The first time I met and interviewed Mike Tyson, well, let's just say things did not go well. At all. How bad was it? The headline stretched across the front page of the USA Today sports section on my story said it all: "Full-force Tyson: 'I hate everybody.'"
I had wound up basically nose-to-nose with Tyson, who was yelling and cursing at me, his finger poking me in the chest, as our interview -- in the dark, dingy basement of a Detroit gym -- went south in a hurry.
I wound up being physically escorted up the stairs and out of the gym by his security detail, who then shoved me into a limousine that drove me back to my hotel. It wasn't supposed to be like that.
As bad as that day went, it was the only time I ever had a bad experience with Tyson. In the 16 years since, I have interviewed Tyson dozens of times and never had any issues whatsoever. In fact, most of the time Tyson has never been anything but great with me, either in person or on the telephone. Supposedly you never have a second chance to make a first impression, but in this case, that wasn't exactly true.
So today, on the occasion of Tyson's 50th birthday, I want to share what went down the first time I ever met Iron Mike.
I began covering boxing for USA Today in March of 2000, so the first Tyson fight I wrote about took place in June against Lou Savarese. But I wasn't sent to Scotland to cover it in person, so I had not yet met Tyson when he signed to face Andrew Golota at the Palace in Auburn Hills, Michigan, in October 2000.
Weeks before that fight, I began laying the groundwork for an interview. The volatile Tyson didn't do many one-on-one interviews in those days, but I had developed a good relationship with Shelly Finkel, Tyson's manager, and he promised he would get Tyson to sit down with me. They were, after all, trying to sell a Showtime PPV event with Golota, and the interview would serve as the basis for a sports cover story scheduled to run two days before the fight, which would give it much-needed publicity.
I flew to Detroit on Monday of fight week -- the bout was scheduled for Friday night, which was unusual. I was supposed to interview Tyson at his hotel on Monday evening. I had no history with him, so I was a fresh face without the history of conflicts he had with so many other writers. In fact, I was informed that Tyson would not be doing any other print interviews before the fight. The idea was to conduct the interview in the peaceful setting of his hotel suite so that the nicer, calmer side of Tyson might come out.
It was supposed to be me, Tyson, Finkel, trainer Tommy Brooks and Tyson's publicist in the room. It turned out to be anything but what I had bargained for.
I got a call from Finkel not long after arriving in Detroit and was told Tyson "wasn't in the mood" to do the interview that night, but he assured me we would do it over breakfast at his hotel Tuesday morning before the final news conference. That seemed reasonable and left me ample time to talk to Tyson and still make my late-afternoon deadline on Tuesday.
But Tyson wasn't in the mood to do the interview Tuesday morning either. Finkel said Tyson would instead do it after the news conference. I was getting a little worried, but when Finkel introduced me to Tyson before the conference, the boxer was in a good mood and confirmed he would talk to me after the presser. But by the time the event ended, plans had changed. Again.
Tyson decided he wanted to spar, which seemed odd given that this was only a few days before the fight. But Finkel said I could accompany them to the gym and interview Tyson there. I didn't ride with them, but a caravan of several cars took us from the presser to the Brewster Wheeler Center, a famed gym that opened in 1929 just north of downtown Detroit. It's where the great Joe Louis used to train.
I was the only media member allowed in, and I was told the interview would take place after the sparring session; so much for that tranquil atmosphere.
I sat at the ring apron and watched Tyson deliver a hellacious beating to sparring partner Jeff Pegues for four rounds. It was absolutely brutal. Tyson stormed out of the ring when they were done and headed for the basement to cool off and change -- and to, at last, do the interview with me.
I followed Tyson and his crew to the basement, where Tyson and I sat knee-to-knee on metal folding chairs. Finkel, Brooks and the publicist all joined us, as did about 10 other guys from Tyson's crew, including Zab Judah, who was defending his junior welterweight title on the undercard. They all sat behind me, creating an intimidating atmosphere reminiscent of a police interrogation scene in the movies -- there was even a naked light bulb hanging from the ceiling. The atmosphere could not have been worse, and I knew Tyson was in no mood to be questioned.
But at least he was there for the interview, so I turned on the tape recorder. I still have the tape of that interview somewhere.
I wanted to make Tyson feel comfortable, so I told him that I grew up near Albany, New York, not far from Catskill, where he spent his amateur and early pro days, and that I had followed his early career. That went over nicely and I thought, great, this just might go well.
Not quite.
The interview was a disaster. It wound up lasting maybe 15 minutes, and by the end, Tyson, still sweating from the sparring, was irate, spewing profanity and making threats.
He promised to kill anyone who disrespected his family, spoke of his desire to "crush" Golota's skull and professed hatred for white people and the media, including going off on my ESPN colleague Wallace Matthews, who covered boxing for the New York Post at the time and had a long history with Tyson. The next day I played the tape for Matthews, who Tyson called "a reptilian piece of s---."
"If anyone disrespects me or my family or my kids, I blow their f------ brains out. So that's the difference between me and them. You don't believe me? You do it." Mike Tyson
"I hate everybody," Tyson said at one point.
Later in the interview, Tyson said, "You guys [in the media] don't got no love for me. You guys looked at my every mistake with a magnifying glass and then broadcast it to the world and then you made me a laughingstock in front of people I love, in front of my children. ... You think it's a joke that I'm angry at you guys? It's not going to be a joke when I'm really angry and I confront one of y'all. Hopefully you're not that person, brother." I thought to myself: Did Tyson just threaten me?
He continued his diatribe, moving on to former promoter Don King, whom he had accused of stealing millions from him.
"I'm an angry guy, I'm bitter, I'm mean because people I trusted all my life, they f----- me," Tyson said, wagging his finger. "It wasn't the fact that they stole some money. I would have given it to them. But I saw what the money did to people, how it changed them. I lost everybody I ever cared and loved over money, my money. Everybody."
Tyson paused to control his anger and then immediately changed course.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm happy, I'm just happy. The world is good, God is good."
That attitude lasted about 10 seconds. Apparently I touched a nerve when I asked him about his infamous remarks after the Savarese fight, when he said he wanted to tear Lennox Lewis' heart out and eat his children.
His response: "If anyone disrespects me or my family or my kids, I blow their f------ brains out. So that's the difference between me and them. You don't believe me? You do it."
Another threat!
Tyson was in such a lather at this point that he had leaned in close to me, almost nose-to-nose, and was pressing his finger into my chest. I was calm, but I knew we might be moments away from a really bad situation. Finkel and Brooks sensed that too, and they called off the interview. Tyson stood up and shoved the chair behind him. I got up, and before I could say anything, his security detail escorted me upstairs and into a limo outside the gym. A few minutes later, Finkel, Brooks and longtime Tyson cornerman and confidant Jay Bright got into the car. Finkel instructed the driver to take them to their hotel and then to drop me off at the one I was staying at with the other media.
We didn't talk much about the interview on the ride. We all knew it had gone badly. After dropping the others off at their hotel, the limo driver got lost taking me to mine. I called my buddy Doug and said, "You'll never guess where I am -- riding around Detroit in Mike Tyson's limo after the worst interview of my life."
I finally got back to my hotel, called the office to offer an update and then wrote as quickly as I could. The story was published the next day and two days later Tyson was credited with a third-round knockout when Golota quit in a fight later changed to a no decision because Tyson tested positive for marijuana.
Five months later, I flew to Las Vegas to cover the heavyweight title rematch between John Ruiz and Evander Holyfield. A day or two before the fight, Showtime arranged to bring a handful of writers to Tyson's Las Vegas mansion to sit down with him and discuss the possibility of him challenging the winner for the title. This would be the first time Tyson and I had seen each other since the gym basement in Detroit.
While we waited for Tyson to come out of his room, we reporters mingled and had brunch. When Tyson finally appeared, he walked right over to me, gave me the once-over, tapped me lightly in the chest with the back of his hand and shrugged. The message came through loud and clear: He remembered me from the awful interview months earlier, there were no hard feelings, and everything was fine between us. We had a second chance to make a first impression on each other.
Happy birthday, Mike.