Word: tysons
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...might have been comical if it hadn't been so absurd. As Mike Tyson flexed his way into the Memphis Convention Center for the official weigh-in before tonight's highly anticipated boxing match, all 234.5 pounds of him seemed to suggest he was ready to rumble. His thick jaws working over a wad of gum, Tyson stood silently, grinning and mugging for reporters in his white shorts and white socks. The former heavyweight champion had nobody to antagonize, for the moment, anyway...
...opponent, Lennox Lewis, had been weighed in three hours earlier in a separate event. Boxing promoters may like the hype, but even they are not taking chances before the opening bell. They learned their lesson at the fracas-cum-pre-fight press conference last January when an enraged Tyson suddenly threw down his hat and, during the ensuing melee, bit Lewis in the thigh. After that, everyone agreed the two men should be kept apart until they crawl into the padded ring at The Pyramid, the 10-year-old downtown arena normally reserved for the city's new professional basketball...
...There will be no ceremonial pre-fight touching of gloves. No joint press conferences. In fact, the referee intends to give them the rules separately - with each fighter in his dressing room. Stacey McKinley, the mouthy, colorful assistant trainer who works for Tyson, blames the lack of pre-fight exhibitions on Lewis. "When you're a coward, you put a lot of things in the contract...
...Lewis, the Englishman/Canadian who has been renting a mansion in East Memphis and working out every day at the high-society Racquet Club, seems to have recovered from that bite in the leg. But this week, he held his tongue when reporters asked whether he nursed any anxieties about Tyson clamping down on him again. He knew better than to answer. After all, it was Tyson's errant teeth and bite in the thigh that brought the boxers and the world of boxing to Memphis. That bite led Las Vegas to forbid Cannibal Mike from fighting at the key venues...
...Whether the city of Memphis has its growth is yet to be seen. Memphis, says HBO boxing analyst Larry Merchant, went after the fight "the way it would go after a new automobile plant." At the weigh-in Thursday afternoon, Merchant stood back, shaking his head and watching Tyson, whom he calls a "psycopath," play to the whooping crowd. "Boxing will lose if Tyson wins," pronounced Merchant, whose HBO network is collaborating with Showtime in producing the pay-per-view version of the fight. "He's convincing people that you don't have the obey the rules, that boxing...