I just got into Mike Tyson. My security people kept saying, 'Haven't you seen him yet?' Well, I finally did, and he's got a real knockout punch.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I love Mike Tyson. I was a fan, as everybody else was. The moment somebody stood up to him, he didn't do so well. And that's the same thing with Anthony Johnson. The guy's a bully. He wants to intimidate you; he wants to dominate you. He wants to knock you out. But what happens when you don't knock somebody out? What happens?
I was a huge Mike Tyson fan growing up; his fights were always on in my house.
'Iron' Mike Tyson is the last boxer who was truly embraced by the media. They followed him around. You didn't know what he was going to do next: bite you, cut you, fight you. When you think about it, that defines him - it was an exciting adventure.
I was a huge Mike Tyson fan, would sit through the night watching boxing matches and would hit the bag at every opportunity I would get.
People say of every opponent, 'When are you going to knock him out?' But I'm not like Mike Tyson, who came flying out of his corner. I'm much more composed. A guy is supposed to be durable, but then I start finding my range, and, well, it comes together. Boom.
The best way to take a punch is to look at it. Honestly. Someone could hit you with the hardest punch that they have, but as long as you see it, it's not going to knock you out. It's the punches that you don't see that knock you out. So you could get tapped with a small punch, but if you don't see it, you're out.
If you look at my career, towards the end you will see I was fighting like once a year. I was not part of the Don King top heavyweights, so I was kind of kept out. His guys were getting three to four fights a year and I could only get one.
I've never seen a truly great fighter get knocked onto the ropes unconscious... knocked out cold before... and I saw Roy Jones get knocked out twice in a row.
At a certain point, Mike Tyson and I reacted to violence a little differently. I was afraid to leave my house for three years while he became the heavyweight champion of the world. The thing was, at first, we reacted to it the same way, and our cowardice and trauma defined us.
Although there's been a fighter before me called Mike Tyson, I'm my own Tyson. I'm Tyson Fury. I ain't trying to be anybody else.