LAS VEGAS (Reuter) - Mike Tyson proved very little on 
Saturday night except that he could seduce 16,736 people into 
spending a record $15 million to see for themselves if three years 
in prison had made him less than ``the baddest man on the 
planet.'' 

    In addition to the on-site curious who paid $200-$1500 a 
ticket, fans throughout the world paid about $45 each to pipe the 
scheduled 10-round fight into their homes on pay-per-view 
television, despite universal predictions that Tyson's opponent 
would crumple in two or three rounds at best. 

    And Peter McNeeley lived up to the promise that had made him a 
17-1 underdog. McNeeley was knocked down about seven seconds into 
the first round and not long after that a second time that so 
impressed his manager-trainer, Vinny Vecchione, that he jumped 
into the ring to end the bout at one minute, 29 seconds of the 
round. 

    Vecchione, who has a brain-damaged son, had said all week that 
he would not let McNeeley, 26, get hurt. 

    Vecchione said the speed of Tyson's punches was the chief 
reason he stopped the scheduled 10-round bout. 

    But Tyson was still clearly rusty, even against an untalented 
opponent, often missing with combinations as well as his once-
vaunted left hook. 

    Vecchione's move has cost him, at least for now, his $179,820 
cut of McNeeley's $700,000 payday. 

    Marc Ratner, the Executive Director of the Nevada State 
Athletic Commission, said he would hold up Vecchione's money. 

    ``We want to talk to him (Vecchione) to see why he stopped the 
fight when he he did,'' Ratner said. 

    It is unclear what that has to do with whether the fighter 
should continue. 

    It seems the question of whether McNeeley would have been 
risking serious harm if he had continued depended Saturday night, 
at least, on the angle of the viewer. 

    Some ringsiders agreed with the fans, whose boos lasted longer 
than the fight, that it had been stopped too soon. 

    But Tyson, released from prison last March after serving a 
three-year sentence for rape, caught McNeeley near his corner with 
a right uppercut that sent McNeeley down on his knees facing his 
corner. 

    As referee Mills Lane was motioning Tyson to a neutral corner, 
Vecchionne jumped into the ring.   

Reut08:45 08-20-95