General Information
At 1984, the Mike Tyson and Lennox Lewis met for the first time and as they were sparring, Mike tyson knocked Lennox Lewis out the ring but he got put and felt ok. At 1996, Mike Tyson refused to fight against his mandatory challenger, Lennox Lewis, so Mike Tyson decided to vacate his WBC title, so the WBC title became vacant until Lennox Lewis defeated Oliver McCall at 1997. If they fought at 1996, Mike Tyson would be favourite to win in the bookies. In 2001, Lewis sued Tyson. The fight was going to take place in Manila, Philippines as "the thrilla in manila 2". The referee for the fight was Eddie Cotton, making it his 20th World title bout. Alfred Buqwana of South Africa, Anek Hongtongkam of Thailand and Bob Logist of Belgium judged the contest, both the WBC and the Tennessee Athletic Commission wanted judges from different continents. Lewis weighed in at 249.25lb and Tyson at 234lb(second highest weight for Tyson).
The fight was promoted by Main Events and was a pay-per-view shown as a joint collaboration between HBO and Showtime in the United States and on Sky Box Office in the United Kingdom. It was the highest-grossing event in pay-per-view history, generating US$106.9 million from 1.95 million buys in the USA, until it was surpassed by De La Hoya vs. Mayweather in 2007. It remains, however, the highest-grossing heavyweight pay-per-view event in boxing history.
However, the ticket sales were slow because they were priced as high as US$2,400, but a crowd of 15,327 turned up to see the biggest sporting event ever in the city of Memphis, Tennessee.
The fight was originally scheduled for April 6, 2002 in Las Vegas. However, Las Vegas rejected the fight and several other states refused Tyson a license before Memphis finally bid US$12 million in order to host the fight.
Among the celebrities in attendance were Samuel L. Jackson, Denzel Washington, Tom Cruise, Britney Spears, Clint Eastwood, Ben Affleck, Hugh Hefner, Halle Berry, Richard Gere, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Vince McMahon, The Undertaker, LL Cool J, Wesley Snipes, Donald Trump, Kevin Bacon, Chris Webber and fellow heavyweight boxer Evander Holyfield.
Read more about this topic: Lennox Lewis Vs. Mike Tyson
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