Less than 24 hours after losing to Jake Paul in their highly anticipated bout, Mike Tyson says he has “no regrets” over having entered the ring one final time at 58 years old. 

But as he was preparing for his first professional fight in nearly two decades, Tyson revealed that his health scare earlier this year was actually a near-death experience. 

Tyson posted on X on Saturday afternoon, where he revealed that his ulcer, which caused him to go to the hospital, led to him almost passing away. 

“This is one of those situations when you lost but still won,” the tweet began. “I’m grateful for last night. No regrets to get in the ring one last time.

“I almost died in June. Had 8 blood transfusions,” he wrote. “Lost half my blood and 25lbs in hospital and had to fight to get healthy to fight so I won.

“To have my children see me stand toe to toe and finish 8 rounds with a talented fighter half my age in front of a packed Dallas Cowboy stadium is an experience that no man has the right to ask for. Thank you.”

MIKE TYSON’S LEGENDARY BOXING CAREER OVER THE YEARS: PHOTOS

Paul commented underneath Tyson’s statement saying, “Love you Mike. It was an honor. You’re an inspiration to us all.”

The Netflix docuseries leading up to the bout between Paul and Tyson saw the 58-year-old former heavyweight champion of the world talking about what happened on a flight from Miami to Los Angeles at the end of May. 

“A week and a half ago, I was training and I was doing great and then all of a sudden I started feeling tired,” Tyson said in the docuseries. “I was explaining to my trainer I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Coming here from Miami on the plane, I went to the bathroom, and I threw up blood. The next thing I know, I’m on the floor – I was defecating tar.”

(L-R) Jake Paul announced as winner against Mike Tyson during LIVE On Netflix: Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson at AT&T Stadium on November 15, 2024 in Arlington, Texas.  (Al Bello/Getty Images for Netflix © 2024)

Upon testing, it was found that Tyson had a 2.5-inch ulcer that was bleeding, causing him to have such symptoms. 

“I asked the doctor, ‘Am I gonna die?’ and she didn’t say no,” he added in the show. “She said, ‘We have options, though.’ That’s when I got nervous.”

Tyson was eventually cleared to return to training, where he says he needed to gain back his weight lost and continue building his endurance. 

The fight, despite fans and critics opining on social media that it was a downer, saw Tyson last all eight, two-minute rounds against Paul, who was eventually ruled the winner by unanimous decision. 

Paul did a bow to Tyson to honor him during the final ticks of the eighth round, and the two fighters shared an embrace afterwards. 

Sept. 15, 2024; Arlington, Texas. Boxer Mike Tyson on the field before the game between the Dallas Cowboys and New Orleans Saints at AT&T Stadium. (Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images)

Being that this was a sanctioned fight in the state of Texas, Tyson’s final record for his illustrious career is 50-7 with 44 knockouts, while Paul is now 11-1 with seven knockouts.

Not until 4:30 a.m. Saturday did two buses transporting the Baldwin Park High football team and cheerleaders from a Division 11 football playoff game at Big Bear arrive home.

There were more than four hours of delays traveling down the mountain because of black ice, coach Robert Maxie said. It was a little scary, he said, but the fun part was beating Big Bear 28-21 despite a snow storm in the second half.

“It wasn’t as bad as it seemed,” Maxie said. “We bundled up pretty good. None of my kids had played in the snow. We couldn’t see the numbers, couldn’t see the hash marks.”

Afterward, the celebration included throwing some snowballs.

“I would take snow any day over rain,” Maxie said.

The only issue was getting home. Players were stranded on the bus with little food other than eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

“They literally talked themselves to sleep like babies,” Maxie said.

Next up is another road game at Portola.

“I told my kids moving forward no matter where they send us, it doesn’t matter,” he said. “We went through the toughest road experience.”

The Champions Classic gives annual intel on four college hoops teams that usually matter — check out CJ Moore’s resulting film breakdown on Duke, Kansas, Kentucky and Michigan State — and that means worthwhile hints on the season at large as well. This year, the Champions Classic has confirmed an enormous shift in college basketball fandom.

Hating Kentucky isn’t cool or fun anymore because Kentucky’s coach is both. Mark Pope is relentlessly likable, which means Kentucky basketball has become likable. Adjust accordingly.

Now, “cool” doesn’t work in every sense of the word, not for a 6-foot-10 guy who gives off the energy of a chemistry teacher towering over his students while delivering gentle words of encouragement. Pope is Mr. Vargas in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” but with a dry-erase board and no hair.

Just as Vargas was the one teacher who could get Jeff Spicoli enthused about learning something, Pope got his thrown-together first team to figure out how to beat Duke — arguably the most talented outfit in the land — 77-72 on Tuesday in Atlanta. Pope is a former Rhodes scholarship candidate and Columbia medical student who can obviously teach as well as learn.

That might not sound cool, and in fact, his wife, Lee Anne, addressed that very word in Brendan Quinn’s profile of Pope, saying: “You know, somebody said to me, ‘He’s goofy.’ But no. He’s not goofy. He’s just — in a world where everyone is cool, he is not too cool. And there’s a big difference. He’s brilliant. He’s authentic. And he’s going to outwork everyone. I know it.”

Last night was a movie 😼 pic.twitter.com/5IbNodYT3J

— Kentucky Men’s Basketball (@KentuckyMBB) November 13, 2024

But authenticity and perspective are cool, and they spring forth from Pope, who told Quinn that if being the coach at Kentucky is “everything you are,” you won’t succeed at it. That story centers on Pope’s relationships with his wife and four daughters, adding to a public glimpse of Pope that makes more fascinating his new job in service of the most ferociously passionate fan base in … American sports?

It adds to an interesting time for the blue bloods, too. Pope beat Jon Scheyer, who is embarking on a critical third season as the friendly, soft-spoken successor to hated (by non-Duke fans) basketball overlord Mike Krzyzewski. Non-North Carolina fans had very few nice things to say about Roy “Aw Shucks” Williams — Hubert Davis is much easier to like. Bill Self, himself an “aw shucks” purveyor extraordinaire, is the only old head left. As any non-Kansas fan will tell you, it won’t be hard to find someone less grating on the nerves than he is.

Pope, meanwhile, replaces John Calipari, which is a leap in likeability. But it would have been a parasail across the Grand Canyon a decade ago. At the rate Cal’s going, he might be a beloved underdog by the time he’s done at Arkansas. He became a bit of a sympathetic figure in recent years (for non-Kentucky fans) because of early NCAA exits with loaded teams, betrayed in part by Calipari’s failure to modernize stylistically.

Kentucky fans got angrier and angrier at him while everyone else connected better with his jokes when he wasn’t destroying the competition every night. Hey, he’s kind of cute when he loses! Now his pressers at Arkansas, where he will fade or prove he has a renaissance in him, are must-stream events. Compare that to a certain UMass presser from 30 years ago, when everyone (except UMass fans, I guess) wished John Chaney would have roughed him up a little.

When Calipari got the Kentucky job in 2009, after breaking NCAA rules at Memphis that people didn’t know existed, the prevailing sentiment in the sport was “Kentucky sold its soul.”

That’s where most of the dislike originated. Calipari was a handy rogue for all with his teams full of NBA players spending a forced year in college, when paying players was still seen as a felony and other coaches swimming in the same waters were able to “aw shucks” their way out of public scrutiny.

If you lost a recruit back then, point at the cheaters. Now there’s no bogeyman. Just you and your collective. Same thing for fans. So much energy used to be spent on which renegades were getting one over on your team and your rule-abiding coach. We’re in an era of forced introspection. And talent fees.

These are the conditions that make villains harder to manufacture. Save for the impossible-to-dislike Tubby Smith, and other than the very early Rick Pitino days when he should have upset Christian Laettner and the basketball overlord, and with all due respect to the parties Billy Gillispie used to throw, the Kentucky basketball coach is supposed to be a despised scoundrel.

Pope is not that. And that goes beyond the era we’re in, and he’s instantly a refreshing change from Calipari, even the late-stage version known as Commiserative Cal.

Pope isn’t just taking over a legendary program; he loves the place, having co-captained Pitino’s absurdly loaded 1996 national championship team. Pope clearly wasn’t Kentucky’s first — or second … or third — choice. He has to prove himself. Instant likeability points.

Word from inside the program is that he’s as lacking in self-importance as he appears to be publicly. He’s emphasizing outreach to former players. He’s honoring history, showing his team clips of legendary Duke-UK matchups stretching back to the 1970s before Tuesday’s tilt.

The fun of Pope is in the basketball itself. This roster, which was completely empty when he arrived, is not loaded with first-round picks. But it’s well-constructed. The Wildcats play a five-out system built around cutting, passing and long-range shooting. It’s a joy to watch. And to hear coached.

Did you catch ESPN’s cut-in to a Pope huddle during Tuesday’s game? The guy is down 7 to Duke in his first huge game at Kentucky, he doesn’t have anyone who can realistically guard Cooper Flagg, and he’s calmly talking fundamentals. Cheerily, even.

“We’re standing a little too much on offense, so let’s really make declarative cuts right now, OK?” Pope said to his players. “Declarative cuts.”

A sentence is the only thing that can be declarative. That declarative sentence, as Professor Pope has demonstrated for us, is inaccurate. This guy is adding to the hoops lexicon and showing how cool basketball nerd-dom can be.

And college basketball can’t help but like him. At least until he wins enough that Kentucky fans love him.

(Photo: Andy Lyons / Getty Images)