What happened to my favorite sport of all time, heavyweight boxing?
I remember being a teenager and watching Mike Tyson clobber Trevor Berbick. It was 1986 and Tyson's precision, ferocity and lightning-fast jabs left anyone who watched him in complete awe. He was only 20 but he was already an icon, so much so that if you got wind of a Tyson match, you cancelled all social engagements, gathered around the sofa and didn't pick up the phone until the fight ended. It felt like a gift to see Tyson in action. I remember watching fighter after fighter get ravaged and hoping Tyson's career would never end.
But utlimately it did. Tyson made bad choices, lost his edge and seemed to lose his soul along the way. His fall from grace was hard but it wasn't solitary. An entire industry fell with him. Twenty plus years after the Berbick fight, nobody really cares about heavyweight boxing. The great American heavyweights are gone and no one has a clue if they will be replaced. Boxing has been eclipsed by ultimate fighting and been undone by aging champions who are just trying to inch one step closer to a title. If you truly loved heavyweight boxing, you truly detest it now.
I console myself by thinking that perhaps there is a contender out there who will help bring the sport back to its glory days, someone who will remind us of Tyson, of Ali, of George Foreman. I'm excited at the prospect of sitting around the sofa with my kids to watch the next great fighter enthrall us and rise to the ranks of legend, once again.
Please hurry!!
But utlimately it did. Tyson made bad choices, lost his edge and seemed to lose his soul along the way. His fall from grace was hard but it wasn't solitary. An entire industry fell with him. Twenty plus years after the Berbick fight, nobody really cares about heavyweight boxing. The great American heavyweights are gone and no one has a clue if they will be replaced. Boxing has been eclipsed by ultimate fighting and been undone by aging champions who are just trying to inch one step closer to a title. If you truly loved heavyweight boxing, you truly detest it now.
I console myself by thinking that perhaps there is a contender out there who will help bring the sport back to its glory days, someone who will remind us of Tyson, of Ali, of George Foreman. I'm excited at the prospect of sitting around the sofa with my kids to watch the next great fighter enthrall us and rise to the ranks of legend, once again.
Please hurry!!
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