The release of MIKE TYSON from an Indiana jail gained heavy
coverage over the weekend in print and TV. CNN's "Morning News"
was live in Indiana Saturday morning. In an extensive interview
after Tyson's release, RING Magazine Editor Steve Farhood
predicted Tyson's first fight would be against DON KING-client
Peter McNeeley. Farhood was interviewed live along with Tyson
Attorney JAMES VOYLES, and spiritual advisor Muhammad Siqqeeq
(CNN, 3/25). Tyson was the 2nd story on Saturday's "NBC Nightly
News" (NBC, 3/25). ABC ran the story fourth on Saturday's "World
News Tonight." BERT SUGAR, of BOXING ILLUSTRATED: "I think he's
a commodity worth hundreds of hundreds of hundreds of millions of
dollars, almost a billion." SUGAR RAY LEONARD and trainer ANGELO
DUNDEE were also interviewed (ABC, 3/25). SI's SONJA STEPTOE and
former Tyson trainer KEVIN ROONEY appeared on "Good Morning
America Sunday" (ABC, 3/26). This morning's N.Y. POST is the
only outlet to report that Tyson has told Don King to "take a
walk." Wallace Matthews writes that Tyson "brought Allah into
his life and asked Don King to leave his house" (N.Y. POST,
3/27). TIME's STEVE WULF compares the returns of MICHAEL JORDAN
and Tyson: There is "little doubt that basketball and boxing can
use them, but as a society we may need them even more, as hero
and antihero" (TIME, 4/3). On CNN's "MoneyLine," John Metaxas
examined the potential financial impact, noting that TV revenue
from Tyson-GEORGE FOREMAN "could be twice that of the last such
megafight," four years ago between Foreman and EVANDER
HOLYFIELD." JOHN MANSELL, a media analyst for Paul Kagan Assoc.,
estimates that Tyson-Foreman could bring in $120M and 3 million
pay-per-view subscribers (CNN, 3/24).
