On St Patrick's Day of 1995, promoter Don King staged a nationally-televised boxing show from the municipal auditorium in Worcester, Massachusetts. The purpose of the exercise was to advance the proposition that Peter McNeeley, a young heavyweight of dubious skills, would present a formidable opponent for Mike Tyson in his first fight out of prison later that summer.

McNeeley dutifully disposed of Danny Wofford, an overweight has-been, in two rounds, but the truly interesting match-up had come a few days earlier. At a press conference held to publicise the Worcester show, McNeeley had gotten into a slagging match with a pudgy South African heavyweight named Francois Botha, who was fighting in one of the evening's supporting bouts. McNeeley abruptly ended the argument by giving Botha a hard slap with his open right hand.

Although the incident took place before dozens of witnesses, the chastened Botha, his reddened cheek stinging, made no attempt to retaliate.

That a man who was scared witless by Peter McNeeley a few years ago was not in the least bit intimidated by the 1999 version of Mike Tyson should tell you all you need to know about the future of the erstwhile `Baddest Man on the Planet.' And, just as Botha was clearly emboldened by having watched Tyson in his two losses to Evander Holyfield, a whole bunch of heavyweights suddenly got a lot braver from watching the Tyson they saw against Botha last Saturday night.

A few weeks earlier we had visited Tyson at his Phoenix training camp and had come away favourably impressed with what new trainer Tommy Brooks had Tyson doing to get ready for Botha, but, as Tyson himself once pointed out, "everybody's got a fight plan until they get hit."

It is not an exaggeration to say that once the bell sounded, Tyson did not do a single thing he had practised in the gym, at least right up until the moment that he delivered the ferocious right hand that ended the fight just before the end of the fifth round. Up until then Botha had had his own way. The South African had won all four completed rounds on the cards of two judges, and three of four on the card of the third. And, as each round progressed, Botha was talking trash to Tyson, repeatedly needling him with taunts of "is that all you got?"

Then he got careless and walked into the right hand. Make no mistake about it, Tyson's boxing skills may have eroded, but he still carries that gun in his pocket - and he can still leave a man for dead with one shot.

"I was winning," Botha would sigh later. "What a dummy I am! I was going to beat him."

Tyson had also had a point deducted by referee Richard Steele in the second round, after he grabbed Botha's left arm with his right and attempted to twist it.

"He was trying to break my arm," complained Botha. "He's correct," Tyson admitted afterwards.

There had been a frightening moment at the end of the first round when the arena seemed ready to explode. The bell had sounded with the combatants locked in an angry death-grip and Steele attempting to pry them apart. Just after the bell, Tyson reached out with his one free hand and fetched Botha a wallop atop the head, and when Botha retaliated, using his free hand to whistle a shot over the referee's head to belt Tyson, pandemonium seemed imminent.

As the Tyson-Botha-Steele menage wrestled about, handlers spilled into the ring from both corners, joined in short order by a phalanx of pistol-packing policemen and security guards from the MGM Grand Hotel.

The display of weaponry restored order. The delay between rounds consumed several minutes, as Steele was joined in the ring by Marc Ratner, the executive director of the Nevada State Athletic Commission. Following this consultation, the referee visited both corners to warn of impending disqualification.

"I told Richard to take a deep breath and take command," Ratner recalled the episode. "I thought he did a good job under trying circumstances." You wouldn't say that Tyson was on his best behaviour (the arm-twisting episode came just a minute later) thereafter, but he didn't bite anyone, and even aided Steele in preventing the mortally wounded Botha from falling right out of the ring following the decisive punch.

"I didn't prove anything," admitted Tyson that night. "I've got to improve, and I've got a long way to go. In two weeks or so I'll get back into the gym and start working to capitalise on everything I screwed up tonight."

His handlers were apparently sufficiently alarmed by Tyson's performance that they now propose to put him in with a fellow who was beaten by Botha, the immortal Axel Schulz of Germany. That bout is already pencilled in for April 24th, and if you detect a trend under way here, your cynicism is not misplaced. If Botha was billed as `the White Buffalo,' what will Schulz be, the White Storm Trooper?

The evidence suggests that Tyson's drawing power may have diminished along with his talents. Seven of the top 10 largest all-time pay-per-view boxing audiences have been for Mike Tyson's fights, but Tyson-Botha was not among them. There were a disappointing 750,000 buys for the overpriced (from $46 to $50 a pop) telecast, and there is no reason to suppose that Tyson-Schulz will fare any better.

Tyson did somewhat tentatively crawl out of his personal financial hole with the evening's work. Representatives of the Internal Revenue Service were at ringside in Las Vegas and with the opening bell they were presented with a cheque for $13.5 million, thus satisfying Tyson's back-tax liability. (Although by one interpretation, the aforementioned windfall may be counted as income from the Botha fight, in which case Tyson, who personally got $10 million for his appearance, may already owe $12 million in 1999 taxes. Former trainer Kevin Rooney also has a $4.1 million judgment against him.)

But at present neither Rooney nor the tax man nor Axel Schulz represents Tyson's biggest worry. Two weeks from tomorrow he must appear for sentencing on assault charges in Maryland. He has already pleaded no contest to the charge stemming from the altercation, which followed a road-rage fender-bender involving his wife. Depending on the disposition of the case, he could receive jail time, and even if he does not, Indiana probation officials could revoke his parole in that state, where he was convicted of rape in 1992. If Tyson goes back to prison, his boxing career will surely be over - if it isn't already.