James Douglas .vs. Mike Tyson (Prime)

[la-califa]

As bad as Tyson looked on that night. Douglas looked magnificent! How would thr Buster Douglas of that night have done against a prime Tyson? I know the rest of Douglas' career looked undistinguished. But on that particular night, he looked very impressive. Could he have duplicated that feat?

[mr. magoo]

It's a lengthy post and one that I copied from another thread that I posted on, but here it is...


Tyson in 1990, was not necessarily a past-prime shell so much as he was damaged goods.

What I'm about to tell you, is all from memory and going way back into my youth, but here goes.

Upon taking complete control of Tyson's career, DK fired everyone who had essentially worked with Tyson from the time he was a teenager, including his trainer, cornerman, and manager. Bill Cayton, Kevin Rooney and everyone else was either terminated or had died by that point. Hired in their stead, were three obscure personalities named Rory Holloway, Aran Snowel, and Jay Bright.

Holloway was essentially hired to manage Tyson's affairs - a position formerly held by Bill Cayton and Jim Jacobs ( who was deceased ). Aron Snowel was a former cornerman for heavyweight champ Tim Witherspoon, as well as Former Jr Welter champ Aron Prior. Jay Bright, was a trainer who had apparently crossed paths with Cus D'amato at some point in the past, and who's great claim to fame was a single sparring session with Muhammad Ali sometime back in the 60's.

These were the men who worked with Tyson for some 18 months following the disolving of the original team Tyson. In the meantime, Mike had gone through several episodes of exercising erratic behavior. He had since been divorced by Robin Givens, and during the whole process, had made death threats to her and her mother. He had been involved in a car accident ( alledgedly called a suicide attempt ) where he was injured-post poning the Frank Bruno fight, which had an original date of October 10, 1988. He had been in a fist fight with ex-opponent mitch green which left Green's face a bloody mess, and Tyson's hand temporarily injured. He performed in subpar fashion against Frank Bruno. He would lose yet another family member, as his sister Denise Tyson would die tragically in her late 20's.

With his list of blood relatives dwindling, his former team dispatched, his life going to peices, and working with incompetant management for over a year,Tyson entered the ring against James Douglas on February 12th 1990. There were rumors of Tyson spending weeks prior to the fight staying out late and rendezvouing with the local escort services. Additionally, he was apparently struggling during training sessions, and at one point was dropped by Greg page in a sparring session.

During the fight with Monsier Buster, Tyson was rarely making an effort to close the sizable gap against the much taller Douglas, whereas against other tall opponents with reasonable jabs, such as Tucker, holmes, Tubbs, and Biggs, Tyson had slipped the jab and followed up with a barage of combinations coming in. We saw little or nothing of this against Douglas. Following the match, boxing legends, Gil Clancy and Angelo Dundee were interviewed on HBO. Both agreed that the corner work in that fight was some of the most unproffesional that either man had seen in quite some time. Snowel was using a disolved bag of water to try and reduce Tyson's swelling over his eyes, while calmly giving him ambiguous advice with no real instruction " Mike your not closing the gap." All the while, Tyson sat with his head down during every intermission between rounds. There was clearly no interest here...


Upon losing to Douglas, King needed to try and salvage his prized race hoarse. He fired some of the personnel that he had originally hired to replace Rooney, and brought aboard long time trainer of Larry Holmes, Rich Giachetti. Did Tyson regain the abilities that he once had upon making these changes? That is subject to question. We can say for certain however that his last performances prior to going to prison against Alex Stewart and Razor Ruddock were certainly a greater reflection of the man who stopped Spinks, than was the horrible display in the Douglas match......

CONCLUSION: Was Mike Tyson washed up in 1990? My answer is no. He was 23 years of age, in perfect health and coming off of one of the best heavyweight runs of all time. Was he the same fighter who had thoroughly flattened the division between 1986-1989. My answer is again, no. He was by this point, the product of an unstable life outside of the ring, as well as a cash cow who was poorly managed. Ad on his immaturity and lack of guidance, and frankly, I think any decent challenger in the 1990 top 10 would have had a good chance of doing to him what Douglas did. Was the Douglas loss a mark of Tyson's end? Once again, my answer is no. Upon rebuilding his team, we saw Tyson recover to some degree in the Stewart and Ruddock fights. Going to prison was far more detrimental to his career than a single loss to James Douglas.

If you have read this post, then I thank you for taking the time to do so, as I have spent much of the morning at work putting it together. The reason I took the time, was because for two years now, I have surfed chat forums, and there seem to be few who remember the REAL story, the WHOLE story or who simply chose to fabricate their OWN story. While James Douglas deserves credit for his efforts and Tyson deserves criticism for his, the outcome of their match ages ago, should limited to just the individual critique of the two of them in this match alone...Nothing else...... To try and use this match as a beacon for fantasy fights across eras, does neither of these men any service and nor does it reflect what type of fighters they truly were. Tyson vs Douglas was nothing more than an obscure case where one man fought the absolute best fight of his career, while the other fought the absolute worst. It does not reflect that James Douglas would have competed admirably against all time greats nor that Tyson would have necessarily lost to them when at his absolute best....

[apollack]

Excellent post, Mr. Magoo. I agree 100%.

I also have quotes from the L.A. Times just after the fight wherein sparring partners Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall, and Greg Page were all said to be easily handling Tyson in training. They all thought Tyson would lose.

The management/promotional team didn't call off the Douglas fight because everyone thought that Douglas was so horrible, that even a sub-par Tyson would still stop him. They did not expect a Douglas who would be in great shape. Even that said, Douglas still almost got stopped by a dead man.

[mr. magoo]

Excellent post, Mr. Magoo. I agree 100%.

I also have quotes from the L.A. Times just after the fight wherein sparring partners Trevor Berbick, Oliver McCall, and Greg Page were all said to be easily handling Tyson in training. They all thought Tyson would lose.

The management/promotional team didn't call off the Douglas fight because everyone thought that Douglas was so horrible, that even a sub-par Tyson would still stop him. They did not expect a Douglas who would be in great shape. Even that said, Douglas still almost got stopped by a dead man.


Thanks, I wrote it several months back, then had to do a search to bring it up. You just educated me on something here. I didn't realize that Berbick was part of Tyson's sparring team. That's interesting.

[faisal]

great read mr magoo

[la-califa]

It's a lengthy post and one that I copied from another thread that I posted on, but here it is...


Tyson in 1990, was not necessarily a past-prime shell so much as he was damaged goods.

What I'm about to tell you, is all from memory and going way back into my youth, but here goes.

Upon taking complete control of Tyson's career, DK fired everyone who had essentially worked with Tyson from the time he was a teenager, including his trainer, cornerman, and manager. Bill Cayton, Kevin Rooney and everyone else was either terminated or had died by that point. Hired in their stead, were three obscure personalities named Rory Holloway, Aran Snowel, and Jay Bright.

Holloway was essentially hired to manage Tyson's affairs - a position formerly held by Bill Cayton and Jim Jacobs ( who was deceased ). Aron Snowel was a former cornerman for heavyweight champ Tim Witherspoon, as well as Former Jr Welter champ Aron Prior. Jay Bright, was a trainer who had apparently crossed paths with Cus D'amato at some point in the past, and who's great claim to fame was a single sparring session with Muhammad Ali sometime back in the 60's.

These were the men who worked with Tyson for some 18 months following the disolving of the original team Tyson. In the meantime, Mike had gone through several episodes of exercising erratic behavior. He had since been divorced by Robin Givens, and during the whole process, had made death threats to her and her mother. He had been involved in a car accident ( alledgedly called a suicide attempt ) where he was injured-post poning the Frank Bruno fight, which had an original date of October 10, 1988. He had been in a fist fight with ex-opponent mitch green which left Green's face a bloody mess, and Tyson's hand temporarily injured. He performed in subpar fashion against Frank Bruno. He would lose yet another family member, as his sister Denise Tyson would die tragically in her late 20's.

With his list of blood relatives dwindling, his former team dispatched, his life going to peices, and working with incompetant management for over a year,Tyson entered the ring against James Douglas on February 12th 1990. There were rumors of Tyson spending weeks prior to the fight staying out late and rendezvouing with the local escort services. Additionally, he was apparently struggling during training sessions, and at one point was dropped by Greg page in a sparring session.

During the fight with Monsier Buster, Tyson was rarely making an effort to close the sizable gap against the much taller Douglas, whereas against other tall opponents with reasonable jabs, such as Tucker, holmes, Tubbs, and Biggs, Tyson had slipped the jab and followed up with a barage of combinations coming in. We saw little or nothing of this against Douglas. Following the match, boxing legends, Gil Clancy and Angelo Dundee were interviewed on HBO. Both agreed that the corner work in that fight was some of the most unproffesional that either man had seen in quite some time. Snowel was using a disolved bag of water to try and reduce Tyson's swelling over his eyes, while calmly giving him ambiguous advice with no real instruction " Mike your not closing the gap." All the while, Tyson sat with his head down during every intermission between rounds. There was clearly no interest here...


Upon losing to Douglas, King needed to try and salvage his prized race hoarse. He fired some of the personnel that he had originally hired to replace Rooney, and brought aboard long time trainer of Larry Holmes, Rich Giachetti. Did Tyson regain the abilities that he once had upon making these changes? That is subject to question. We can say for certain however that his last performances prior to going to prison against Alex Stewart and Razor Ruddock were certainly a greater reflection of the man who stopped Spinks, than was the horrible display in the Douglas match......

CONCLUSION: Was Mike Tyson washed up in 1990? My answer is no. He was 23 years of age, in perfect health and coming off of one of the best heavyweight runs of all time. Was he the same fighter who had thoroughly flattened the division between 1986-1989. My answer is again, no. He was by this point, the product of an unstable life outside of the ring, as well as a cash cow who was poorly managed. Ad on his immaturity and lack of guidance, and frankly, I think any decent challenger in the 1990 top 10 would have had a good chance of doing to him what Douglas did. Was the Douglas loss a mark of Tyson's end? Once again, my answer is no. Upon rebuilding his team, we saw Tyson recover to some degree in the Stewart and Ruddock fights. Going to prison was far more detrimental to his career than a single loss to James Douglas.

If you have read this post, then I thank you for taking the time to do so, as I have spent much of the morning at work putting it together. The reason I took the time, was because for two years now, I have surfed chat forums, and there seem to be few who remember the REAL story, the WHOLE story or who simply chose to fabricate their OWN story. While James Douglas deserves credit for his efforts and Tyson deserves criticism for his, the outcome of their match ages ago, should limited to just the individual critique of the two of them in this match alone...Nothing else...... To try and use this match as a beacon for fantasy fights across eras, does neither of these men any service and nor does it reflect what type of fighters they truly were. Tyson vs Douglas was nothing more than an obscure case where one man fought the absolute best fight of his career, while the other fought the absolute worst. It does not reflect that James Douglas would have competed admirably against all time greats nor that Tyson would have necessarily lost to them when at his absolute best.... Great post, Yes, sadly I'm very aware of Mike Tyson's downfall. But the question remains, on the night of Douglas' life, could he have competed against Tyson , who had his origional corner? Or would Mike easily dispatch Douglas in a couple of rounds?

[mr. magoo]

Great post, Yes, sadly I'm very aware of Mike Tyson's downfall. But the question remains, on the night of Douglas' life, could he have competed against Tyson , who had his origional corner? Or would Mike easily dispatch Douglas in a couple of rounds?


We'll never know for sure. I will say however, that Douglas would noticably be facing a very different version of Tyson.

[guilalah]

Good post, Mr Magoo!

I favor the Tyson who fought Spink's over the Tokyo Douglas.

[My2Sense]

Douglas KO in 10, after leading most of the way; possibly rising from a knockdown somewhere around the 8th round.

[MRBILL]

Mike Tyson was in his prime in 1990, but he was pussy-whipped and soft for Buster Douglas in Tokyo....... At age 23, Mike Tyson was regressing in 1990 because he was teamed with Don King and being trained and handled by a buncha' jive-turks from the hood........ Aaron Snowell actually does have a clue about boxing.. But in 1990, in Tyson's corner, Aaron Snowell was just a puppet / voice..... Rory Halloway and John Horne were idiots.... And Jay Bright was just a champion pie eater........ Nuff said........:scaredas:

MR.BILL:deal

NOTE:

After Rooney was fired, Mike Tyson should've teamed with Tommy Brooks..... By the time Brooks came into play, Tyson was faded and over-the-hill..... Brooks can only do and help out so much...... By 2000, Tyson no longer had the metal to be a champion......

[punchy]

I think Douglas may still have his number, such was his domination of Tyson in Tokyo.

[Russell]

I like how fighters who got the shit kicked out of them by a fighter get called back to be his sparring partner down the road. :lol::lol:

[Hydraulix]

I think Douglas would have beat him anyway. Think about it; Buster was throwing double and triple jabs. It's relatively easy to slip one jab, but a rapid succession of jabs is hard to dodge. You're gonna get hammered by at least one. Also, Douglas treated Tyson the same way that Billy Conn treated the flat footed Joe Louis; he'd jab him and jump out of range before Tyson could retaliate. Buster Douglas was fighting like Ali. He'd stick and move. And Tyson just couldn't catch him. Despite lacking a good corner, Tyson still had his explosive speed and power in the Douglas fight. He was just outboxed. Also, if Tyson lost to Douglas at this point in his career, I have no doubt that Holyfield would have beaten him, too.

[Unforgiven]

I seem to remembe something like "Douglas KO10 Tyson"

Tyson was in his prime, and considered unbeatable by any active fighter, hence the fact of him being something like a 42-1 favourite

[SteveO]

I like how fighters who got the shit kicked out of them by a fighter get called back to be his sparring partner down the road. :lol::lol:

Kind of like wiping entire cities out in wars and the enemy spending billions to rebuild them.

[My2Sense]

I seem to remembe something like "Douglas KO10 Tyson"

Tyson was in his prime, and considered unbeatable by any active fighter, hence the fact of him being something like a 42-1 favourite

Exactamundo. :good

All this talk about Tyson being "past his prime" is revisionist history at its very worst. From the Spinks fight right up until this fight, he was the most highly regarded he ever was.

[Holmes' Jab]

Tyson of '86-'88 vintage beats him.

[josak]

Tyson of '86-'88 vintage beats him.

correct.

people like My2SEnse can't accept the fact that Tyson ceased being the same fighter after Don King took over. The evidence is blatantly obvious if you just watch his fight with Bruno following the Spinks fight.

[mr. magoo]

correct.

people like My2SEnse can't accept the fact that Tyson ceased being the same fighter after Don King took over. The evidence is blatantly obvious if you just watch his fight with Bruno following the Spinks fight.


People generally like to see a bad guy fall or get what they feel he has coming to him. Such is often the case with Mike Tyson. He is viewed by many as a bully, criminal, rapist and the quintessential symbol of ignorance. For this reason, some take the fairy tale approach, which goes something like this " the evil king was destroyed, and everyone lived happily ever after. " To some, its a preferable way of thinking, as opposed to the obvious truth which is that like all great fighters, even the unpopular ones experience decline weather due to age, inactivity, change in managment, personal injury, or troubles outside the ring in private life...

When it comes to Tyson haters however, its the fabricated belief that he just wasn't that good and a better man beat him. While this is certainly a plausible scenario as no man is invincible, I have keenly observed that the facts are rarely ever fully covered in their entireity.

[ripcity]

It's a lengthy post and one that I copied from another thread that I posted on, but here it is...


Tyson in 1990, was not necessarily a past-prime shell so much as he was damaged goods.

What I'm about to tell you, is all from memory and going way back into my youth, but here goes.

Upon taking complete control of Tyson's career, DK fired everyone who had essentially worked with Tyson from the time he was a teenager, including his trainer, cornerman, and manager. Bill Cayton, Kevin Rooney and everyone else was either terminated or had died by that point. Hired in their stead, were three obscure personalities named Rory Holloway, Aran Snowel, and Jay Bright.

Holloway was essentially hired to manage Tyson's affairs - a position formerly held by Bill Cayton and Jim Jacobs ( who was deceased ). Aron Snowel was a former cornerman for heavyweight champ Tim Witherspoon, as well as Former Jr Welter champ Aron Prior. Jay Bright, was a trainer who had apparently crossed paths with Cus D'amato at some point in the past, and who's great claim to fame was a single sparring session with Muhammad Ali sometime back in the 60's.

These were the men who worked with Tyson for some 18 months following the disolving of the original team Tyson. In the meantime, Mike had gone through several episodes of exercising erratic behavior. He had since been divorced by Robin Givens, and during the whole process, had made death threats to her and her mother. He had been involved in a car accident ( alledgedly called a suicide attempt ) where he was injured-post poning the Frank Bruno fight, which had an original date of October 10, 1988. He had been in a fist fight with ex-opponent mitch green which left Green's face a bloody mess, and Tyson's hand temporarily injured. He performed in subpar fashion against Frank Bruno. He would lose yet another family member, as his sister Denise Tyson would die tragically in her late 20's.

With his list of blood relatives dwindling, his former team dispatched, his life going to peices, and working with incompetant management for over a year,Tyson entered the ring against James Douglas on February 12th 1990. There were rumors of Tyson spending weeks prior to the fight staying out late and rendezvouing with the local escort services. Additionally, he was apparently struggling during training sessions, and at one point was dropped by Greg page in a sparring session.

During the fight with Monsier Buster, Tyson was rarely making an effort to close the sizable gap against the much taller Douglas, whereas against other tall opponents with reasonable jabs, such as Tucker, holmes, Tubbs, and Biggs, Tyson had slipped the jab and followed up with a barage of combinations coming in. We saw little or nothing of this against Douglas. Following the match, boxing legends, Gil Clancy and Angelo Dundee were interviewed on HBO. Both agreed that the corner work in that fight was some of the most unproffesional that either man had seen in quite some time. Snowel was using a disolved bag of water to try and reduce Tyson's swelling over his eyes, while calmly giving him ambiguous advice with no real instruction " Mike your not closing the gap." All the while, Tyson sat with his head down during every intermission between rounds. There was clearly no interest here...


Upon losing to Douglas, King needed to try and salvage his prized race hoarse. He fired some of the personnel that he had originally hired to replace Rooney, and brought aboard long time trainer of Larry Holmes, Rich Giachetti. Did Tyson regain the abilities that he once had upon making these changes? That is subject to question. We can say for certain however that his last performances prior to going to prison against Alex Stewart and Razor Ruddock were certainly a greater reflection of the man who stopped Spinks, than was the horrible display in the Douglas match......

CONCLUSION: Was Mike Tyson washed up in 1990? My answer is no. He was 23 years of age, in perfect health and coming off of one of the best heavyweight runs of all time. Was he the same fighter who had thoroughly flattened the division between 1986-1989. My answer is again, no. He was by this point, the product of an unstable life outside of the ring, as well as a cash cow who was poorly managed. Ad on his immaturity and lack of guidance, and frankly, I think any decent challenger in the 1990 top 10 would have had a good chance of doing to him what Douglas did. Was the Douglas loss a mark of Tyson's end? Once again, my answer is no. Upon rebuilding his team, we saw Tyson recover to some degree in the Stewart and Ruddock fights. Going to prison was far more detrimental to his career than a single loss to James Douglas.

If you have read this post, then I thank you for taking the time to do so, as I have spent much of the morning at work putting it together. The reason I took the time, was because for two years now, I have surfed chat forums, and there seem to be few who remember the REAL story, the WHOLE story or who simply chose to fabricate their OWN story. While James Douglas deserves credit for his efforts and Tyson deserves criticism for his, the outcome of their match ages ago, should limited to just the individual critique of the two of them in this match alone...Nothing else...... To try and use this match as a beacon for fantasy fights across eras, does neither of these men any service and nor does it reflect what type of fighters they truly were. Tyson vs Douglas was nothing more than an obscure case where one man fought the absolute best fight of his career, while the other fought the absolute worst. It does not reflect that James Douglas would have competed admirably against all time greats nor that Tyson would have necessarily lost to them when at his absolute best....

Exlent post one of the best on ESB (don't let it go to your head :lol:)

[ripcity]

Douglas was as close to perfect the night they realy met. His only laps was the 8th round knock down. While Tyson was still young and in his physical prime and also still a good and dangures boxer his best days were behind him.
What Douglas has going for him in a prime for prime match up is he has the right style to beat Tyson. I like to call it Jab and Grab. Throw the jab falow it up with a stright every now and again. Stay in front and stay close. Before Tyson can go on the Offensive tie him up. What Tyson has going for him is speed. The jab and Grab is often eiseier said than done against a prime Tyson. First of all holding never looks good to the judges and the stratgy is basicly banking on triering Tyson out for a late round stopage. While Tyson shown signs of getting fristrated and tired in the later rounds of fights if they got that far how many did he lose? 0. Tyson also had a much better corner in his prime than he did afterwards. They would have made the adjustments to take care of Douglas.
I think because of Douglas's style it would be close for 5 or 6 rounds but I will go with Tyson by stopage by the 7th round.

[My2Sense]

The evidence is blatantly obvious if you just watch his fight with Bruno following the Spinks fight.

It sure wasn't "obvious" to all the people who rated him higher than ever and picked him to beat Douglas easily. Which was basically everyone.

[My2Sense]

To some, its a preferable way of thinking, as opposed to the obvious truth which is that like all great fighters, even the unpopular ones experience decline weather due to age, inactivity, change in managment, personal injury, or troubles outside the ring in private life...

Actually, the great fighters DON'T experience declines as a result of most of the those things. That's what makes them great. This idea that, "He's great if he's at his absolute best and all the stars are aligned in his favor; but if not, he's a bum and can't be held up to any expectations" - is a total contradiction in terms.

When it comes to Tyson haters however, its the fabricated belief that he just wasn't that good and a better man beat him. While this is certainly a plausible scenario as no man is invincible, I have keenly observed that the facts are rarely ever fully covered in their entireity.

What "facts" would those be?

[sugar71]

It sure wasn't "obvious" to all the people who rated him higher than ever and picked him to beat Douglas easily. Which was basically everyone.

Tyson opened that Holyfield fight as a 25 to 1 favorite:yikes which dropped down to about 8 to 1 before the fight. Sportwriters & fans openly surmised that Holyfield could be seriously injuered & that he probably shouldn't be in the ring with Tyson.

Delusional fans blaming everything from issues with KING to the very lovely Robin Givens for Tyson's shortcomings is ridiculous. They blame the death of Cus for his lack of discipline yet Teddy Atlas openly criticized Cus for pampering/coddling Tyson. Atlas accused DAmato of being too permissive of Tyson's delinquent behavior ,but Cus is now turned into some iron fisted disciplinarian who would have reeled Tyson in:roll:.

The man was a flawed fighter & human & it will be ice when everyone decides to recognize this.

[apollack]

Yes, but what about a Holyfield NOT on steroids. Fight might be much tougher for Evander. Think about it.