Many feared for Ali's health before this contest. Yet the year-old delivered a stark warning as he turned his flashing eyes to stare at King. I'm gonna show you how great I am. King's subdued response was to sit snicker, yet deep down he was probably loving Ali cranking up the hyperbole. All publicity was welcome for a mega-fight some considered a mismatch.
Plus King wasn't an easy man to genuinely intimidate. Garrett's last words were reportedly: "Don, I'll get you the money. King had reinvented himself as a boxing entrepreneur since his prison term but his relationship with Ali in Zaire was strained. Away from the cameras, another flashpoint occurred when King blanked Ali's trainer Angelo Dundee and leaned past him to speak to Ali.
With none of the playfulness he showed for the cameras, an angry Ali stopped King in his tracks and scolded him for disrespecting a man who'd been in his corner throughout his pro career.
Ali knew King was deep in Foreman's camp and that the champion retaining was desired by the promoter as much as it was expected. The fight did not go to King's plan. Ali got in one last verbal shot at Foreman during the referee's instructions, saying: "You have heard of me since you were young. Don said some innocuous thing and all that jealousy and rage spilled out of me and I kicked him in his fucking head. The bad blood definitely seems to be there still, with Tyson tossing the contents of his glass of water over King at the Boxing Hall of Fame induction over the weekend in Canastota, New York.
As King took to the stage, he appeared to give Tyson a friendly pat on the shoulder but Tyson was not in the mood to pretend like they were pals. Tyson has admitted that he shouldn't have reacted as he did but he simply couldn't keep his temper. Throughout his career, Don King promoted some of the biggest fights and most popular boxers in history. So when Mike Tyson started becoming the biggest thing in the sport in the s, it was only natural for King to want a piece of the action.
Five months later, he beat Tony Tucker to become the undisputed heavyweight champion of the world. Anything Tyson touched at that time turned to gold and Don King knew it.
In , he was able to lure Iron Mike away from his management team and the two went on to make a ton of money over the next decade, minus the three years Tyson spent in prison anyway.
George Foreman Never Happened. Among other things, Tyson claimed in the suit that King had defrauded him in two monster contracts with Showtime upon his release from prison in
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