King Fighting to Regain Control of Douglas

WASHINGTON —  In boxing parlance, Don King is fighting off the ropes. He’s been in the position before but worked himself out of it. This time, he’s battling to regain control of James “Buster” Douglas.

King has lost his opportunity -- at least for the time being -- to promote a Douglas-Mike Tyson rematch and gone to court to try to win back Douglas’s services and block Las Vegas hotel magnate Steve Wynn from putting on a Douglas-Evander Holyfield heavyweight title fight.

A man of many words, King summed up his situation Friday succinctly. The self-proclaimed “man of the hour in the news” is “beleaguered.”

He gave the keynote address at Howard University’s fifth annual Salute to Blacks in Business Conference, sketching the history of racism in America and urging black students to study diligently to prepare themselves to face a “racist society.”

During the speech, he referred to Douglas’s upset of Tyson in Tokyo and his own futile efforts so far to promote a rematch. He cited his “vilification” for protesting the “long count” that Douglas was given before he knocked out Tyson.

King criticized Mirage Hotel owner Wynn for signing Douglas to a “conditional contract,” although he did not mention Wynn by name until a news conference after the speech. The Mirage, and Douglas, filed suit earlier this week to determine whether King has a valid promotional contract with Douglas.

King contends he is Douglas’s promoter “whether he knows it or not,” and indicated his best chance to regain control of Douglas is through his breach-of-contract suit against Douglas, filed Thursday. “I believe in America,” King said.

While Tyson’s estranged manager Bill Cayton and former trainer Kevin Rooney have criticized King for his handling of Tyson, King sees his role as Tyson’s friend, promoter and de facto manager as just the opposite. “Every fighter I’ve ever had anything to do with,” King said, “they’ve all gotten an opportunity to gain fame, acclaim and affluence.”

In his attempt to promote Douglas’s next fight, King told the audience that he met recently with “a top fight executive” who told him “the day of you, Don King, is like a dinosaur -- it’s extinct. ... “

“Since I didn’t acquiesce to his intimidation,” King added, “he sued me.”

Later King said, “What’s happening here, as the guy told me, Steve Wynn, it’s only business.”

Wynn clearly wants to get into the heavyweight business in a big way, reportedly offering Douglas $25 million to fight Holyfield and if successful another $35 million to fight Tyson. Said King’s rival promoter Bob Arum: “Douglas asked for big figures. And Wynn said yes.”

King and Arum appeared to agree on one thing: It was a staggering offer.

As Douglas tries to rid himself of King legally and rake in the jackpot Wynn has offered him, King charges that Douglas is turning his back on him.

“All the years I’ve taken care of this guy,” King said. “I still had the faith to keep putting him in. Not once, but twice. I got him two world title fights. One was Tony Tucker in 1987, one in 1990 ... nine years of total subsidization ... stayed with him all this time ... after all the money, time and effort I’ve invested, and love, and helping him when many would have discarded him. ... “

King also claimed Douglas’s manager, John Johnson, has a short memory. “I took care of John Johnson the last four years because I thought John was good for the fighter,” King said.

“Here’s a guy (Douglas) who was getting $50,000 a fight (getting) $1.3 million (for the Tokyo fight). That’s a nice jump. And before that, every card you saw Buster Douglas. Now, wouldn’t he even consider sitting down to discuss without just jumping off, and then suing me, too?

“Now I’ve never talked about them negatively in any way, shape, form or fashion. . . .

“The biggest fight in the world for (Douglas) would be Mike Tyson. He told me when he was going into the ring, if I win I want the rematch. Not me asking him that, he told me that. So now I’m going along with what he said. Plus, the ennobling qualities of loyalty, integrity and honesty, commitment to these guys is what he’s decrying.

“That’s how he got the shot, by me having a relationship with Mike Tyson. So now he’s not going to reciprocate? He’s going to abandon everything and go another direction because the guy put so much money on the table that he just found that he couldn’t refuse?

“But he still could have gotten the money. If he stayed there and be smart enough and we didn’t have to do anything. Because I told him and his manager, I said, you’ve captured lightning in a jug.

“Now the thing to do is to get paid. There ain’t nothing wrong with getting paid, but we should do the same when we came to the table. Let’s accommodate him. Let’s don’t try to do it at one or the other’s expense.”

Johnson could not be reached for comment Friday, but before he met King in New York last week Johnson said, “We feel some loyalty because he helped us out when nobody did.”

But Douglas and Johnson reportedly believed that King didn’t show Douglas enough “respect” when they met.

That left the way open for Wynn, “the man,” according to King, “who is interfering with my contract.”

“The guy don’t want me to deal with (Douglas),” King said. “He wants to deal directly. He just wants to go to your fighters and buy them from everybody.”

For now, Tyson is odd man out. Douglas wants to fight him next February, after Holyfield. King said Friday that Tyson has to get back to work and that it wouldn’t make sense for him to wait long for Douglas although King sidestepped a question about the possibility of Tyson fighting George Foreman.

“Mike should be ready to fight soon,” King said.

Cayton has criticized King because Tyson has fought much more infrequently than he did under Cayton’s direction, and that Tyson was out of shape and neither physically nor mentally prepared for Douglas.