By James Slater – Recently, before Sky Sports TV cameras, Mike Tyson was asked his opinion on Britain’s WBA heavyweight titlist David Haye. “Iron” Mike was asked whether he agreed with Haye’s boast that he can bring “the glamour” back to the heavyweight division. On this score, Tyson said he ain’t sure, but that from Haye’s most recent performances he doesn’t think so. “But things could change,” the youngest ever world heavyweight titlist added.
On the subject of who would have won, had Haye met Tyson in Mike’s “timeframe,” the 44-year-old became more animated, if only briefly..
“I’d like to think I’d have beaten anyone in my timeframe,” Tyson said, adding that his ego makes him think like this.
But when thinking about how the fearsome “Kid Dynamite” would have done against the former cruiserweight champ, my gut feeling tells me Tyson would have had a relatively easy night in his prime. But what do you guys think?
Sure, Tyson was never a huge heavyweight, and Haye has overcome a monster in the form of the colossal Nikolai Valuev. But would Haye, a fast fighter himself, have coped with the blinding blend of speed and power that the 21-year-old Tyson had?
Imagine the two meeting; with Tyson being the version that destroyed Michael Spinks and Haye being the version that outfoxed the lumbering but massive Valuev. Both guys would explode from the starting blocks and the fireworks would begin. But they’d have been brief, wouldn’t they? Haye can bang, yes, but on the peak Tyson’s level?
Back in the day, his day, the only guys who lasted a significant amount of rounds against Tyson were: A: big guys who could tie him up (Bonecrusher Smith), B: fast guys who could box and punch and who had a great chin (Tony Tucker, James Tillis), or, C: exceptionally tough guys who could take severe punishment (Mike Jameson)
Isn’t it fair to say Haye fits none of these criteria? So how could “The Hayemaker” have dealt with the peak Tyson? Yes, he’d have had something of a puncher’s chance, in that he might have landed a perfectly placed bomb early on. But if Tyson were able to walk through his best shot and keep threshing forward, what then? Would Haye’s boxing skills have helped him; would he have been able to go into hit-and-not-be-hit mode and frustrate Tyson? It’s unlikely.
No, at some point, probably early on, one of Tyson’s frighteningly fast punches would have exploded on the chin that lesser, slower fighters such as Jean Marc Mormeck and Monte Barrett have exploited with their less powerful shots, and the end would have arrived for Haye.
This is not to say Haye is a bad fighter; merely that he would have been no match for the peak Tyson. But then, Muhammad Ali, Sonny Liston and George Foreman aside, who would have been?