“WOULD Don King, one of the wisest men boxing has ever seen, put me in the corner of the most valuable brand that not only boxing, not only sport, but entertainment had to offer if I didn’t know what I was doing? Would he?”
There’s an authoritative tone to Aaron Snowell’s growl as strives to convince me of his qualifications to handle the meticulous training responsibilities of a peak Mike Tyson.
“Of course not, it was Mike Tyson and believe me when I tell you that he trained hard for this fight because there’s no way he could’ve took the beating that he took for 10 rounds if he wasn’t in shape,” Snowell vows. “There was a lot to come after the fight, a huge fight with Evander Holyfield was building and to face Holyfield we had to do a real good job on Douglas. Myself and Mike were too experienced to cut any corners in training and he really put in the hard work but his head wasn’t right and you could see that from the first exchange.”
Snowell, undeterred, spoke quietly in the corner and insists he was never tempted to scream at his charge even though it seemed a firm approach should have been administered.
“I’m the cornerman and everything that goes wrong in the corner is all down to me and I accept full responsibility for a huge mistake on my part,” he laments. “It wasn’t like we didn’t respect Buster or that we thought he couldn’t make a mess of Mike’s face, it was just a mistake and we were careless. It was the first and last time it happened to me as a trainer, but suggestions that we just didn’t think we needed one is crazy talk from jealous people.”
“There was a lot of that at the time from people in the industry, guys who should know much better, but the fact I was Tyson’s trainer upset a lot of jealous and envious people because they wanted the gig. At that time, I was the most suited man to train Mike, and when he won it was cause of Mike and the one time he lost it’s because of me. That’s the type of stuff that I had to put up with.”
The end for Tyson came in round 10 when a Douglas attack forced his battered opponent to the floor. Tyson fought to retrieve his fallen gumshield as though it were a diamond in the dirt, but it was to no avail as he was counted out.
Snowbell entered the ring and informed the now-former champion that he had just been beaten, as a mixture of King’s protestations and the celebrations of Douglas and his team dominated the congested ring. Minutes later, in the corner of Tyson’s Tokyo Dome dressing room, Snowell found himself alone with the tearful ex-ruler.