On February 11, 1990, in Tokyo, journeyman boxer James 'Buster' Douglas knocked out undefeated heavyweight champion Mike Tyson in the tenth round, ending Tyson's reign and pulling off odds of 42 to 1, one of the most shocking upsets in modern sports history. Douglas had trained through personal turmoil, including his mother's death weeks before the fight, which he dedicated to her memory.
Tyson entered the Tokyo Dome as an aura as much as a boxer: 37-0, most wins by devastating early knockout, widely regarded as unbeatable and the most feared heavyweight since Muhammad Ali's prime. Douglas was a 29-year-old journeyman with a so-so record, brought in as what many assumed was a paid formality before Tyson's next marquee bout.
Douglas's mother had died of a stroke just 23 days before the fight, and he later said her death, rather than shattering him, focused him: he trained obsessively, using his height and reach to keep peppering Tyson with jabs that the champion, unaccustomed to real resistance, had no answer for. In the eighth round Tyson landed a vicious uppercut that dropped Douglas, who many at ringside thought would not rise; he beat what may have been a slow count and recovered. Two rounds later, Douglas unleashed a combination that put Tyson on the canvas for the first time in his professional career, groping blindly for his mouthpiece as referee Octavio Meyran counted him out. The result was so unexpected that Don King's camp tried, unsuccessfully, to have it overturned on a disputed long count.