I don’t know how many of you decided to fork out the exorbitant sum that it took to purchase a viewing of the Mike Tyson vs. Andrew Golota fight on Friday night, but my roommates and I were unfortunately among your ranks. What we saw was the poorest excuse for a heavyweight fight since Tyson decided to give Evander Holyfield some free plastic surgery almost three-and-a-half years ago.

For those of you who haven’t heard, here’s what happened. Tyson tagged Golota in the first round and knocked him down. The second round was pretty much a waste. Before the third round could even begin, Golota quit and walked out of the ring.

The most entertaining part of the match was seeing Golota walking down the path to the locker room, all the while being pelted by beers from disgusted fans.

In my house there were about 30 angry people yelling obscenities at the television, my girlfriend and me included. We were all thoroughly pissed about the outcome, and we pretty much assumed that we had been duped into tuning into a fight that was fixed from the beginning. But later we heard some information that made us all feel like we belonged in Satan’s constituency.

It turns out that Golota not only suffered a concussion from his two-round brawl with Tyson, but he also received a broken cheekbone. Feeling bad, I began to think about whether we, as fans, have the right to expect people to fight to the brutal end against animals like Tyson.

First of all, I considered whether our assessment that the fight was rigged was accurate. After doing quite a bit of thinking, I came to the conclusion that Golota didn’t go into the fight looking to take a dive.

My evidence is twofold. First of all, in the interview after the fight, Golota looked greatly distraught about the occurrences during the six minutes of fighting. It was clearly not the look of a man who had come to Michigan looking for a quick payday.

Second of all, and more importantly, I figured if Golota wanted a quick score, he could have had it much faster. Tyson absolutely demolished him with a knockout blow at the end of the first round. Golota staggered and then hit the mat.

If this man wanted to take the money and run, there is no way he would have got up from this shot. He would have meekly stayed sitting on the canvas, counting his millions as the referee quickly counted him out. But Golota didn’t do that. He got up and stood in with Tyson for another round before quitting, taking unbelievable punishment that he could have easily avoided if he wasn’t looking to win.

Although I had solved to my satisfaction the controversy of whether this fight was prearranged, at least in Golota’s mind, my real question was whether this fight should have taken place at all. My conclusion was a resounding no!

These men are completely unstable, and their track records prove it. Golota has a history of mental health problems and also has a problem keeping his punches away from his opponents’ genitals.

Tyson’s problems have been well-documented and range from something as simple as asocial behavior to something as serious as rape. Clearly, these people are not in the right physical and mental state of well-being to put themselves in the middle of a ring punching the tar out of each other. But who in his right mind would do that anyway?

Heavyweight boxing has become an absolute circus. This fight encompassed everything bad about the sport. Tyson received $10 million, while Golota received $2 million for six minutes of work.

Like many of the marquee heavyweight boxing matches of recent years, this one ended by some completely unexpected freak occurrence. It gypped the people who paid for the fight out of their hard-earned money, and the sport of boxing out of its integrity. In the last five years, we have seen fights end because of people biting off others’ ears, random head-butts, boxers having nervous breakdowns in the middle of the ring and, in the case of Golota, simply quitting in the middle of the fight and delivering blows to his opponent’s groin one too many times (which he did on two occasions, both times against Riddick Bowe).

And who gets screwed when this kind of garbage goes on in the ring? People like you and me. We tune in and hope to see a real classic, like the first battle between Holyfield and Tyson, but for every one of those there are 10 Tyson vs. Golota matches.

I have seen enough of these episodes that I will never again pay one red cent to watch this crap. I can do many things with $50 that would be much more fulfilling than watching two social deviants dance around and beat on each other for five minutes before one of them gets sick of it and does something that ends up getting him disqualified. There is also a much better way to use my time than to watch an entire undercard of fighters that I have never heard of waiting for the big match-up to arrive, only to be thoroughly disappointed once it does.

So, for those of you who are loyal Reality Check readers, add heavyweight boxing to NBA basketball on the list of garbage sports that this writer will never again become interest in.