As the circus wheels on around him, Mike Tyson knows there is nothing new to say – so at his pre-fight press conference he said nothing

Mike Tyson sat in almost magnificent silence, refusing to engage in the bombast and bluster of the final press conference before he fights Jake Paul in a charade of a contest on Friday night in Arlington, Texas. As I stared at his familiar tattooed face I remembered what he had told me on a sweltering afternoon in the summer of 1991.

We sat then in a stinking Las Vegas gym and Tyson tapped me on the hand in reminder of a bleak truth. “Look what happens to fighters,” he said, “even the best of them. Joe Louis ended up a doorman at Caesars Palace. He was in a wheelchair at the end. Sonny Liston died in this town, a drunk and a junkie with no money. Even Ali, look at Ali. I love Ali but when they introduce him at my fights I look away. Sure, they cheer him, but where’s his beauty now, his speed, his talent? It’s gone … it’s gone.”