Buster Douglas vs. Evander Holyfield
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| Date | October 25, 1990 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Venue | The Mirage in Paradise, Nevada | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Title(s) on the line | WBA/WBC/IBF/The Ring/Lineal Heavyweight Championships | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tale of the tape | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Boxer | James Douglas | Evander Holyfield | |
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| Nickname | "Buster" | "The Real Deal" | |
| Hometown | Columbus, Ohio | Atlanta, Georgia | |
| Pre-fight record | 30–4–1 | 24–0 | |
| Height | 6'4" | 6'2" | |
| Weight | 246 lb | 208 lb | |
| Style | Orthodox | Orthodox | |
| Recognition |
WBA/WBC/IBF/ The Ring/Lineal Undisputed Heavyweight Champion |
WBA/WBC/IBF #1 Ranked Heavyweight |
Buster Douglas vs Evander Holyfield, billed as "The Moment of Truth", was a professional boxing match contested on October 25, 1990 for the WBA, WBC, IBF, The Ring and lineal Heavyweight championships. The bout took place at The Mirage in Paradise, Nevada, USA and saw Douglas making the first defense of the titles he won from Mike Tyson in February 1990.
After becoming the first boxer in history to win all three major sanctioning organizations' world titles in the cruiserweight division, Evander Holyfield decided to move up in class and take on the top heavyweights. In his first fight at heavyweight he defeated James Tillis by knockout and then knocked out former champion Pinklon Thomas before the year was out. Shortly after that Holyfield became regarded as the #1 contender to Mike Tyson, who was the undisputed champion of the division and who in 1988 won the lineal championship from Michael Spinks. A match between the two was signed for June 18, 1990, and Tyson elected to take a tuneup fight on February 11, 1990, against fringe contender James "Buster" Douglas in Tokyo. Despite having been regarded as a top contender for the title in the past, Douglas' reputation was as a lazy, out of shape fighter who did not pay much attention to his training. As a result, most casinos didn't even bother to make odds for the fight. The only one that did so, The Mirage, installed Tyson as a 42-1 favorite. Douglas was not given much chance to last against him. Not only had Tyson never been defeated, but he had only gone the distance four times in his career and had not gone past the fifth round with an opponent since Tyrell Biggs took him to the seventh round in 1987.
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