5. Mike Tyson Feels Bad About Properly Belting HBK
It might feel immediately odd for some fans to see Mike Tyson on a list of wrestling legends, but his credentials check out; many credit Tyson's involvement in the Austin-McMahon storyline as one of the things that brought WWF back to the mainstream in the late 90s and made it cool again. After all, it's hard to ignore how huge the Baddest Man on the Planet was back then. Tyson is surprisingly candid about an outsider's perception of wrestling, stating that even he saw athletes like Rodman or Lawrence Taylor as "selling out" by appearing in a wrestling ring. Despite these qualms, he was a big fan of the art-form, marking out over spotting Ricky Steamboat backstage, and stating matter-of-factly to the camera: "wrestling is real." He remains ever thankful to McMahon and Co. for giving him some much-needed spotlight during one of his lowest periods - the WM14 appearance came during his suspension from boxing for biting Evander Holyfield's ear. He also expressed remorse about Shawn Michaels getting, in his own words, "hit pretty good." Apparently Michaels had told him beforehand to go wild on his face and Tyson hadn't held back, clocking him on the jaw. Hard. To this day, Tyson feels "terrible" about that. To be fair, if Mike Tyson hit me, I would also want him to feel bad, or at least as bad as my face would have felt.
