On the one hand, what you say is true. On the other hand, Cuba Gooding Jr.
Good call on Mike Tyson. He’d still be called unbeatable.
I’ve often thought that Ray Davies won’t get the reassessment he deserves until it’s too late. If he had died after Village Green Preservation Society, he’d probably be in the critical pantheon, and a beloved cult figure. If he’d died around the State of Confusion/Come Dancing era, people would be saying “it’s a shame he died just as he was getting his mojo back and The Kinks were finally making it big in the US”. As it is, it seems like The Kinks get relegated to about 2nd or 3rd tier status.
Mike Love would probably have a better reputation if he’d died around 1970 or so, before he became known as the guy who can’t get along with his own family.
OJ Simpson anytime after NFL retirement but before 1994.
Errol Flynn.
Before he became a sad parody of himself.
Tiger Woods, before Fire Hydrant.
Tyson lasted four-plus years before famously losing to Buster Douglas, but Joe Frazier passed the six-year mark the month he famously beat Muhammad Ali – and Smokin’ Joe could’ve left it all behind as the undefeated champ after passing the seven-year mark like Rocky Marciano, only without any split decisions à la Marciano along the way. How would we remember the Olympic gold medalist with the devastating left hook if he’d gone out on top?
Iggy Pop. If he’d OD’d the day New Values came out, he’d have saved us decades of embarrassment AND the the resulting press might even have earned him the posthumous superstar status he deserves.
Those are my favorite points in their careers. 
Um, wasn’t he ALWAYS a parody of himself and other handsome rogues getting by on their looks and not their talent?
Sting, right after the Police broke up, and he announced he was going to try some stuff in a new direction - stuff that wasn’t pop, and wasn’t jazz, but something very introspective.
But *before *any of it came out.
Music: Prince
Sports: Lance Armstrong
Thank you. If anything, Mould is sort of the opposite. I still listen to his new stuff, and not in a* “Frank Black’s solo career is not really that bad if you stop comparing his music to the Pixies”* sort of way.
Woody Allen prior to Soon-Yi. I don’t care, what he did ruined his reputation.
And John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas prior to… actually I’m not sure how far back you’d have to go, but certainly prior to his alleged incest.
This came out in Mackenzie Phillip’s bio, written after her father’s death.
Quite correct, I meant KISS ALIVE II.
Zombie bump, but I gotta ask: at what point would Bill Cosby have been deified?
Anytime after the last episode where Theo graduated from college to about 4 years ago.
Zombie bump as well but this isn’t true at all.
What happened after his death is that his ex-wife took over control of his estate. First thing she did was bring in real business people to handle his affairs and then promptly got rid of “Colonel” Tom Parker (the business deal he had was that he got 50% of Presley’s gross and Presley was never incorporated or benefited from any tax planning whatsoever. One of the worst deals in showbiz history). So while Priscilla cleaned it up, Presley was a massive selling artist (maybe the biggest of all time, who was still packing them in before he died).
How about Bette Davis? If she’d died in 1950, she’d be remembered as a golden beauty courageously taking one middle-aged role (All About Eve) before her tragic disappearance, not the chain-smoking she-Yoda who creeped out Johnny Carson in her last few appearances.
If M. Night had died after The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable people would think the world lost an all time director with an entire oeuvre of cinematic brilliance ahead of him. It would be tragic, actually, to live in a world where The Happening didn’t, uh, happen.