On his right forearm, Tyson has a dragon tattoo which is easily the most impressive of all his artwork. This is the one tattoo there is little information on, with nobody being sure of the tattoo artist or the actual meaning behind the tattoo. Tyson himself hasn’t discussed the ink but as The Sun detailed, “In Chinese culture, the dragon represents strength, wisdom, and freedom,” so it wouldn’t be a stretch to think Tyson knows this and wanted the tattoo to represent these things. Or maybe he just really likes dragons? We will never know until he comments on the artwork.
The next, somewhat inevitable step is that the face tattoo has finally hit the streets. “Unquestionably, these types of tattoos have become a trend in recent years,” explains literary critic and literature professor Nadal Suau, in a conversation with EL PAÍS. He classifies facial tattoos under the category of “unruly tattoos.” This group also includes ironic tattoos. He also adds what he calls “ugly, dirty or violent” tattoos — such as painting the anus of a cow on your skin — are part of “a bad taste that disobeys the imperative of homogeneous beauty.”
The UFC veteran said, “I don’t like it but Mike Tyson and I’ve been there and I was with him when he was getting ready for the Roy Jones fight. Kamaru like this dude’s disciplined dude he’s almost like us you know. He gets moody when he’s in fight camp. He stops smoking or he doesn’t smoke as much you know. He starts to eat clean he runs every day 5 in the morning.”
In 1992, Tyson was convicted of rape and sentenced to six years in prison. He was released on parole after three years. After his release in 1995, he engaged in a series of comeback fights, regaining the WBA and WBC titles in 1996 to join Floyd Patterson, Muhammad Ali, Tim Witherspoon, Evander Holyfield and George Foreman as the only men in boxing history to have regained a heavyweight championship after losing it. After being stripped of the WBC title in the same year, Tyson lost the WBA title to Evander Holyfield by an eleventh round stoppage. Their 1997 rematch ended when Tyson was disqualified for biting Holyfield’s ears, one bite notoriously being strong enough to remove a portion of his right ear. In 2002, Tyson fought for the world heavyweight title, losing by knockout to Lennox Lewis.
Tyson was known for his ferocious and intimidating boxing style as well as his controversial behavior inside and outside the ring, which he explained was inspired by Sonny Liston, a boxer who is widely regarded as the most intimidating man in the history of boxing. With a knockout-to-win percentage of 88%, he was ranked 16th on The Ring magazine’s list of 100 greatest punchers of all time, and first on ESPN’s list of “The Hardest Hitters in Heavyweight History”. Sky Sports described him as “perhaps the most ferocious fighter to step into a professional ring”. He has been inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame and the World Boxing Hall of Fame.
Having based the series on “extensive research of factual accounts, interviews, footage of real-life events,” Rogers added that, as a writer and storyteller, he doesn’t like to rely on a single source. “I really like to do the research and get all these different opinions and then put a story around all of that. I don’t like to be beholden to just one person,” he said.
The most puzzling pre-fight antics have come courtesy of Jake Paul, which we kind of expect from the guy who illegally touts cryptocurrencies and once got married purely for social media engagement. This time, his stunts are focused squarely on his imminent opponent, with Paul recently revealing a facial tattoo identical to Tyson’s.
The significant strikes between the strawweight champion and challenger remained even in the fourth, with Zhang and Jedrzejczyk each landing 40 shots. Still, Jedrzejczyk was slightly more accurate, landing 40 of 79 strikes (50 percent) compared to Zhang’s 40 of 91 shots landed (43 percent).
Mike was the clear aggressor throughout the bout and landed 67 of his 193 punches, with Roy landing 27 of 236. Tyson is a current betting favorite in the purported trilogy bout between him and Holyfield.
In a 2012 interview with Graham Bensinger, Mike Tyson discussed the story behind his face tattoo, box saying, “I just thought it was a cool tattoo. I was going to get a bunch of hearts and stuff. That would have been really stupid. I was going to be the man of hearts, baby. I was very close. Victor Perez, the tattoo artist said ‘I ain’t doing that. I can’t do that’.”
The family lived in Bedford-Stuyvesant until their financial burdens necessitated a move to Brownsville when Tyson was 10 years old. Throughout his childhood, Tyson lived in and around neighborhoods with a high rate of crime. According to an interview in Details, his first fight was with a bigger youth who had pulled the head off one of Tyson’s pigeons. Tyson was repeatedly caught committing petty crimes and fighting those who ridiculed his high-pitched voice and lisp. By the age of 13, he had been arrested 38 times. He ended up at the Tryon School for Boys in Johnstown, New York. Tyson’s emerging boxing ability was discovered there by Bobby Stewart, a juvenile detention center counselor and former boxer. Stewart considered Tyson to be an outstanding fighter and trained him for a few months before introducing him to boxing manager and trainer Cus D’Amato. Tyson dropped out of high school as a junior. He was later awarded an honorary Doctorate in Humane Letters from Central State University in 1989. Kevin Rooney also trained Tyson, and he was occasionally assisted by Teddy Atlas, although Atlas was dismissed by D’Amato when Tyson was 15. Rooney eventually took over all training duties for the young fighter.