Don’t ask Tyson if he’s an icon, or what he thinks his legacy looks like. Those two words make him wildly uncomfortable. “What is an icon?” he asks after a doctor’s appointment in late May. “I’m still going to die; I’m still going to starve if I don’t eat. Suppose I go on hard times and become a bum on the street. Am I still an icon? What is my legacy? Nothing but an ego. Who cares about my legacy? My legacy can’t buy me a hot dog. Legacy is going to get me nothing.”
Prior to their fateful meeting in April, Joe Joyce had his career mapped out. He was the WBO interim heavyweight champion and was in line to be that organization’s mandatory challenger for Oleksandr Usyk. At the same time, he was mid-stream on negotiations for an all-British title match with Tyson Fury.
“But that’s what people do when they’re high,” he said. Originally, Tyson said he wanted his whole face done, but his tattoo artist talked him into a different tattoo, one that would cover just one side of his face. He said he consulted some of his friends about getting one, but “they all said no. And that’s why I said yes,” Tyson said.
What set Tyson apart from other fighters of his era was how hard he worked. His training regimens were intense. Despite being considerably younger than all of his opponents, Tyson worked just as hard, if not harder than his veteran foes. As a result, he became the youngest heavyweight world champion in history at age 20.
In Tyson’s case, his face tattoo is a powerful symbol of his determination to be different and stand out from the crowd. It’s a bold statement that challenges societal norms and shows that he is unafraid to take risks and embrace his true self. Whether you love it or hate it, there’s no denying that Tyson’s face tattoo is a unique and unforgettable form of self-expression.
We don’t know what this fight will look like, but we know it provides an opportunity to remember what the two fighters were at their peaks – particularly Tyson, who once reigned as the most dominant athlete on the planet.
If getting a face tattoo isn’t strange enough, Tyson also has an original tattoo of Chinese leader Mao Zedong on his right arm. For those whose history is a little shabby, Mao Zedong was the founder of the People’s Republic of China. He remains a controversial figure, with the majority of Chinese citizens believing him a great leader for ending decades of civil war and reuniting the country as one, while the rest of the world sees him as a dictator whose rule resulted in the deaths of close to 80 million people through his policies.
In 2003, the boxer filed for bankruptcy after his exorbitant spending, multiple trials, and bad investments caught up with him. To curb expenses, the boxer also sold his upscale mansion in Farmington, Connecticut, to rapper 50 Cent for a little more than $4 million. He crashed on friends’ couches and slept in shelters until he landed in Phoenix, where he bought a home in 2005.
His famous facial tattoo, which appeared in 2003, has become one of the most recognizable elements of his image. The tattoo, which is a pattern covering part of his face, symbolizes the profound personal and spiritual changes that Tyson underwent during that period. Mike Tyson tattoo meaning is that this tattoo reflects his inner measures and desire to maintain his individuality. It became a leading part of his public image, attracting attention and evoking a different behavior box among fans and critics. The tattoo also symbolizes his transformation and desire for a new beginning, a kind of visual reminder of his complex and multifaceted life journey.
The American former boxer Mike Tyson has four tattoos of note. Three—at least two of them prison tattoos —are portraits of men he respects: tennis player Arthur Ashe, Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara, and Chinese communist leader Mao Zedong. The fourth, a face tattoo influenced by the Māori style tā moko, was designed and inked by S. Victor Whitmill in 2003. Tyson associates it with the Māori being warriors and has called it his “warrior tattoo”, a name that has also been used in the news media.
He told Fox Sports: “My first impression was that I’ve never had a tattoo in my life, but I thought we are fighting in a week and when you get a tattoo you can’t fight because they snap up and it wouldn’t be healthy to do that.
The battle of two heavyweights with a proven track record to take on all comers was spent largely at close quarters. Parker, No. 4 at HVY, was subtle in his movement but not nearly as successful early as he was throughout his December 23 points win over former WBC heavyweight titlist Deontay Wilder in this very venue. China’s Zhang, No. 3 at HVY, kept the former WBO heavyweight titleholder in his desired punching range and landed the more telling blows.
“I thought it was so hot,” he explained, adding: “I would be in these dens, these clubs and strip places sometimes and all the girls said ‘oh you are very exotic’…. They said I looked like some tribesman or s**t.”
