Mike Tyson comes out of retirement
On 23rd July 2020, the contract for one of the most iconic events in 2020 was signed. Mike Tyson announced that he is coming out of retirement for an exhibition match against Roy Jones Jr. which was huge news for even those who did not know anything about boxing. The match was originally supposed to take place on 12th September at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California. However, in August it was announced that the fight was pushed back to 28th November, 2020 at the STAPLES Center in Los Angeles to maximise the revenue as the organisers thought that the Covid-19 situation would get better with time and people would be able to watch the fight live. Fighting in front of a live audience was what Tyson wanted as well.
Mike Tyson has gone down in history as one of the best boxers in the world. One does not need to follow boxing to know who Mike Tyson was. His announcement to fight Roy Jones Jr. came as a surprise to everyone as the boxer stepped out of retirement after 15 whole years.
Rules for the fight were as follows-
- The fight is at heavyweight – no weight limit,
- Eight two-minute rounds
- Tyson and Jones aren’t required to wear headgear
- The fighters will wear 12 ounce gloves
- The fight will be stopped if either man suffers a bad cut
None of the fighters committed too hard while throwing strikes as they always ended up in a clinch which was broken up by the referee. Tyson dominated the early rounds while throwing clean punches and occasionally throwing his signature left hook. Jones appeared to be fatigued but he made up for it in the later rounds. The fight went on for all of 8 rounds with a disappointing result to the fans. The match ended in a draw with the unofficial score card saying: Chad Dawson (76–76 draw), Christy Martin (79–73 for Tyson), and Vinny Pazienza (76–80 for Jones). Tyson seemed satisfied with the draw but that was not the case for Jones. He commented,
However, Jones wasn’t the only one dissatisfied as fans thought that Tyson clearly won the fight and personally, I also felt that Tyson should have been given the win. Tyson after the fight said that he is not coming back to professional boxing but will be open to more exhibition matches and maybe a rematch with Jones for which the fans and I are all excited for. Both the fighters were guaranteed to earn $1 million and Tyson had publicly pledged to donate all his earnings to charity which is an amazing and thoughtful deed by the legend.
Abhideep Sinha
SY B.Sc Economics