, he was definitely steered away from the top fighters in order to cash out against Lennox. There’s no doubt about that. There’s a reason he fought guys like Julius Francis.

Yes, in the 90’s, he missed lots of guys. But most of the timelines didn’t match up. Again, his 3 year absence was huge. Upon his release, he was then built back up into title contention before fighting Evander. The fight with Evander should have happened in 1991.

If Mike hadn’t have gone to prison, then I’m sure he’d have fought most of those guys. Likewise, if he’d have beaten Evander in 1996 and 1997, I’m sure we’d have seen the Lewis fight earlier amongst others.

You can’t hold it against him for missing guys like Foreman and Bowe when he fought Evander twice, before both of them went on to retire shortly afterwards.

He didn't spend the entire 90s in prison. He was back in the game in 95. That's another half a decade he could have fought all the dangerous opponents mentioned.

But literally the only good one he faced was Evander Holyfield and that's ONLY because Evander was thought to be washed up and easy pickings.

Tyson was on a bum of the month club tour post-prison. There is no denying that he ducked many fighters.

You know why Tyson gets SO much **** from historians for not fighting the best? It's because he easily COULD HAVE. We can't rag on greats like Marciano, Johnson, Dempsey, Wlad. They simply did not have the option to fight many great fighters, almost nobody great was around.

But Tyson was in the strongest or second strongest era ever and fought almost nobody but Evander and Lewis, both crushed him. Inexcusable.

They all would have crushed him because he would have been beaten before going into the ring. That's why he ducked them.

[QueensburyRules]

You're speaking nonsense and missing a lot of information. I will just repeat the post I made earlier in this thread. Try to learn if you can:

So Tyson fans don't believe he ducked opponents in the 90s. Lets look a little deeper into his 90s record. He went 9-3.

He lost to Douglas and Holyfield. The only other good fighters(debatable btw) he faced were Ruddock, Bruno and in 2000 against Golota which was a NC. Only the latter 2 were after prison, when Don King clearly paved an easy road for Tyson even with the Holyfield fights which they only accepted because they thought Evander was way past it and an easy win.

Looking at all the scrubs he faced inbetween you're gonna say he couldn't have faced Tua, Ike, Bowe, Wlad & Vitali, Mercer, Byrd, Foreman, Moorer? Who were all good/great fighters, all held a title at some point and almost all of them were a bad stylistic matchup for him.

But Mike was instead content with taking out scrubs like Savarese, Francis, Nielsen, Seldon, Mathis Jr, Norris, Botha etc. Good lord.

Tyson was the biggest name in boxing, everybody wanted to fight him plus this was after Douglas and Holyfield ruined his aura. It wasn't a coincidence. Tyson ducked dangerous opponents. He faced a bunch of scrubs(save Golota who was a known mental case) to get a title shot against the undisputed HW champion FFS.

It was already well known that Tyson ducked a young prime Holyfield and an old Foreman and later Lewis. Why not more? Because the 90s were filled with dangerous HW boxers and Tyson was insecure in and out of the ring.

- -Mr Field then known as Holy turned pro the same yr as Mike.

Mike busy setting hvy ring records and purse records while Field literally went life and death with the tubby sawed off Qawi and almost died. Such the first accusation of many to follow of PED use.

What grade they send U dummy back to this year?

[robertzimmerman]

MIke was in prison as he still was when those guys were relevant and some undefeated .

Tommy Morrison lost the Bentt fight which killed the Tyson mega one .

Nothing shocking if you did research on when those guys had some fights ,Mike came back in 1995 and was fast tracked to Holyfield,why would he have fought some of those guys over a huge pay per view that was the biggest fight then ?

Mercer lost to Holmes in 1992 ,you can troll better then this can’t you ? Ha

Great post.

He hasn’t even allowed for the fact that Mike didn’t have a top level fight for almost 5 years, between 1991-1996.

[robertzimmerman]

The idea that Tyson was this perfect fighting machine at 20 and then at 22 he was totally washed up and not half the man he was before is just ludicrous.

As is the idea no other man but Cus D'amato could train him.

He wasn’t a perfect fighting machine, but he was clearly a different fighter when he wasn’t focused.

The results speak for themselves.

He wasn’t as fit and as sharp.

Less movement, where he was hit more.

Has he aged, he fought mostly for the money where he relied on his power to get him out of trouble.

[robertzimmerman]

None of them fighters would of beaten Mike Tyson in the 90's.

They’d have had a good chance against the post prison versions of Mike.

By the end of the decade, Mike was nowhere near the fighter he’d once been.

Even the versions of Mike who fought Ruddock were completely different to the versions who fought Botha etc.

I’d have comfortably picked Vitali over him.

[robertzimmerman]

Mike Tyson was bashing Danny Williams up, until he injured his knee 'Williams was all over the place'.

There was a distinct drop in Tyson's performance, soon after he injured his knee 'Which he later needed treatment'.

Mike was done against Lennox, where he was only fighting purely for the cheque.

After that, he was completely shot.

An 80’s-early 90’s version of Mike could literally have beaten Williams and McBride on the same night.