After Ban Comes A Bomb

Once again the boxing world encourages Mike Tyson when he has done nothing to repay it.

The NBA has the sense not to charge for its exhibition games in this lockout-ruined season, but the boxing folks have the nerve to ask $46 to watch a glorified trial on pay-per-view television. Some fans even bought it, and about 12,000 people paid ticket prices starting at $200 to see Tyson fight Francois Botha at the MGM Grand Arena Saturday night.

No refunds are coming even though Tyson vs. Botha wasn’t a competition; it was a warmup. You might as well pay to see a janitor wet his mop or cough up 30 bucks to watch a doctor wash his hands before surgery.

It only took one punch to send Botha to the canvas. But it took Tyson five rounds to land it.

Before that it was four rounds of watching Tyson acclimate himself to the ring after a 19-month absence brought about by his biting Evander Holyfield’s ear the last time he fought here at the MGM Grand Arena.

All this evening demonstrated was how far Tyson has dropped, how little his appeal has to do with anything resembling boxing.

The supposed new, more technical Tyson lasted for about 10 seconds. He opened with a couple of jabs, then spent the rest of the fight going for the big punch, swinging wildly and missing again and again.

When it was about boxing, not a demonstration of punching strength, Tyson trailed on all three cards. Tyson won only one round by one judge, but he had a point subtracted from that round for what referee Richard Steele called unnecessary roughness (isn’t that just a 10-yard penalty?). This fight contained both elements people have come to expect from Tyson: the raw power and the wild extracurricular activities.

After the bell sounded to end the first round, Tyson and Botha remained in a clinch. Tyson wouldn’t release Botha’s arm, and Botha hit Tyson with a right hand. Security guards rushed into the ring and separated them and police officers lined the apron. Once again, a Tyson fight leans toward something that should only be sanctioned by the WWF, if anyone at all.

But the first four rounds provided little of interest.

It has gotten to the point that Tyson is more entertaining behind a microphone than in the ring. That’s much more exciting and unpredictable.

With the Nevada State Athletic Commission just waiting to give Tyson his license back at his hearing in October, Tyson nearly did himself in with his rambling answers. They asked him what had happened when he attacked a couple of motorists after a traffic accident in Maryland last summer, and he said if he did hit anybody he didn’t remember because he was so angry he simply blacked out. Yeah, that sounds like a guy who won’t lose control in the ring again.

He was at it again this week, getting into it with a television interviewer and likening the doctors who performed his commission-ordered psychological exams to Nazis.

This from a man who is supposed to be under continuous psychological review. But it shouldn’t change anything. If the doctors gave the thumbs-up to his return after he told them he wanted to harm them during his examinations, then they probably won’t be too offended by this latest comment.

The boxing world can’t say no to Tyson. It’s drawn to him gawking like a tourist mesmerized by the gazillion blinking flashing lights on the Vegas Strip. (The alternative is bad news like learning the George Foreman-Larry Holmes fight wasn’t canceled, only postponed. Just what we need: a fight between Foreman and Holmes when they’re even older.)

The MGM let Tyson in its house, even though his ear bite in 1997 set off a melee that caused the hotel to close its casino for the rest of the night, costing the MGM untold amounts of money.

Of course, Tyson has cost himself an untold amount of money by landing in jail with a rape conviction and by having his license revoked for the Holyfield incident (with a $3-million fine tacked on). He missed out on prime years and big paydays. But there always has been the promise that he can make more, that he’d still be the top draw in the sad sport of boxing.

How much longer can it go on? Will people continue to pay top dollar to watch the further erosion of an ex-champion?

This is a man who couldn’t outbox Francois Botha, a man whose fights will never be shown on ESPN Classic Sports.

And there’s no guarantee that Tyson can get enough ring time to work himself back into form.

Next month, Indianapolis Judge Patricia Gifford could rule that Tyson’s actions in the Maryland traffic incident violated his parole for the rape sentence and send him back to jail.

If he goes and then returns to the ring again, how much worse will he be than he is now at 32?

The excitement that accompanied his rise to the top in the ‘80s--when we thought we were witnessing the ascension of the greatest fighter of all time--is gone away like so many other parts of that era, packed deep in the closet next to the Members Only jackets.

Tyson used to have a mystique. Now there’s only a morbid fascination with him. Other fighters aren’t afraid, which means he’s lost a weapon even more powerful than that big right hand.

Mike Tyson can always be famous, but he’ll never be revered. That’s a status reserved for the likes of Muhammad Ali.

Ali still drew crowds of admirers whenever he walked through the MGM lobby this week, and received the only standing ovation when the celebrities were introduced before the fight.

We look at Ali, slowed by Parkinson’s Syndrome, and sometimes feel sad because he isn’t what he once was.

When we see Tyson years from now, we’ll shake our heads because he never became what we thought he could be.