YouTuber Jake Paul and 58 year old boxing legend Mike Tyson will finally square off in their made for streaming exhibition boxing match in Dallas at AT&T Stadium on Friday.
Paul’s boxing career has been a huge financial success, even if it has toed the line between celebrity entertainment and legitimate sport. Paul started out fighting fellow content creators, then moved to fighting mostly retired MMA fighters, and even had a bout against former NBA player Nate Robinson. Paul lost his only fight against a full-time boxer in Tommy Fury by split decision.
While that hasn’t slowed down the hype of the Tyson fight, it does open up Paul to questions about where exactly he’s going with his boxing career. And Jacob Detamore from The Ticket in Dallas was the one to ask about it.
During a pre-fight press conference, Detamore asked Paul, “You’ve said in the past that you want to be taken seriously as a boxer, so if that is your goal, when can we expect you to start fighting legitimate contending fighters in your given weight class?”
Paul responded by calling Detamore a profanity, shifted the focus to Tyson, and then didn’t answer the question.
Jake Paul calls a reporter a “dumbass” after being asked: “When can we expect you to start fighting legitimate contending fighters in your weight class?”
[🎥 @MostVPromotions] pic.twitter.com/CwTaRmknX4
— Michael Benson (@MichaelBensonn) November 14, 2024
This isn’t the first time Detamore has asked Paul this question. He also did so back in May when the fight was originally scheduled to take place, drawing the ire of both Jake Paul and Mike Tyson at the time.
Who knows what to expect from the Paul-Tyson fight on Netflix on Friday night. Will it be competitive? Will it be one-sided? Will it be entertaining? Literally anything can happen. Maybe even Fan Man will make his triumphant return.
In spite of a highly professional broadcast team that’s worthy of a championship fight, we all know what we are getting here. It’s way more spectacle than substance. But that seems to be the only way that boxing can still draw a crowd in today’s sports marketplace. So regardless of how legitimate it is, the only thing we know for sure is that people are going to watch. And as long as they do, Jake Paul will keep finding people to get in the ring with and make money, whether they are championship boxing level contenders or not.
