The night ‘Cinderella Man’ toppled Mike Tyson

Paschal Collins revisited the most memorable of upsets in the heavyweight division as he prepares to guide Alen Babic against Johnny Fisher.

Babic, 33 and from Croatia, is the underdog on Saturday evening against the popular Fisher at London’s Copper Box Arena, and largely because the bigger Fisher is perceived to be the more destructive fighter with the heavier hands.

Collins and Babic are working together for the second fight following March’s stoppage of Steve Robinson elsewhere in the English capital, but the Dublin-based trainer is far from intimidated by their status given he has previously conquered considerably greater odds.

The Irishman helped to prepare his compatriot Kevin McBride for his fight in 2005 with the great Mike Tyson, on an occasion when Tyson, similarly, had been expected to win. Not unlike with the undefeated Fisher, wider plans also existed for Tyson to enter a higher-profile fight off the back of victory, but Collins, working alongside Goody Petronelli – once so influential in the career of the great Marvin Hagler – contributed to ensuring that it was instead McBride who experienced his greatest night.

“I’d known Kevin for a long time,” the trainer said. “We boxed together as amateurs, and then in America I trained with the Petronellis [Goody and Pat] in Brockton. Kevin had a career in the UK; eventually he got beat a couple of times; he was out of contract, and he moved to America, so we lived together for a while. We knew each other; we’d both go to the gym; trained together. I’d get him out running, and look after his diet, but Kevin didn’t really live the life. It wasn’t that he didn’t want it – he just didn’t have the knowledge. 

“We were both fighting on a Main Event card at Foxwoods Casino; I got split [cut] about a week out, but we’d been training together. I was off the card; Kevin was on the card. Kevin said, ‘Will you still help me prepare?’, which I did. He went, had a big win in Foxwoods [stopping Kevin Montiy], and then he got offered the Mike Tyson fight.

“The first thing he said was, ‘Will you help me get ready?’. So we moved away for two months to Brockton – we lived in Boston – 30 miles away. The reason I moved to Brockton, significantly, was because the DW Park was where Rocky Marciano used to do all his running, because he’s from Brockton, and it’s right by our gym. This was the same run Rocky Marciano did every day. We brought everything back to basics; got the roadwork in, because it’s all about fitness – fighting Tyson at 39 years of age. 

“If you’re strong enough; fit enough; and have the right game plan, you can beat him. We just [made] the training camp a really tough training camp. The game plan, we looked at Lennox Lewis fight Tyson; we looked at Danny Williams, who’d just beaten Tyson. ‘When he gets in close, lean on him, put your chest on his head, and put all the weight of your body on him.’ We done that – and uppercuts, and that’s where Danny Williams was landing shots.

“We were lucky – we were looking at them fights that Tyson lost. We had the right training camp, and the night before the fight we went to the cinema to watch Cinderella Man – the premiere. We actually went. ‘Kevin, that’s you – how ironic. That’s gonna be you, Cinderella Man.’ Washington DC. 

“This was the night before the fight, and the next day we were in the venue, and it was 99 per cent Tyson fans, and one per cent Irish. But Kevin just knew that he had a chance, and as the fight went on he kinda sensed he had more of a chance, because Tyson headbutted him; tried to break his arm; hit him low. He done everything that Tyson does to win, and we knew that Tyson was worried, because when he goes to them tactics, the other tactics ain’t working. ‘Kevin, hang in there; keep putting the weight on.’” 

Forty seconds into the sixth round, the referee Joe Cortez deducted two points from Tyson for intentionally headbutting McBride, who suffered a cut over his right eye. McBride, then 34, absorbed Tyson’s pressure and by the round’s conclusion had Tyson on the ropes. 

He succeeded with a succession of right hands and uppercuts that hurt the once-feared, former world heavyweight champion, and to the extent that he landed on the canvas via his backside and was partly kept upright by the bottom rope.

That Cortez instead ruled that McBride had pushed Tyson – paid a reported $5m – was perhaps a demonstration of the extent to which those involved wanted Tyson to finish June 11, 2005 with his 51st win. Tyson’s trainer Jeff Fenech regardless recognised his fighter had little left to give. He told Cortez at the round’s conclusion that Tyson would not be returning for the seventh. Cortez waved the action over. McBride had secured a life-changing win. 

“He drained him and took his legs, so when Kevin actually started putting shots on Tyson, Tyson just slumped down, because he was done,” Collins said. “He’d had enough. He couldn’t stand another five, six rounds of that. He hadn’t got it left in him, and that was it.

“What I didn’t like was Tyson got abused. People were throwing bottles at Mike Tyson. I didn’t like that, because anybody who knew boxing knew that Mike Tyson at 26, 27, beats anybody, and they should have respected that he was an older man. For Kevin McBride it was a huge win, and people don’t give him the credit, because Kevin was 34; he was coming off a couple of losses; he was a heavy drinker. 

“He’s seven years sober now, and he’s turned his whole life around because of that fight. It was a huge night for me, because believe it or not, I was still boxing at the time. It was my first time getting involved in the coaching. After the fight people were calling me up, getting ready for fights. That was it – that was how I got into coaching.

“[It was] one of the best nights as a trainer. It was probably one of the best nights ‘cause myself and Goody Petronelli were there. He was my coach, and Goody was like a father figure to me and Kevin. He was coming near the end, and it was something that we done together. 

“Every year, in June, I get a call from someone and someone wants to talk to Kevin about it. It was probably one of the best wins I’ve been known for. It was a great night – it was a great night for Kevin and his family, and for Clones [in Ireland]. 

“But it was kind of a bittersweet moment, because I’m looking at Mike Tyson going, ‘He wasn’t the same Mike Tyson’. Take nothing away from Kevin – Tyson turned up to fight, and if Kevin had folded after three or four rounds Tyson would have beaten him. But Kevin stuck in there – big tough man – and Tyson folded because there was no fight left in him.”