2024-07-22 06:15:01
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Jake Paul was in all likelihood heading toward a comfortable victory over Mike Perry before scoring a TKO in the sixth round.
He caught Perry with a left hand that stunned the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship star. From there, the YouTuber-turned-boxer followed with a flurry of shots that sent Perry to the canvas for the third time. While he returned to his feet, the referee stopped the fight.
CBS Sports’ Brent Brookhouse had Paul ahead 50-43 heading into the sixth round, and he wasn’t alone in seeing a clear gap between the two fighters. Josh Peter of USA Today had it 49-44, while Zain Bando of Sporting News was a little more charitable toward Perry at 49-45. Longtime boxing writer Dan Rafael scored it four rounds to one in favor of Paul.
Paul landed 96 total punches to Perry’s 33 and connected on 42.5 percent of his blows, per CompuBox. Conor McGregor, who has an ownership stake in BKFC, was apparently so dissatisfied with Perry’s performance he “fired” the 32-year-old.
Conor McGregor @TheNotoriousMMA
Hey Mike youre released and you can go and compete in your smelly dirty boxing championship thing, the smell of it, good luck. You’re fired. @bareknucklefc
Perry was an injury replacement for legendary heavyweight Mike Tyson, who had to withdraw in May due to an ulcer. Tyson and Paul are instead scheduled to cross paths Nov. 15 at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.
On Saturday, Perry was clearly overmatched in the ring. This was only the second professional boxing fight of his career.
Paul, 27, will certainly have an advantage over Tyson, 58, in terms of their respective ages. Iron Mike might put up a much stiffer challenge, though, given is vast experience in the sport.
