Mike Tyson
Mike Tyson
Michael Gerard "Mike" Tysonis an American former professional boxer. He held the undisputed world heavyweight championship and holds the record as the youngest boxer to win the WBC, WBA and IBF heavyweight titles at 20 years, 4 months, and 22 days old. Tyson won his first 19 professional bouts by knockout, 12 of them in the first round. He won the WBC title in 1986 after defeating Trevor Berbick by a TKO in the second round. In 1987, Tyson added...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionBoxer
Date of Birth30 June 1966
CityNew York City, NY
CountryUnited States of America
I was drinking every day, fighting guys on the street, hanging out with bizarre women. But those days are gone. That guy is dead.
I just love to fight. I like to hurt people. I haven't lost that. I didn't lose it when I first got a bit of wealth and I haven't lost it now. The nature of my business is to hurt people.
Sometimes you have to wait for the right deal. They all seem good, at least at first, and they may make you some quick money. But when the right deal comes, and it fits into your [overall] plan, it's just overwhelming success. Sometimes, with the long-term deals, you have to take a risk if you're going to get a reward. It's exactly like fighting. Sometimes you have to take chances to get that huge win.
Fighting is endurance, knocking a guy out in 10 seconds is not fighting, its beating him to the punch. But when you put in that time, that is fighting because you are thinking
I fight for perfection
People see it [boxing] as a physical contact sport, but it's not. It's really a spiritual one of will against will. Who wants it the most? How much is he willing to take - and dish out - to get it? It's like fighting is 10 percent physical and 90 percent emotional.
I don't try to intimidate anybody before a fight. That's nonsense. I intimidate people by hitting them.
Fighting is not physical, fighting is spiritual. It's the determination and the will in the guy.
Everybody you fight is not your enemy and everybody who helps you is not your friend.
Fighting is a sport if you're not humble it's going to bring humbleness to you.
It's unnatural to fight somebody who has nothing against you and never did anything to you or to your family, who never stole anything from you. And now you've got to go and try to dismantle this guy.
I felt the same fear in my first fight as I did in my last fight. It never goes away.
I was very dedicated and serious about fighting. I'd read about all the fighters. I found out where they came from, knew about their mothers and their fathers . . . I just read all about their lives, their training.
I didn't come from a household where my mother dragged me outside and said, "You'd better fight." My mother wouldn't let me fight. I was not an aggressive kid.