I don't know what did it. Maybe it was all of the money any chump could get for a title fight (get floored by Tyson in 45 seconds = $2 million dollars!) But boxers were treated like gods for years, back to Ali and before that Floyd Patterson, Sugar Ray Robinson, etc (except for the grainy newsreels, guys I've obviously never seen).

To go from Ali vs. Frazier to Hollifield vs Lennox Lewis... I mean, I expected those guys to call off a fight for a broken nail (which in Evander's case I guess God and Benny Hinn would miraculously heal through prayer).

About the old school boxers, for years Leon Spinx (I know I'm spelling that wrong), the guy that knocked out an over-the-hill Ali, was working as a bouncer in Chicago. Sort of a Rocky II story only without the coma or the comeback or the gilded ending. All of his money paid for one of Don King's solid gold tie racks, I think.