New York, NY – Executives at Fox Broadcasting here in New York have confirmed that, as many expected, former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson has signed a contract to fight on the network’s popular television show "Celebrity Boxing."

Tyson’s opponent on the main card will be legendary actor/comedian Don Knotts. "Tyson-Knotts I: Mr. Lithium vs. Mr. Limpet" will take place sometime this upcoming fall.

"We are thrilled and honored that boxing legend Mike Tyson has agreed to join the Celebrity Boxing family," said Thomas Wilson, Vice President of Programming at Fox. "His appearance will no doubt enhance his already great career, the way it has for Barry ‘Greg Brady’ Williams, Darva Conger, and that ‘Screech’ kid from ‘Saved by the Bell.’"

"Plus," Wilson added, "where else was Tyson going to fight? I mean, seriously. Did anyone not expect this?"

Tyson, once the most feared heavyweight boxer on Earth, suffered a brutal defeat to Lennox Lewis on June 8 in Memphis that, according to many experts, all but ended his professional career. But at a recent press conference, he insisted that his decision to fight a brittle, near-dead septuagenarian on network television in no way signals the demise of his once promising career.

"No, man, no way, Knotts was a cartoon fish, and cartoon fishes are slippery, man, they bite," Tyson said, inexplicably referencing Knotts’ starring role in the 1964 partly animated film The Incredible Mr. Limpet. "But I’m gonna eat that fish up good, and eat that fishes children, and that fishes childrens’ children. What’s fish brain called? Caviar? I’m going to splatter caviar all over the motherfucking ring."

When asked if he was in fact, referring to Mr. Limpet, Tyson stared out at the mass of reporters for quite some time before mumbling a barely audible, "Limpet blimpet plimpet flimpet glimpet zlimpet……."

His sentence then trailed off and he resumed staring out into the distance.

Tyson, whose career started off with great promise – he became heavyweight champion at the age of 20 – and rapidly degenerated into a sideshow, will make $8,500 for the fight, or .0005% of the $17 million he received for the Lewis fight. But it’s not the size of the purse that Tyson is interested in, according to Fox’s Wilson.

"It’s the classic shot at redemption," Wilson said. "Mike knows that America loves the underdog, and knows that if he gives America what it wants – to see a brittle, disoriented senior citizen beaten to death on national T.V. by a murderous, raging behemoth with singular personality disorders– America just might forgive him again."

"And only on ‘Celebrity Boxing’ will they get to see this," Wilson added proudly. "Take that ‘Fear Factor.’"

Later, Tyson elaborated on his strategy for the Knotts fight. "I hope he [Knotts] has children, so I can kick them in the fucking head or stomp on their testicles, so they can feel the pain their old cartoon fish father is going to feel."

Upon hearing Tyson’s desire to end his life in a grisly, painful fashion, Knotts, 78, had no comment, mostly due to the oxygen mask he wears tightly strapped to his shaking, skeletal head 24 hours a day. But he did manage to make little whimpering noises and contort his withered face into the comically frightened, bulge-eyed mug that tickled moviegoers for decades in such films as 1965’s The Ghost and Mr. Chicken (picture right).

Knotts then slowly shuffled back down the hall of his Brentwood, CA home alongside the wheeled IV drip that keeps him alive.

The soon-to-be-publicly-beaten Don Knotts

The soon-to-kill-a-senior Mike Tyson.