[Poindexter]

The former undisputed heavyweight champion of the world looks back on a long, strange trip

This spring, over the course of two days and two different cities (New York and Las Vegas), I spent approximately eight hours hanging out with Mike Tyson. The final product is a feature in Sports Illustrated's annual "Where Are They Now?" issue, on newsstands this week. Here, below, is a portion of our conversation.

SI: I imagine you have a few stories from your days as a junkie.

Mike Tyson: Listen: I was in St. Tropez, in the South of France. In Ibiza, Spain. I was in Monte Carlo. I was in the Ukraine, Russia, all those places, for three months. From Russia I went to Lisbon, Portgual, from Portugal I went to Amsterdam. In Amsterdam I met this drug dealer, right? And he sees that I like getting high, and he wants to be my buddy, right? This guy goes and gets me a big rock of cocaine. So pretty soon I got a party going on. I got everything: I got these rugby players. I got these naked girls, I got all these ... everything's going on in the room. Plus I also had this girl with me that I picked up in Romania. But then [the dealer he met in Amsterdam] saw how much of a mess I was. He came in and kicked everybody out of my room! All the nude people, all the people having sex. He said, "I feel so bad I ever gave him that stuff."

SI: How about in Las Vegas? What would your typical day in Vegas be like?

Tyson: This is how the day would start: I would go to a club, at say, 2 o'clock [a.m.]. Hang out there for what, two hours, and then I'd go to the after-hours [clubs], that start at 6 o'clock [a.m.]. So I'd stay there from 6 in the morning to 7:30 at night. I'd be sitting down and drinking and doing cocaine, talking to girls ... doing anything. Everything. Then I make it home and I'm tripping out at home. I'm calling people, I'm tired, but I've got people coming in and we're making plans to go out a few hours later. We're getting high, staying up, [doing] cocaine. Somebody would be calling me: "Come hang out with me." So we would go out and get high, till 11 o'clock [p.m.] or something, then go somewhere, to a bar or somewhere. We might go to a club, then get high all day long.

SI: You got involved with prostitutes.

Tyson: Listen, I was living a crazy life. A [prostitute] would go, "There's that guy who hit me the other day, who took money from me the other day, who intimidated me." And [that guy] had to give some money up. [I'd say,] "This is my girl, man. She works for me now. This is my girl now." That's how it was. I wanted to show loyalty to these people. I was so stupid. I'd say, "If you have a problem, just let me know." And all these guys would say, "What's Mike Tyson going to do [to me]?" It was always like that until I got in their f-----' ass. I'm a nice man, but back then, I wasn't. I'm not proud of it.

SI: So your home looks pretty different now, it's safe to say...

Tyson: I'm very fortunate that I have my wife and my children. I don't know how it happened, but, man, I'm living such a different life. Listen: If I allowed my will to run riot, this house would be full, you'd hear people screaming from sex upstairs. If I allowed my mind to run riot, that's what this place would be like.

SI: How many times did you end up going to rehab?

Tyson: I was addicted to rehab. I was like the poster boy, because I would go to like five meetings a day. You were only required to go to one. I would go to five, because I'm an addictive freak. I love hanging out, the camaraderie. It's just awesome! But you know what people want, too? [Tyson leans in closer, his voice suddenly quieter.] This is what I realized, bro: It gives people family. A way of starting over. [In rehab] we start a new life with new family members. And all they gotta do to stay in this family is not get high, and you gotta try really hard. And then if you do get high? "We got your back." That's what I like.

SI: What do you see when you look back at your infamous press conferences?

Tyson: I always wanted to be that guy who said, "F--- you." When I see people doing that, trying to imitate me, these tough guys trying to emulate me, I'm sitting there thinking, like, This guy's an idiot, so I know I'm an idiot. Floyd Mayweather doesn't stand a chance as far as that idiocy. He's not even in my league as an a--hole. He's a good kid. Everyone's hard on him, but this is a great kid. He's just a kid having fun, living in a fantasy world.



SI.com takes you behind the lens during the Mike Tyson photo shoot while reporter Pablo Torre discusses what it's like to spend a day with Iron Mike.

SI: When did your wife, Kiki, really get to know you?

Tyson: She really got to know who I am, the real core, maybe two years ago, three years ago. She got to know the barometer of an individual. She never gave up on me; I gave up on me. But she would never give up. I have a great deal of respect for her as a human being for that. Me and her, we're too far gone as just human beings to try and butter each other up.

SI: What was it like to lose over 100 pounds of weight?

Tyson: I don't want to be grotesque, but when you're 330 pounds, it's hard to wipe your a--. You know? I didn't like living like that. I felt like an animal. I'm more active than I have been in years.

SI: You're a big fan of ancient history, I've heard.

Tyson: I like classical biographies. Hannibal was an awesome person. Clovis was pretty awesome, the Franks and stuff. The Khans: Genghis and his grandsons. Listen, this is pretty interesting, with this Clovis guy. Clovis was king at 15. He gets to be king at 15 with some of his father's ragtag army. Still, he would conquer people and take all their lands. He was still an evil guy. His bloodline became kings of different countries.

SI: How did you learn about all of that stuff? Do you go online now?

Tyson: Before I got involved with the Internet, I used audio books. I used to listen to them while working out, or lying down and falling asleep. [Kiki, his wife, then interjects: "He'll randomly, out of the blue, say, 'Google for me, Who is Clovis' father's first monkey's pet?' It's the craziest things."]

SI: What did you make of your time in jail?

Tyson: In a weird way, prison was the best thing that happened to me. Imagine if I was out here from '92 to '95 -- I probably would have caught AIDS, I would've got shot, I would've got into all kinds of s---. You have no idea what kind of person I was on the street, when I was in Mike Tyson megalomaniac mode.

SI: You famously converted to Islam. Are you still very religious?

Tyson: You know, people say, "My god is better than your god." But how do we prove whose god is better? And this is when it gets really interesting. This is how we prove whose god is better than whose: [by saying,] "I'm going to kill you, or you're going to kill me first." And that's real godly. That's real godly. Yeah. I bet you people think, I wonder who would win a fight with the Prophet Mohammad and Jesus? These are sick people. This is crazy, you know what I mean?

Source

[Noise]

There's one topic I've yet to hear Tyson even go near. Even this new, romanticized version of Tyson. No journalist or interviewer seems to have the guts to bring it up. Not even Oprah. No idea why. But it's this:

Teddy Atlas.

When Tyson is ready to talk about Atlas, then I might start taking him more seriously. There's a laundry list of other people and things I wish people would ask Tyson about - I read somewhere that he had been peddling an autobiography a little while back, so maybe he's holding his cards there. Not sure if the rumor was true, or if it got picked up or what, but I'm always really suspicious of Tyson and his public relations. It's so hard to figure this guy out because he's such a contradiction. If you ask me, he may still be in that "megalomaniac" mode. A little more sophisticated version. Time has forced the mad monk to evolve.

[Poindexter]

I forgot about that - I don't really know all the details. This is from wikipedia:

Teddy Atlas trained as an amateur boxer briefly with Hall of Fame trainer Cus D'Amato, but he was forced to retire after suffering a back injury. Atlas became an assistant to D'Amato, and he occasionally helped in the training of protege Mike Tyson. However, Atlas felt Cus D'Amato ought to discipline the young Tyson for his frequent bouts of petty thuggery and clashes with police. He finally took matters into his own hands after Tyson had allegedly tried to force himself on Atlas' 13 year old niece. Atlas confronted Tyson and put a gun to the 15 year-old's head, firing off a bullet. Atlas was 26 at the time, and D'Amato threw him out of his upstate camp.

Atlas enjoyed his greatest professional success as a head trainer with Michael Moorer. He also drew criticism for what some considered to be overly dramatic speeches in the ring corner, particularly during Moorer's Heavyweight title fight with Evander Holyfield, and some felt he did these antics to draw attention to himself rather than help his fighter, during one such speech Atlas blocked Moorer from sitting on his stool and remarked "do you want me to take over".

Atlas has denied this,[1] stating that he did what he believed the fighter needed based on his understanding of the fighter. Moorer went on to defeat Holyfield by a majority decision. He also worked the corner of Featherweight world champion Barry McGuigan in one fight, trained Light-Heavyweight Donny Lalonde[2].

Lalonde went 8-0 with Atlas as his trainer, but they clashed in temperament and style. "He ran things like an army camp," Lalonde said. "I'm more of a free spirit." He and Atlas parted ways, and Lalonde hired Tommy Gallagher as his new trainer.

In 1997, he founded the Dr. Theodore Atlas Foundation to honor the memory of his late father. The Foundation awards scholarships and grants to individuals and organizations.

Atlas published his autobiography, Atlas: From the Streets to the Ring: A Son's Struggle to Become a Man, in 2006. The book covers many different periods of Atlas's life, and compares his position as trainer to a role as a father. Atlas confessed in the book that at one point he was so angry at Donny LaLonde he went to his home with a gun and a friend, to kill LaLonde for firing him as manager. Atlas states in his biography that he changed his mind at last minute.

On April 3, 2009 while covering the "Heavyweight Collision" card at the Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles California, featuring former WBC Heavyweight Champion Samuel Peter and IBF ranked Number 3 heavyweight "Fast" Eddie Chambers. Atlas revealed that he had been approached by Samuel Peter's team to take over as head trainer. Atlas went to Las Vegas where the Nigerian born Peter currently resides and spent a couple of days in the team, but did not take the job as he wanted Peter to relocate to New York where Atlas would have been able to train him full time.

In 2009, Atlas began training Russian heavyweight Alexander Povetkin as Povetkin prepared for an eventual title match against Wladimir Klitschko.

[Noise]

Oh, I'm familiar with the story. But I've yet to hear Tyson utter anything about it. Not just it, but Atlas himself. It's as if Tyson has completely rid himself of even the memory of the 135 pound trainer with the bad back who was the integral part of his childhood - One of the very, very few people to have stood up to the little bully. One of the very, very few people to have emotionally and psychologically propped him up, too.

Wikipedia is wrong, by the way. Way off - It wasn't Atlas' niece, it was his sister-in-law. And she was not 13, she was 11 at the time. Her name was Susie - She was the little sister of his wife (Elaine). The gun was a .38 revolver. The trigger was pulled (warning shot, to say the least). Supposedly, Tyson was going to have Teddy killed as retaliation but was either talked out of it or just "lost his nerve." After all this, Cus actually tried to bribe Atlas away! To keep it all quiet and shit. He offered Teddy 5% of Tyson's future earnings to just go away. On top of all that, after Teddy left (no, he didn't take the "offer" - he told Cus to go fuck himself), Cus badmouthed him all around town and blah blah blah. I would love to hear/read what Tyson has to say about Teddy Atlas. I'm not sure he has the guts, though. To go there. All this sentimental, introspective image bullshit is just that: an image. The facade of an emperor who can no longer conquer in the ring.

You know the word Atlas once used to describe Tyson? Manipulative.

[Poindexter]

Yeah, he can't cut it in the ring anymore. But he seems a bit more insightful than he has in the past - and seems to be conquering at least some of his demons. Who knows, looks can be deceiving.

[Noise]

Thing is, I'm not sure he does seem a bit more insightful than he has in the past because in the past he's seemed incredibly insightful, hahah. I'm talking quoting Machiavelli, citing F. Scott Fitzgerald, analyzing Voltaire and Alexander Dumas, comparing Hemingway's work to boxing - On and on. Pete Hamill did an amazing piece on Mike Tyson in Esquire (March 1994) that makes you wonder if it's, in fact, the same Mike Tyson. It's called "The Education of Mike Tyson" - Haven't bothered to check if it's on the internet or not, might want to try Google'ing it.

But I figure those demons probably haven't been conquered as much as they have just...Aged, haha. I read a little while back that he did some commentary work for Don motherfucking King's website. I wish I had kept the fucking article so I could source it appropriately, but I believe it was for the Agbeko-Perez fight. Anyway, I don't know. Like I said, the guy is such a fuckin' contradiction. Not so much a hypocrite as a contradiction. When he gave his old IBF heavyweight title belt to a combat veteran who had lost both his legs in Afghanistan, I felt it was all Tyson. And when I saw what he had to say about Jimmy Jacobs and Bill Cayton in that Toback documentary? Yea, that was Tyson too. Both genuine, both complete contradictions.

God, I've ranted way too much in this thread. Sorry, hahahah.