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NEW YORK. — When you grow up in boxing, young kids either want to be Rocky, Muhammad Ali or Mike Tyson.

From the moment Michael Gerard Tyson stepped through the ropes to begin his professional career, a star was born.

This short, muscular teenager wasted little time on his way to heavyweight stardom and put millions more eyes on the sport along the way.

He changed the game for fans — casual and purists — fighters and promoters. They all wanted him.

“Before the Tyson era, the division had stagnated a bit,” boxing fanatic and former Crystal Palace owner Simon Jordan told talkSPORT.

“That might not be fair to Larry Holmes, who was a great heavyweight champion, but previous to him you’d had Ali, (Joe) Frazier, (George) Foreman and Earnie Shavers — really engaging, interesting, flamboyant fighters that had taken the heavyweight division to a high.”

Then out of the blue in 1985 came the phenomenon that is Iron Mike, a man who broke bones, got rich and kept a tiger as his pet.

He blew competition out of the water in his early years with a series of quick knock-outs.

He wasn’t one to waste a minute and in 1986 became the youngest heavyweight champion in the world, aged just 20.

In doing so, he overcame a childhood that is hard to fathom for most where drugs, guns and prostitution were an everyday occurrence in his life.

He went from nothing to being the money fight at just 20 years old.

The best wanted to face him and it says a lot that Lennox Lewis was gutted when Tyson was given a six-year prison sentence in 1992.

“I thought I’m going to have to wait and delay my retirement,” he told Joe Rogan when discussing the appeal of his former adversary.

Tyson wasn’t quite the same when he was released from prison after three years served, but he was the draw in boxing.

And he was even forced to spend time in the nick when he visited the UK for a fight against Julius Francis in 2000.

Home secretary Jack Straw granted him special dispensation to enter the country and a casual walk in Brixton, south London drew thousands of people desperate to catch a glimpse of the superstar, which forced him to take shelter in the local police station and plead for them to disperse.

He is also possibly the only man in the world to get the legendary Floyd Mayweather — unbeaten in 50 professional fights and with more money than God — to be humble.

“He paved the way for me to be where I’m at,” he acknowledged.

Where Mayweather is about slickness and glamour, Tyson was about pain and savagery. He didn’t mess about in the ring.

What that his appeal? Did people like his throwback look? Were the black boots, shorts and very simple introduction what many think a fighter should represent. — talkSPORT.