By Adam Rear
With a combined age of 105 years, Mike Tyson and Roy Jones Jr came together for a veteran heavyweight clash at the weekend at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.
After the eight two-minute rounds of boxing had finished, many thought that the 54-year-old Tyson had won the bout, but the result was officially as a draw.
The fight was originally meant to take place on September 12 at the Dignity Health Sports in Carson, California. In August, it was announced that the date had been pushed back to November 28 in order to maximise revenue for the event.
The fight sold more than 1.2 million pay-per-views in the US, raking in £45 million.
Tyson, a boxing icon who excelled in the 1980s and 1990s, is understood to have pocketed around £7.5 million for his 16 minutes of fighting in the ring on Saturday night.
As well as the shorter fight length (eight two-minute rounds instead of 12 three-minute rounds), both fighters wore 12oz gloves rather than the usual 10oz.
Furthermore, the fight was judged by former World Boxing Council champions instead of professional judges.
The fight was scored as a split draw and the three judges scored the fight as followed: Chad Dawson (76-76 draw), Christy Martin (79-73 for Tyson) and Vinny Pazienza (76-80 for Jones).
The results were controversial because it seemed that Tyson was winning most rounds, and the stats agree.
Tyson out-landed Jones Jr continuously throughout the exhibition bout, landing at least twice as many punches in five rounds out of the eight in total.
Round 6 was the only round that Jones Jr landed an equal amount of punches.
A closer inspection of the fight as two halves (Rounds 1-4 and rounds 5-8) shows much of the same, Tyson clearly landed a higher number of punches.
Although Tyson clearly landed more shots, he was not annoyed at the split decision draw.
“I’m good with a draw, because I entertained the crowd,” said Tyson during the post-fight interview.
“The crowd was happy with it. I’m just happy I got this under my belt.”
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