{"id":27866,"date":"2016-05-26T08:00:46","date_gmt":"2016-05-26T15:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/tyson-on-proposal-to-allow-pros-in-olympics\/"},"modified":"2016-05-26T08:00:46","modified_gmt":"2016-05-26T15:00:46","slug":"tyson-on-proposal-to-allow-pros-in-olympics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/sports\/tyson-on-proposal-to-allow-pros-in-olympics\/","title":{"rendered":"Tyson on proposal to allow pros in Olympics"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>BEIJING<\/strong> \u2014 A proposal to let professional fighters compete in the Rio de Janeiro Olympics is \u201cridiculous\u201d and \u201cfoolish,\u201d former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson said Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>In Beijing to promote professional boxing in China, Tyson said any pro boxers going to the Olympics should be prepared to lose because the amateurs could prove too fast for them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s ridiculous, it\u2019s foolish and some of the pro fighters are going to get beat by the amateurs,\u201d Tyson said. \u201cIt\u2019s just going to happen. Some of them are going to get beat I think. I really believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The head of the International Boxing Association, C.K. Wu, has proposed allowing pros in the Olympics, although it\u2019s uncertain how the plan would be implemented for Rio because qualification tournaments are either underway or have already been held for boxers in most countries.<\/p>\n<p>Amateur bouts involve a maximum of four rounds, while professional fights can last as many as 12.<\/p>\n<p>Tyson said he still has strong memories of the speed and skill of boxers from Cuba, Russia and elsewhere he fought as an amateur in the 1980s.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor three rounds, four rounds, some of the professional boxers aren\u2019t going to be able to catch these guys,\u201d he said. \u201cThese guys are going to be fast for three rounds, four rounds. These guys are not going to be accustomed to that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While eight-time world champion Manny Pacquiao has he would consider representing his native Philippines in the Olympics, his promoter Bob Arum has said that is a terrible idea<\/p>\n<p>Arum said last month he can\u2019t imagine Pacquiao fighting teen-age amateurs in what would surely be mismatches in the Olympics, warning \u201cthere will be serious health consequences\u201d to putting experienced pros in with rank amateurs.<\/p>\n<p>Even if pros are not allowed in Rio, the boxing competition will resemble the pro game more, with a 10-point must system scoring and no headgear for the first time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BEIJING \u2014 A proposal to let professional fighters compete in the Rio de Janeiro Olympics is \u201cridiculous\u201d and \u201cfoolish,\u201d former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson said Wednesday. In Beijing to promote professional boxing in China, Tyson said any pro boxers going to the Olympics should be prepared to lose because the amateurs could prove too fast [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":27867,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-27866","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27866","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27866"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27866\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27867"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27866"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27866"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27866"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=27866"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}