It’s hard to say which is more impressive: Watching Mike Tyson smoking marijuana from a pipe or witnessing one of his practices in a gym, as if preparing to collide with Evander Holyfield again.
Videos of Tyson in those two activities are available online, perhaps because the ex-boxer is as good at promoting himself as he once was at knocking out opponents.
But it will be desirable that the former heavyweight monarch is aware of a great difference between the acts he performed in each of the videos.
Maybe smoking marijuana won’t kill you. But getting back in the ring at 53 could do it.
Tyson has not announced any plans to fight again, although he did suggest on Instagram that he would be available for three- or four-round shows if paid just enough. And some people in Australia are already talking about the possibility of offering him a million dollars to participate in an exhibition match against one or two rugby stars.
If the internet serves as a guide to anything, it is clear that there is still interest in Tyson. The video that shows him in the gym was not only viewed nine million times in a few days, but has generated a flurry of comments about how much power the retired boxer can have left in his fists.
And you have to admit it: Tyson looks good, he’s still explosive and powerful even at his age. In some people’s fantasies – perhaps his own – he looks good enough to take another real fight in the heavyweight division if someone were willing to offer him millions of dollars.
“He hadn’t fought with gloves and pads for almost 10 years, so I didn’t expect to see what I saw,” coach Rafael Cordeiro told ESPN, referring to the video. “I saw a boy with the same speed and power as 21 or 22 year old boys.”
I’M BACK! 😎@MikeTyson he trains daily to return to the ring in exhibition fights🥊💥
A fight with Mike? 😅 pic.twitter.com/SrYQ1Hffbn– elambito (@elambito) May 11, 2020
Tyson knows how to excel in these types of practices. Coach Cus D’Amato coached Tyson in his teens, devising a number system for each hit the fledgling fighter threw.
D’Amato recited them, while an assistant held the pads and Tyson threw right or left strokes in response to what was asked of him.
I watched Tyson train for a good part of his biggest fights, and doing pad sessions with a coach was always part of his preparation. To be honest, he doesn’t look much different in the video he shot at age 53 than during the fights when he was 23 and a world monarch.
The speed is still impressive. The power still seems authentic.
But that’s when no one responds to his blows.
Tyson posted the video with a tag proclaiming that he is “still the most wicked man on the planet.” Without delay, his followers responded with predictions that their idol will once again be the champion of the highest category.
Of course, it is nonsense. At his age, Tyson couldn’t beat an ordinary boxer in that division, much less the cream of the crop in a category that had regained its luster when the pandemic brought all fighting to a standstill.
And although people continue to celebrate Tyson for the merciless knockouts he achieved in the best moment of his career, it must be remembered that, in his last fight, he refused to continue fighting, sitting on the bench, a whopping 15 years ago.
But boxing will return. And Tyson remains intriguing, even to a new generation of fans who know him only from the stories his parents tell or the videos showcasing his most powerful punches.
I saw many of those moments up close. I was on one side of the ring when Tyson became the youngest champion in heavyweight history, knocking out Trevor Berbick in 1986. In 2005, I visited Washington and also saw the way Tyson gave up on a An ordinary rival, who would not have survived a single assault against the same opponent a few years earlier.
Between those two episodes, I covered the occasion when he threatened to eat Lennox Lewis’s children, the one when he bit Holyfield’s ear, and the whole journey he took us around the world, as perhaps we will never see someone else do it again. .
So I feel entitled to say that whatever fantasy Tyson may have about fighting again is just that.
I guess Tyson is just stirring the flames of popularity with his latest video. The fact is, he has accomplished remarkable work in finding a new path in life after boxing. He’s made incidental appearances in movies, put on one-man shows, headlined a podcast, and now grows cannabis on his Tyson Ranch.
All the hype is good when you’re Mike Tyson. And he’s getting a lot with a video released at a time when the world is starving for any sport.
Another possibility is that he is smoking so much marijuana that he begins to believe that he is the Tyson from before.
Or maybe it just made you hungry.
And that, of course, would make a third fight with Holyfield much more palatable than it actually is. AP (HN).