When Tyson bit Lewis

Former heavyweight boxing champ Lennox Lewis has figured out why Mike Tyson bit him, says Brian Doogan in the London Times. At their infamous pre-bout press conference in 2002, the mercurial Tyson took a swing at Lewis, and it was instant pandemonium. “The place erupted with people piling in left, right, and center,” Lewis recalls. “The next thing I know is I feel a sharp pain in my leg and somebody’s biting me. So I push myself up and there’s Tyson, looking like a maniac, with his mouth in my leg.” Lewis was completely baffled. “I got bit by a man! Usually, an animal does that. It was a situation that really took me by surprise.” But after some reflection, Lewis thinks he understands what was driving Tyson, who at that point had already served a prison term for rape. “The guy must have been scared. Only a scared man would bite. You bite when your life is in danger.” Lewis figures Tyson had succumbed to his prison mentality. “In prison that would be like a trophy. He could always say, ‘I bit a guy’s leg.’” But the incident only served to get Lewis fired up for their upcoming fight. “I looked at it like he’d drawn first blood,” Lewis says. “It provided me with even greater motivation.” When the two men met a few months later in Memphis, Lewis knocked out Tyson in the eighth round.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up