By Michael Marley, Examiner.com
Let me follow up my Friday exclusive interview with Don King on his South Florida visitor/special guest Floyd Mayweather Jr.
If it's a massage, particularly the ego massage of a lifetime, the vainglorious Mayweather has gone to the right guy.
DK could be a masseur because he never rubs an undefeated superstar such as Mayweather the wrong way...at least before they sign a voluminous DP contract.
Seriously, let's not forget how the persistent King lured Mike Tyson, who was briefly in the clutches of then wife Robin Givens and her Mommy Dearest, Ruthless Ruth Roper, away from manager Bill Cayton and trainer Kevin Rooney.When the ladies got involved in a domestic quarrel with the explosive Tyson at his Bernardsville, NJ, mansion, and numerous household and personal items were hurled by “the Baddest Man On The Planet” into the mansion's fireplace.
I was working the breaking story for The New York Post and recall someone tipping me off that Tyson was trying to cool down at an area coffee shop.
“Where is Brother Mike?” King said to me, speaking excitedly over the phone from his stretch limo. “I've got to rescue this man and do it now,”
Mike and Robin were divorce bound and King's aggressive pursuit was the beginning of the end for the impersonable Cayton regime.
After Hasim Rahman shocked the world by knocking out Lennox Lewis in South Africa, his promoter Cedric Kushner made some drastic errors.
He had pocketed a contract renewal bonus due Rahman because he was convinced, like the rest of the world, that The Rock would be hammered into submission by Lewis. If memory serves, the amount was meager, something like $40,000.
Then “The Walrus” let his overachieving client fly in steerage rather than first class back from Johannesburg to the USA. Kushner compounded the mistake by not traveling with the exuberant new heavyweight champion.
By the time Rahman's flight got to Baltimore or Washington, you can guess who was there to meet and greet him and had a suitcase loaded with $100 bills to bestow on Lewis' conqueror.
Kushner's reign as Rahman's promoter vitually ended at the baggage carousel.
When crackhead-alcoholic Oliver “Atomic Bull” somehow flattened Lewis (with his eyes closed, no less) in London, I was working for King.
The next day, I heard King booking some tickets on the Concorde. Great, I thought, I always wanted to try the supersonic transport.
“You're not going on the Concorde,” King said. “That's just for Oliver and me. Oliver is the new Yankee Doodle Dandy for knocking out Lennox right here in London. You can fly coach and meet us in New York.”
Like I say, if Mayweather's nose is out of joint, if he truly feels his handlers have not kissed his rump enough or brought in all dollars available, them maybe his public meeting with King will lead to a relationship between the two.
At the least, Mayweather is getting his super ego fondled like never before.
But a great massage is one thing and a “happy ending” is yet another.
Even Al Gore now knows that much.
Right now, though, King seems to be “rubbing” Mayweather the right way.
(mlcmarley@aol.com)
Source: examiner.com
