Power of Caring
  presented by CIGNA

Tyson: 'Let's see what you've got'

Click here for more on this story

Posted: Monday December 21, 1998 05:44 PM

Editor's note: CNN/Sports Illustrated's Nick Charles spoke with former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson at the Madison Square Garden Gym in Phoenix, where Tyson is preparing for his January 16 fight with Francois Botha. The bout will be Tyson's first ring appearance since he was suspended by the Nevada Athletic Commission in July 1997 for biting Evander Holyfield's ears during their second fight.  

On Returning To The Ring

Tyson: "I haven't been motivated. I haven't been truly too happy lately. A lot of screwed up things happened to me" Brian Bahr/Allsport

NICK CHARLES: Mike, when we were talking, you said so often you were born to fight, born to be in a gym. I watched you today and I feel like the hunger's back. What do you like so much about this atmosphere, this comfort zone?

MIKE TYSON: I don't know, it's just something I've been doing for a long time. I could be off two years, 18 months and it's not hard to pick back up for some reason. Some guys, they're gone and they're finished. Maybe I have a knack for it and don't know it.

CHARLES: Tommy Brooks [Tyson's new trainer], how has he made a difference?

TYSON: It's just good having a trainer in your corner, working with someone new, discussing some things you like and don't like that he does. Just basically working through things and becoming better.

CHARLES: When I saw you today in terms of maneuvering, making shots count, using your jab and playing off that. It seems like what you're doing is things that maybe you had let slide.

TYSON: Just basic fundamentals, the basics we work on most of the time. I'm just jabbing, moving, constantly punching. There's a variety of things, but it's nothing spectacular, just all basics.

CHARLES: But were they things that you had let lapse? Would it be fair assessment to say that now you have to pay more attention to getting better because you were so good so young?

TYSON: I don't know. I was just having a ball back then. I was just having fun.

CHARLES: And now?

TYSON: I don't know. I'm just paying the bills, taking care of my responsibilities. I don't think I'm going to do this much longer.

CHARLES: Really? Is it fun being back in the ring, or is it a means to an end? Why are you back?

TYSON: Sometimes you think it's a means to an end. But I don't realize how much fun it is until I'm in the dressing room the night of a fight. Then I realize how much I love it. But if I'm just walking the street ... people aren't going to understand the life of a fighter. They think of most fighters as wild and reckless because all of our life has been in a gym and we've paid our dues and no one knows who you are, no one pays attention to you, no one has the faith or believes in you. I'm talking about the whole collective people, and it's just a weird life.

CHARLES: It's not like being a high school quarterback star, where you have cheerleaders and you're fifteen years old. It's a lonely thing.

TYSON: It's very lonely. They look at most boxers as wackos.

CHARLES: But speak for yourself.

TYSON: Yes, I got my moments.  

On Fatherhood

Tyson: "I am just trying to make their futures the best possible. I have a lot of hope for them, but they're basically going to be their own individuals at one time and that's really the frightening part."CNN/SI

CHARLES: You've been a father for years, but you seem to be enjoying that role more. Why is that Mike?

TYSON: I don't know. It's just a thing, a part of your life. When you're 20, you want to have fun, chase the girls and drink a lot of liquor. Then I guess at a certain age you're ready to hang out with your kids and you get mind boggled when this kid calls to you 'Daddy, I love you daddy.' You're like 'Wow, does that mean I'm old or not? Does daddy mean I'm old or is it just that I'm happy to be a father and young?' God, that's like before I told people I would like my kids to call me by my first name, I'd choke them. Now, I wish they would call me by my first name, I would feel better. I guess it's all an insecurity thing.

CHARLES: But it's a great feeling for a guy who grew up maybe without a mentor, without a father figure. It's important. What do you give back to your kids?

TYSON: I am just trying to make their futures the best possible. I have a lot of hope for them, but they're basically going to be their own individuals at one time and that's really the frightening part. I'll teach them, hopefully, that I'm a strong believer that people never learn, it's very hard to learn, from someone else to learn from your mistakes. Sometimes, people have to feel that fire, that it's hot. It's just such a cruel world out there, so cruel and vicious and we're all a part of it. All of us, it's a part of this world, how we go around loving kids and kissing kids and we have businesses and factories where kids are dying in Honduras and China and these factories and we say we're such advocates for abused children. We live in such a hypocritical society and we become the monster that we hate so badly and it's just horrific and nothing can be done about it. Nothing wants to be done about it.  

On Good vs. Bad

Tyson hasn't stepped in the ring since the now-infamous ear-biting incident with Evander Holyfield on June 28, 1997 Jamie Squire/Allsport

CHARLES: Mike, I've known you for 14 years I think. I saw you go from really a man-child to win the heavyweight title at 20 years old and now you're 32. Tell me about the evolution of Mike Tyson. What have you learned through that time?

TYSON: I really want to believe that everyone is good. I started getting philosophical and reading books and trying to believe that people are good people by nature. At times I wonder, people are greedy. The human nature of people is to be greedy and vindictive.

CHARLES: Do feel you have been victimized through the years?

TYSON: Hey, I'm not a victim. No, I can't say I'm a victim. I just made some s----y decisions, but I'm not a victim. I've never been a victim. A victim I've never been. I like to sometimes get the sympathy of a victim, but a victim, no. I wish I was the victim.

CHARLES: In other words, you made a choice to let these things happen.

TYSON: Yeah, they happened. Unknowingly, but they happened. I don't believe in victims, no one's a victim. I don't know why we use that word. There's no one who is a victim, we choose our own destiny. After a bad coincidence has happened, we choose whether we're going to sob and blame the world or just go on and say screw it and make the best of it. Whatever it is.

CHARLES: Is that what you're doing now?

TYSON: I don't know what the hell I'm doing.

CHARLES: Sure you do, you have direction. I saw you in the gym today. You're not here going through any motions Mike.

TYSON: Oh no, please. I'm a good man. Some days I'm better than others, but I'm pretty good. Great when I want to be, but I have my own complexities I have to deal with.  

On Growing Older

Tyson is scheduled to fight Francois Botha (right) on January 16 AP

CHARLES: Is there more a sense of urgency now in terms of your boxing career? You're 32 years old, you don't want to blow it, you don't want your skills to wash down the drain and you want to recapture what you had.

TYSON: I stayed pretty active in my exile, so to speak. I wish I felt as good as everyone says I look, but I don't feel that off.

CHARLES: Do you think there's a difference now in you, and in terms of what everybody tells you? Do you think you've come to a point in your life when you need somebody to tell you what you need to hear rather than what you wanted to hear?

TYSON: No, I don't like people telling me what to do. I'm at a stage where I hate to be bossed around. In the gym, when you're a fighter, you get bossed around a lot and I just hate that. It's something you have to do to be a fighter, you're disciplined and get bossed around a lot. I really hate it. All trainers do it. They talk s--t, they boss you around, that's just the way it is I guess.

CHARLES: Do you listen?

TYSON: I listen, but I hate it. Of course I listen, it's in my best interest.

CHARLES: How can you be more effective than you've been in the last couple of fights? What do you have to do?

TYSON: Get more motivated. I haven't been motivated because I haven't been truly too happy lately. A lot of screwed up things happened to me, which became a focus point. A lot happened and it takes a lot out of you. Going to prison, being involved with a lot of crap, and just being abused and dehumanized. It takes a lot out of you. You just need to breathe for a moment. I just don't understand, even with my trainers, I think they clutter me too much, they think they're protecting me, but I just need my space. I need to be left alone, I need to walk down the street by myself, I need to breathe. It's just, wow, the stuff they call superstar, I could do without it.

CHARLES: It's the flip side of fame though right? It comes with the territory.

TYSON: Yeah, I guess so.  

On Love and Marriage

CHARLES: How have you taken control of your life?

Tyson (with wife Monica): "... it's about me now. And my family, that's what it's about." AP

TYSON: It's an ongoing process, it continues to go on. This is something new in my life. Everyone feels like I don't know what the hell I'm doing. Even my wife feels like she's my bodyguard, a watchdog now. You know how that feels with a guy. Give me a break, let me show my manhood a little. I don't need you to be my watchdog all the time. Chill out alright.

CHARLES: What's she worried about Mike?

TYSON: I don't know. She thinks I'm naive or else I have a big heart. It's not all about that. Some people just need more love than others, some people need caring and she says, 'The hell with them, they will manipulate you and take advantage of you.' And I'm a true believer that a lot of people never had love before. I always had it but I didn't want, I couldn't relate to it.

CHARLES: How come?

TYSON: I don't know. I always wanted be a hard-ass when I was a kid. And the hard guys always were able to take the atrocities and be tough and take whatever happens. Somebody kills someone in your family, you have enough discipline to take it with your head up and face your enemy with your eyes and die with dignity, whatever the situation might be. I just wanted to be a bad ass.

CHARLES: You never wanted to show vulnerability, right?

TYSON: No.

CHARLES: Or your soft side?

TYSON: Yeah.

CHARLES: How has marriage changed you? How has it helped you, how has marriage changed you this time and to this woman?

TYSON: I don't know if it has helped me, but I know it has changed me. I have a beautiful wife and she really thinks that she's the boss. You know if they're angry with you, you had a fight, and they know they want to talk to you, but they say, 'Hon, the kids want to talk to you, I don't want to talk to you. Your daughter wants to talk to you.' I say 'Yeah, okay. Hi Rayna, you're one-year-old, what do you have to say to daddy?' Listen, you know little kids, you have to be careful. My daughter Rayna says, 'Somebody pushed me in school today.' My wife is mad saying, 'Somebody pushed you in school.' Then I'm mad, I'm all the way in Phoenix and I'm ready to get on a plane and go devastate those little pre-kindergarten kids. [Laughs] I'm going to get them to call their parents and pop their parents and go crazy in this private school we have her in. And then my other daughter, Gina, goes like this, 'Mommy don't believe Rayna. Rayna doesn't know what happened. Rayna did you go to jail today?' And Rayna says, "Uh huh." Then Gina, she's eight, nine years old, she says, 'See Mommy, you can't believe this girl, she doesn't know what she's doing. Rayna did you go to prison today? Yes I went to prison today. See, Mommy, you can't believe her, you have to go ask people.' And I am thinking, oh God. With children you're too apprehensive, uneasy about the situation.

CHARLES: Yeah, but children are brutally honest, too. What you see is what you get.

TYSON: That's why I am trying to change my life. I want to move my kids, I would love to live in another country and just start fresh because Gina, who is the oldest daughter said, 'I heard that you hit somebody, but I know you didn't hit somebody because you're always telling me not to hit somebody unless they bother me or hit me first.' And I say, 'You're right, I did not hit anyone. And I think, God damn I lied to my kids and this and that. I just want a change of perspective.  

On Being Liked

Tyson pleaded no contest last month to a suit where two motorists said he kicked and punched them after an automobile accident in Maryland Elsa Hasch/Allsport

CHARLES: You've said nobody likes you. How can you change that?

TYSON: I don't care if no one likes me, as long as they respect me. The only ones I want to love me are my wife and my children. Everybody else, I don't care.

CHARLES: But it's a bonus if other people like you?

TYSON: It doesn't matter.

CHARLES: Really?

TYSON: It's a bonus if they respect me.

CHARLES: You've said that the biggest problem in your life is that you never learned to play the game. What did you mean by that?

TYSON: I don't know. I never smile and talk to people I don't like regardless of their position, even if they can help you and your situation. I'd say, 'No, I don't want to talk to that person.' I just feel like a real lowlife talking to somebody that I don't like them and they don't like me, but we need to work together to get something accomplished. That's really being a liar to yourself. A person should have some kind of dignity toward the truth. And if you don't like a person, you shouldn't be associated with them. For business or no reason. I mean businessmen they understand, 'I'll work with this guy,' like a lot of people who probably work with me say, 'This guy is a beast, he's a savage but I'll work with him because he's a ticket. He's a walking cash machine.' If I don't like somebody I won't work with them.

CHARLES: You had a different corner, guys you trusted and then it went wrong.

TYSON: That's life. People are never what they appear to be. They're never that way. I like to think now I have a good corner, they knew me a great deal, but how in the hell am I going to trust someone? I trust them to the capability of just doing our job together, working together. But how can I trust someone. My wife thinks she's my manager now. You know, 'Honey let's just have babies.' She says, 'I'm going to take charge of this because no one loves you like I love you.' And this is not good.

CHARLES: She's probably right about that.

TYSON: She's absolutely right about it.... I'm just a difficult guy to get along with.

CHARLES: Why is that?

TYSON: I like being by myself because I enjoy myself. Sometimes when there are a lot people I get bad vibes. Also if I'm in a certain kind of mood they may have, everything is going well, I may have read a book about slavery and look at them and get mad and read something about the Holocaust and look at this guy and he's German and oh man, I'm all jacked up. [Laughs]

CHARLES: Do people expect you to walk in a room and start entertaining them, and you're just trying to be yourself?

TYSON: That's so ironic, that people expect so much out of me, when I'm actually below average. They expect a lot out of me. Every now and then I do outrageous things and it appears to be fascinating to them. I don't see how people think I'm fascinating. How am I fascinating? What in the world is fascinating about me besides I fight and beat people spectacularly. Other than that, what's so fascinating about me?

CHARLES: Well, people who are drawn to you find something compelling about a guy, and it is your power and a manner in which you put away people and a manner in which you won a championship and then they want to know more about somebody so they want to open you up.

TYSON: They can never figure me out. No one is going to ever be able to figure me out because I'm that person. Once you think you have me one way, I think that's my biggest insecurity. Everyone thinks they know me, but they don't know me at all.  

On Image

Tyson: "I never get ashamed or embarrassed of anything. If I did I think would cry, but I never cry." AP

CHARLES: So, having your life as an open book this last year has been a real experience. Everybody got a copy of [the psychiatric report prepared on Tyson at the behest of the Nevada Athletic Commission].

TYSON: I'm always saying some s--t. I always try to figure something to say to disorganize some people's thinking. To be honest, nothing embarrassed me. I never get ashamed or embarrassed of anything. If I did I think would cry, but I never cry.

CHARLES: I guess people talk about that, being vulnerable and crying and stuff, but you've talked about fear and Cus [D'Amato, Tyson's mentor] talked about that. How to control it.

TYSON: I think that I was born in the wrong world. I always think and look at people, because we just use one another, like everyone wants to be accepted and wants everyone to like them -- like Moses, I mean Evander Holyfield.

CHARLES: Was that a Freudian slip there?

TYSON: Yeah, he's not what he appears to be, everybody wants to be loved and that's not who we are. We're people who make mistakes. We have disgusting thoughts. We have perverted thoughts. We do things, but we hide under the bill of sanity and it's just ridiculous. I look at people and they're afraid to be who they are. If you're gay, be gay. Don't try to be a man if you're truly gay. Be who you are, we'll still love you because we love who you are. We don't care what you represent, we love who you are. But people are afraid to be themselves.

CHARLES: Is that the message you want to send to people. Hey I'm misunderstood if you really knew me?

TYSON: Listen, I don't know if I'm misunderstood, but more people would be like me if they had the nerve.

CHARLES: How so?

TYSON: Most people thought I'd be finished now. They thought I was finished after being married the first time and going through that ordeal. I'm strong and sly, there's nothing that's going to ever happen to me, unless someone kills me actually physically. But someone kills me spiritually, that's never going to happen. I'm always going to be around and it kills them that I'm still coherent, I'm still around and I'm still, even though they hear I have tax problems, I can still go out and spend a million dollars worth of clothes if I want to. It kills everybody that I live my life the way I want to.

CHARLES: You think it kills everybody?

TYSON: Yeah, it kills them. I know it kills them.

CHARLES: Why? Does it diminish them? Or do people build you up and knock you down? How do you feel about them?

TYSON: People want to believe they're better than someone. Everyone's so insecure and everyone wants to be a star. Everyone wants to be the person. And everyone's not meant to be that person. Everyone wants to be in the in crowd. There's no loyalty, there's no friendship, this bondship between them. They just want to be connected with this person, being seen with this person. Be yourself, be strong, be a man or a woman, whoever you are. Black, white, candy-striped, who cares. The one thing I know, everyone I know respects the true person and everyone's not true with themselves. All of these people who are heroic, these guys who have been lily white and clean all their lives, if they went through what I went through, they would commit suicide. They don't have the heart that I have. I've lived places they can't defecate in. So, these people mean nothing to me. Their status means nothing to me. Their big-shot money means nothing to me. Man for man, let's deal with me man for man; let's see what you've got. Man for man, one on one, let's see what you've got. Deal with me from that perspective. You got nothing.  

On Life In Prison

Tyson served three years for rape in Indiana Al Bello/Allsport

CHARLES: Nobody was with you when you were in prison..

TYSON: Who cares? I wasn't worried about me. I went in there a man and came out a man. Most of those guys get eaten for lunch, breakfast, and dinner. They get cavity checks. Anal cavity checks. Some guys, trust me, they're never what they appear to be. These tough guys or so called killers, see them when they're by themselves, when they have to look at themselves one on one. They're not the killers they think they are. The big shots with their bodyguards that they think they are.

CHARLES: You've talked about how there is a conspiracy and that's how you wound up behind bars. Do you fear now that it could happen again?

TYSON: Listen, anything is capable of happening again. Especially as far as I'm concerned. Because I believe this society believes I belong in prison.... If I even consider looking at a white girl, if I get caught reckless eyeballing a white girl, they'll put me in prison.  

On Don King and God

Tyson: "I still love Don. He's a good man, but he is just evil and greedy." AP

NICK CHARLES- Sounds like you [care about less fortunate people around the world].

MIKE TYSON- Oh I do. I got Mao on my arm who doesn't. I care about everybody, any human people, but then again I said, Really, who really cares. We got guys like Jefferson and Lincoln ... who we look up as heroes. These guys owned slaves, they raped woman, and they killed kids. These guys are murderers. But they're our heroes. They're on our money, our income, our money -- In God you Trust -- these guys. These are the people we worship and what the hell do they care about some kids in China, Honduras or Nicaragua. To be honest, it's just another losing battle.

CHARLES: Talk about Don King [whom Tyson is suing, claiming that, as Tyson's promoter, King took far more than his share of Tyson's income]. How did he take advantage of you?

TYSON: I would like to talk about him but I don't think I can talk about him because it's pending and stuff. He just took advantage of my loyalty. After everyone told me he was a piece of prefabricated monkey dung, I said, 'Give him a chance. He's a good guy.' I still love Don. He's a good man, but he is just evil and greedy. And I think when you're like that, there's nothing personal with you, it's just the way you are....

CHARLES: How do you feel about Don King now?

TYSON: I don't have any ill feelings, because I believe that he has to seek God one day and deal with it.

CHARLES: You've said your finances are fine...

TYSON: I'm not going to starve to death or nothing.

CHARLES: People hear what you made in the ring and then they hear you had trouble with the IRS, and they can't believe it. Do you see their point? They can't believe you would go through that kind of money.

TYSON: I'm a wild guy. Even now, I give away a lot of money because I'm always in a position to get a lot of money. This is 14 years later and I'm still breaking records financially. Fourteen years, 15 years, there's never been a time I wasn't a millionaire. A guy like me doesn't really make a big thing out of having it. I don't know, maybe God has something better for me in another life. If this is what it's all about, getting a bunch of millions, and having all the finances and nice cars and nice homes in the world, this is very overrated man.

CHARLES: You've been on the scene so long, you've been in the news so long. What have you learned?

TYSON: There's nothing really as bad as it seems and nothing's really as good as it seems. It all has to do with you and yourself. God has nothing to do with nothing, there's no such thing as we're going to be a family and all of us are Muslims and all of us are Jews and all of us are Catholics. It's all about your own salvation, what you truly believe, God's all within yourself. That's what it's all about. All about you. You know what I mean because there's Muslims who are supposedly my brothers and they've done some really disrespectful things to me. And there are some Jews that were supposed to be my brothers and they've done some disrespectful things to me. Some Catholics, and I have done some bad things to those people too and those kind of religions too. But the fact is you have to live with yourself and it doesn't matter about nationality or religion--good person or bad person, that's all that matters. Good person or bad person. Some people are atheist and don't believe nothing about God but they will give the shirt off their back. Some people pray to God all day and are vicious and malicious people.  

On Himself

Tyson: "Listen if I didn't have my kids and my wife, something that I'm truly proud of, and people took advantage of me, their heads would be rolling. They'd be dead." Jed Jacobsohn/Allsport

CHARLES: You know what, I think you're a good person, sometimes you just don't know it. I'm not blowing steam.

TYSON: Please, I won't allow people to blow steam. I'm good people right? People get it confused. I'm a kind person, I'm not a friendly person. I'm just kind because my mother was kind. But I'm hard because Cus was hard, and he was mean and he was strong and he gave me that. I had to have some inclination of it, but he really tacked it on me. That's why nothing phases me and I don't cry for my life. If something happens to you and you go to jail for 20 years, 100 years, be a man and handle it. I screwed up. If they think I screwed up and if I screwed up I got to handle it, regardless. I don't cry to no one. Whatever has to be done is done.

CHARLES: You're just trying to move on and do this for yourself, right?

TYSON: For my family. For me? Please I don't need anything. What do I need? Be honest, if I didn't have a wife and I didn't have kids, you know what I would tell the IRS. You know what would tell these people? Please, give me a break. If I didn't have kids and a wife, you know what I would tell everybody if I owed them some money or something? Get it off the roof. Or get if off moon, alright. You want your money, get it off the moon.

CHARLES: But Mike, you got so much pride and so much talent and even more potential, why would you want to walk away from it? Even for yourself.

TYSON: No, listen. The fact that anybody would try to downplay me, belittle me, I'd sacrifice my life. I'm not going to let anybody push over me. Listen if I didn't have my kids and my wife, something that I'm truly proud of, and people took advantage of me, their heads would be rolling. They'd be dead.

CHARLES: Oh, I believe that. But what I'm getting at is that I know you have too much pride not to give this your best shot again.

TYSON: That's going to happen regardless, because that is who I am. This is who I am, I could walk away from this, but this is who I am. Don't get it wrong because I'm no longer 18 years old, I'm not a little boy anymore. I think for myself, but Cus put me in gear, all of that's irrelevant, it's about me now. And my family, that's what it's about.

CHARLES: That's what I was getting at, you're fighting for yourself and for them.

TYSON: High five (slap hands with Charles), Ah-ha!

CHARLES: Thank you Mike.

TYSON: You're welcome.

 

Related information
Multimedia
Mike Tyson tells CNNSI's Nick Charles that he doesn't like the superstar treatment   • Start(835 K .MOV) Click here for the latest audio and video
Search our site	Watch CNN/SI 24 hours a day
	Sports Illustrated and CNN have combined to form a 24 hour sports news and information channel. To receive CNN/SI at your home call 1-888-53-CNNSI.