Mike Tyson, even at age 58, continues to shape boxing

After covering Mike Tyson since his most famous unsanctioned fight — a predawn TKO of Mitch “Blood” Green in an after-hours clothing store in Harlem, New York, on August 23, 1988 — and spending the last three- plus years after anatomizing his ascent as a cinematographer, I’ve gotten many calls, all asking the same basic question:

“Is this thing real?”

That’s right, what a spokesman for the Texas Commission of Licensing and Regulation assures me is “a professional, sanctioned fight” with Jake Paul, live from AT&T Stadium, Friday on Netflix. Still, the cynicism comes as no surprise. It is boxing, after all, where “real” fights can be effectively written (and often are) in the matchmaking. So is Tyson, to whom state-run boxing bureaucracies have always been accommodating. In this case, Texas signed Tyson-Paul’s request for 14-ounce gloves (instead of the heavyweight standard 10-ounces) and eight two-minute rounds (instead of the standard three minutes across 10 or 12 rounds for men).

What’s more, don’t expect the state to enforce its marijuana ban against Tyson — which, of course, swore he quit weed in preparation for this fight — with the same fervor it did against, say, Keyshawn Davis, a rising star who lost a win after testing positive last year in Rosenberg, Texas.

But all that misses the point. In fact, it misses them both. First, Tyson’s is the biggest comeback I’ve ever seen and probably ever will. By the time the city editor sent me up to the city, Tyson was already on his first public crack. In itself, this is not unusual. Most fighters look like they were born to be destroyed. They tend to be used up: physically, neurologically, spiritually and of course financially. However, Tyson was always an extreme case.

At 22, his doom already seemed a foregone conclusion.

In 2012, I asked him during previews of his one-man show “Undisputed Truth” if he had ever imagined reaching his then age of 45. “I couldn’t have believed it,” he said.

I’d venture an educated guess that over the years I’ve written more nasty things about Tyson than, well, anyone — much of it justified, some of it not, some of it shameful. But those same years also taught me that it is better to judge warriors not by their records, but by what they have survived. In Tyson’s case, that includes most of the urban ills endemic to his Brownsville neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York, in the 1970s, including violence and fatherlessness, but also the untimely death of a mother.

Imprisonment (youth and adult). Assault. Alcohol. Cola. Boxing. Bankruptcy. Don King. Death of a child.

And perhaps, most treacherously of all, fame. Tyson got a lethal dose of a very special American strain of it whose victims include Elvis, Marilyn and Tupac.

But here he is: a tennis dad with a Goldendoodle. It’s impossible to ignore that this second ascension coincides with the years of his now 15-year marriage to the former Kiki Spicer. In many respects, she is the architect of his comeback, and not coincidentally, the author of the same one-man show. It is a peculiar proposition: to try to reconcile old Tyson with this exterior happy, tame and prosperous. But that finally brings me to the second point: At 58, Tyson has not only become an avatar of bridge culture, but remains the most lucrative person in the history of martial arts—or any sport for that matter. Wherever he’s been, whatever he’s done, Tyson remains the undisputed champion of the male demographic.

So understand that this business with Jake Paul means less as a fight than it does as a long-running media story. First, it was cable—a full decade before Tony Soprano, Tyson was HBO’s leading man, a “walking billboard” for a still-image new network, as one executive called him. Then it was pay-per-view — a whole business that grew around Tyson. Want to talk about matches that are fixed in the matchmaking? Start with Tyson vs. Peter McNeely in 1995. It made 1.55 million purchases. Just four months later, Fox – then another fledgling network looking for some heat – aired Tyson vs. Buster Mathis Jr. Although it offered even less excitement than the McNeelley fight, 43 million people tuned in. In other words, now that the game is live streaming, it’s no surprise Netflix wants in.

It’s time to stop dismissing Jake Paul as a YouTuber, an impresario of pure stunts, or even a former Disney star who has made himself a passable professional fighter. He is a better promoter than many of the “purists” who have brought boxing to its current state. Paul is nothing if not purposeful. His involvement in boxing began long before most people know, as far back as 2016, fighter Ryan Garcia once told me. And while Paul remains a skilled provocateur—or perhaps because of it—he understands how to work the media better than anyone I’ve ever seen, at least anyone not named Al Sharpton or Donald Trump.

Now consider where Paul was as a fighter and promoter. With a 10-1 record after dropping a split decision to Tyson Fury’s brother, Tommy, he had beaten YouTubers, former MMA stars and rising professional boxers. But the news had worn off. So where does he go?

His friend Tyson.

Is it a crowd? Of course. Anything involving two fighters and a promoter is, to some extent, what wrestling fans call “a job.” Whether it’s life or death or a scripted showdown, they’re trying to sell you something: a thrill, a rating, a PPV buy, or in this case, a Netflix subscription. It’s absurd to think of this as a regular battle or a high level one. And yes, it can turn out to be a stinker. But you factor in the gloves, the experience of the main characters, relative age and health (27 and 58, with Tyson having canceled the first fight due to a bleeding wound in May), and you can see why Netflix cut this deal. If that makes the “purists” sick, so good. Unlike the vast majority of fights you’ll watch on broadcast or streaming platforms (my own included), you already know enough about these fighters to have an actual opinion. What’s more, unlike the main events of most “real” boxing cards, you don’t know who’s going to win. The bookmakers have made Paul a favourite, but not an unaffordable one. Therefore, you can probably imagine both guys with their hands raised.

That’s what makes a fight.

So it is genuine? As real as the billions of dollars at stake in today’s streaming wars. The technology may change, but the dynamics? Not so much. It’s still about buzz and buying. And if Tyson isn’t in his prime, so what? The last time he was involved in a power struggle between media companies, he was much lower than he is now. It was 1998. He had been banished from boxing, the pariah who had bitten off a piece of Evander Holyfield’s ear. That’s when Vince McMahon – another expert provocateur – hired him for a stint with WWE.

McMahon and his “Monday Night Raw” broadcast on the USA Network were locked in a war with Ted Turner’s “WCW Monday Nitro” on TNT. In fact, it might have seemed charitable to call it a war at the time, as “Nitro” was in the midst of an 84-week winning streak in the ratings.

“I didn’t see WWE as a threat,” Eric Bischoff, “Nitro’s” creator, told me.

Then he got the news. Bischoff remembers being at a pay phone. “You’re kidding me,” he said. “No,” he was told. “They signed Tyson.”

Bischoff had not advanced in the ratings by not knowing his target audience. “If you were to create the ultimate wrestling character, it would be based on Mike Tyson’s persona at the time,” he told me. “I mean, that’s the world’s perfect badass right there.”

The ear bite from 1997 only helped. The pay phone went silent for a moment. “I knew it was getting really serious,” Bischoff said. “I knew Tyson would change the game.” Tyson debuted on “Raw” on January 19, 1998 at the Selland Arena in Fresno, California, and ended his run on March 29 at WrestleMania XIV at the TD Garden in Boston. In two months, Tyson’s persona legitimized two others, “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and the evil “Mr. McMahon,” while changing the history of sports entertainment.

“That was the turning point,” Bischoff said. “The 18-to-49-year-old demographic that I controlled for two years just changed… It changed hard and fast and for no other reason than it was Tyson and how well they executed the story.”

Could anyone have caused that shift but Tyson, I asked.

“No,” he said. “No.”

In 2000, WCW was losing about $80 million a year. In 2001, Turner sold it for pennies on the dollar to his bitter rival, McMahon.

So now you know why Netflix is ​​all in on Tyson-Paul. But the real question is not who wins or loses. It’s whether Mike Tyson, Good Guy-Babyface-Hero, can generate the same heat he did as a villain.