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My how a sports great has fallen:
Some crowded around the ring with cell phone cameras in hand. Others sat at a bar not 20 feet away drinking beer. Still others ignored it all and smoked cigarettes and played slot machines.
Mike Tyson used to put on displays. On this day, he was just on display.
Down the street, tourists watched lions and dolphins between breaks at the slot machines. In the Aladdin hotel, they didn’t need to move from their seats at the bar to see another curiosity in a makeshift ring.
The former baddest man on the planet has been reduced to this — just another freak show on the Las Vegas Strip.
The signs said he was in training, and that was enough to lure a few hundred people to the makeshift ring set up just outside the casino’s buffet restaurant. Training for what was a question better left unanswered.
Tyson once made $35 million for one fight and more than $300 million in his career before blowing it all. Now he’s a casino sideshow, trying to make a few bucks the only way he knows how in a sport he no longer can stand.
Exhibition bouts might be in Tyson’s future. It’s like Rocky with the never-ending sequels. What pro wrestler will Tyson take on?
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| Thursday, June 29, 2006 |
Evander Holyfield, one of the most charismatic heavyweight champions of the modern era, is making yet another comeback.
The “Real Deal” is returning. Former four-time heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield, 43, is coming back from a 21-month layoff to face journeyman Jeremy Bates in a 10-round bout Aug. 19 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. “I’m very excited about it,” Holyfield told ESPN.com on Wednesday. “Being able to finish what I’ve started means a lot. I was sidetracked lately, but I am getting back on the path.” A news conference to announce the fight is scheduled for Thursday afternoon at the American Airlines Center, event organizer Lester Bedford said.
Holyfield (38-8-2, 25 KOs) has lost three in a row and is 2-5-1 in his last eight fights. He hasn’t fought since dropping a lopsided unanimous decision to Larry Donald on Nov. 13, 2004, in New York. After the Donald fight, Holyfield was indefinitely suspended by the New York commission for “poor performance,” meaning he couldn’t fight anywhere in the United States until the suspension was lifted. However, Holyfield protested and, after passing a series of medical tests more than a year ago, New York boxing officials changed his suspension from a medical one to an administrative one, which allowed him to seek licenses elsewhere. Last week, Holyfield was granted one in Texas.
“I still want to be the undisputed heavyweight champ of the world,” Holyfield said, repeating the mantra he has preached for the past several years. “There is no reason to fight if that was not my goal. Everything I have ever done was with that goal in mind. If my goal wasn’t to be the undisputed heavyweight champ of the world then there would be no reason to get back in it.”
Sad.
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| Thursday, May 11, 2006 |
Floyd Patterson, who came back from an embarrassing loss to become the first boxer to regain the heavyweight title, died Thursday. He was 71. Patterson died at his home. He had Alzheimer’s disease for about eight years and prostate cancer, nephew Sherman Patterson said.
Patterson’s career was marked by historic highs and humiliating lows. He emerged from a troubled childhood in Brooklyn to win the Olympic middleweight championship in 1952. In 1956, the undersized heavyweight became at age 21 the youngest man to win the title with a fifth-round knockout of Archie Moore. But three years later, Patterson was knocked down seven times in the third round in losing the title to Ingemar Johansson at the Polo Grounds in New York City.
Patterson returned with a vengeance at the same site in 1960, knocking out Johansson with a tremendous left hook to retake the title. “They said I was the fighter who got knocked down the most, but I also got up the most,” Patterson said later.
Despite his accomplishment, he was so humiliated when he lost the title on a first-round knockout to Sonny Liston in 1962 that he left Comiskey Park in Chicago wearing dark glasses and a fake beard. Patterson again was knocked out in the first round by Liston in 1963.
Patterson got two more shots at winning the title a third time. Battered and taunted for most of the fight by Muhammad Ali, Patterson was stopped in the 12th round in 1965. He lost a disputed 15-round decision to WBA champion Jimmy Ellis in 1968.
Overall, Patterson finished 55-8-1 with 40 knockouts. He was knocked out five times and knocked down a total of at least 15 times. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1991.
After retiring in 1972, Patterson remained close to the sport. He served twice as chairman of the New York State Athletic Commission.
Patterson retired right before I became aware of the sport.
Bill Jempty has thoughts on his passing.
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| Wednesday, April 12, 2006 |
Muhammad Ali has sold the rights to market his name, for a cool $50 mil.
 Muhammad Ali, one of the world’s most recognized people, has sold 80 percent of the marketing rights to his name and likeness to a firm for $50 million. The 64-year-old former heavyweight champion, who suffers from Parkinson’s disease, will retain a 20 percent interest in the business. The new venture will be operated by a company called G.O.A.T. LLC, an acronym for “The Greatest of All Time.”
Ali and wife Lonnie are expected to work with CKX, Inc. to market his interests around the world. The deal includes trademarks owned by the boxing great. “This relationship with CKX will help guarantee that, for generations to come, people of all nations will understand my beliefs and my purpose,” Ali said in a statement issued Tuesday by the company. “I am honored to be able to partner with CKX as they continue to grow.”
CKX has concentrated primarily on entertainment and holds the rights to the IDOLS television brand, which includes the show “American Idol.” It also holds the rights to Elvis Presley’s marketing, and has an interest in the operations of Graceland, Presley’s Memphis, Tenn., home.
Elvis and Muhammad Ali are a pretty good combo, I guess. Still, this somehow seems wrong.
And how does one sell eighty percent of one’s name, anyway? Eighty percent of the profits, sure. But either Ali has a veto power over how his name is sold, in which case he effectively owns at least 51 percent of it, or not, in which case he effectively owns none of it.
Update: I hope they don’t change his name to “Enron Field.” That would really suck. Although, if they changed it back to “Cassius Clay,” it’d be kind of funny.
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