Jake Paul, a YouTuber turned professional boxer, added Mike Tyson’s name to his list of unimpressive victories on Nov. 15 after the judges awarded him a victory in what was essentially an exhibition match.
According to The Athletic, Netflix, which has made a substantial investment in order to add live sports to its portfolio, received backlash on social media for its unreliable streaming and technical issues during its broadcast of the event.
In the lead up to the fight, in an appearance on CNN, Bomani Jones, the former host of HBO’s Game Theory called the fight between the two men a “farce” and pointed to the demand for the fight from the public as a byproduct of a desire to see someone knock Paul out.
Jake Paul is making millions of dollars off of boxing non-boxers and elders. His “draw” is a combination of spectacle and great white hype. He’s not really boxing. He’s creating boxing content to satisfy a certain audience. He will not step in the ring with a CURRENT real boxer. https://t.co/olnPPIrGOM
— L E F T, PhD
(@LeftSentThis) November 16, 2024
According to The Associated Press, the bout drew a Texas record for combat sports, making $18 million of revenue at the gate.
The record draw aside, the crowd was not pleased with the bout and what they were witnessing and booed as the fight’s action progressively got slower and slower
The main event was lopsided, and much more spectacle than boxing contest as Tyson looked every bit of his age.
The 58-year-old Tyson only managed to throw 97 punches over the eight two-minute rounds, while the 27-year-old Paul taunted and cajoled the much older and slower man.
The co-main event, by contrast, produced the best fight of the night, complete with a controversial decision from the judges.
Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano’s re-match of their 2022 bout that was widely considered the fight of the year, was a thrilling contest between two top contenders and largely lived up to its billing.
Serrano and Taylor went to work in that fight, trading and exchanging combinations in flurries and flourishes of activity.
Although Taylor was docked a point for multiple headbutts and was out landed by over 100 punches, she ended up the victor by unanimous decision, which was met with a chorus of boos from the crowd at Arlington’s AT&T Stadium.
Due to the nature of its controversial ending, the Taylor-Serrano fight is likely to produce a third fight, however, Paul will likely continue to receive criticism for hand-picking opponents that he can very clearly beat in a boxing ring even as he appeared to advocate for a match with Canelo Alvarez, arguably boxing’s biggest draw, after the fight with Tyson was over.
“Boxing fell off as an attraction for mainstream sports viewers a long time ago, and in this era of social media, viewers appear more excited to watch a YouTuber fight an almost 60-year-old former heavyweight champion than they are in watching a real fight between boxers who are relevant to the sport,” Keith Reed, a sportswriter and editor, wrote in an op-ed for MSNBC. “This strikes me as symptomatic of our culture’s rejection of skill, qualifications and experience as prerequisites for taking center stage — in any profession, from the president of the United States on down.”
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