Monday Milestone: Iron Mike

Iron Mike

"Holyfield butted me in the second round and then he butted me again. He looked right at me and came right into me. What am I supposed to do? I've got children to raise. … He got a little nick on his ear. … "
– Mike Tyson's view on the incident

This Week in History:
1997, June 28
Mike Tyson bites Evander Holyfield on his ear during their WBA Heavyweight Title fight, and is disqualified and suspended.

It was billed as ‘The Sound and the Fury’. Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield would go toe to toe for the WBA Heavyweight Championship of the world. It was “Iron Mike” versus “The Real Deal” in one hell of a rematch.

The first bout had occurred the previous November in Las Vegas. As with any big boxing match it had all the theatre of a heavyweight classic. It had six years in the making. First there were injuries, then Mike Tyson had spent three years in prison following a rape conviction. The fight had been building for a long time.

So when they took to the ring, it was with huge fanfare. Holyfield had studied Tyson’s style thoroughly and by the fifth round Tyson had found himself outboxed. In the sixth and seventh rounds Tyson received head butts that referee Mitch Halpern adjudged to be legal. He complained but it got no better. Evander Holyfield was winning every round, and by the eleventh Halpern had seen enough, a technical knockout saw the fight stopped. In the wash up, although Tyson professed respect for the huge underdog Evander Holyfield, whom many had considered washed up, Iron Mike was not used to being beaten, and a rematch was arranged.

So this was how we arrived that June evening in Las Vegas. Tyson’s record now sat at 45-2 and was determined to recapture his WBA Heavyweight Title. The first two rounds were pretty tight, but once again Holyfield was winning, landing a key overhand right, and head butting Tyson once again, much to his disbelief.  

As the third round began Tyson was ordered back into his corner. He had resumed without his mouthguard. Hindsight tells us that this was an act that that foreshadowed what was about to come, but it was not the first time he had chewed on Holyfield. With forty seconds left in the round, in a clinch, Tyson rolled his head above Holyfield’s shoulder, spat out his mouthguard biting him on the top of the right ear, ripping a inch long chunk out of his ear and spitting it out on the canvas as Holyfield jumped around the ring clutching his bleeding ear. Tyson was disqualified, and later suspended.

What makes even the most professional of athletes think for one moment that this is ok? Yes it was the heat of the moment. Yes, in the middle of sporting battles we make some interesting decisions. But he ate a piece of ear. Let me say that again. A piece of ear. It is still impossible to comprehend why, other than admitting the obvious.

Mike Tyson is unhinged. His chequered history suggests that tenfold. But that day he went into a new stratosphere. Promoters wanted ‘The Sound and the Fury’ – they got both. Only it was heard through a damaged ear.

 

Milestone Five:  Famous (and infamous) Mike Tyson moments

5. Between 1992 and 1995 Mike Tyson is imprisoned for raping Desiree Washington

4. Shortly after his final professional victory in 2003 Tyson gets himself a facial tattoo.

3. In 2009 Mike Tyson appears in The Hangover as a caricature of himself, when Phil, Stu, Alan and Doug break into his place and steal his tiger.

2. In 1987 at the age of 20 years 4 months and 22 days, Tyson becomes the youngest undisputed heavyweight champion of the world.

1. Mike Tyson bites the ear of Evander Holyfield in their WBA World Heavyweight fight in Las Vegas  in 1997.

 

With thanks to Noel Vasquez/Getty Images for the photo