TThe cheers from a crowd wanting more action grew again when Jake Paul dropped his gloves and bowed to 58-year-old Mike Tyson before the final bell.
Tributes to one of the biggest names in boxing history didn’t do much for the fans who filled the home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys on Friday night.
Paul won an eight-round unanimous decision over Tyson as the hits didn’t match the hype in a fight between the 27-year-old YouTuber turned boxer and the former heavyweight champion in his first sanctioned pro fight in nearly 20 years.
All the hatred from the pre-fight buildup was gone, replaced by boos from stunned fans hoping for more from a fight that raised many questions about its legitimacy well in advance.
The fight wasn’t exciting according to the judges’ cards, with one giving Paul an 80-72 lead and the other two calling it 79-73.
“Let’s give it up for Mike,” Paul said in the ring, not getting much of a response from a crowd that had already begun to file out before the decision was announced. ‘He’s the best to ever do it. I look up to him. I am inspired by him.”
Tyson came after Paul immediately after the opening bell and landed a few quick punches, but he didn’t try much else the rest of the way.
Even fewer rounds than the normal rounds of 10 or 12 and two minutes instead of three, along with heavier gloves designed to reduce the force of punches, couldn’t do much to generate action.
Paul was more aggressive after Tyson’s quick burst in the opening seconds, but the punches were not very efficient. There were quite a few wild swings and misses.
“I tried to hurt him a little bit,” said Paul, who improved to 11-1. “I was afraid he would hurt me. I tried to hurt him. I did my best. I did my best.”
Tyson usually sat back and waited for Paul to come to him, with a few exceptions. It was quite a contrast from the co-main event, another slugfest between Katie Taylor and Amanda Serrano, which saw Taylor retain her undisputed super lightweight championship with another disputed decision.
Paul said he took it easy from the third round on because he thought Tyson was tired and vulnerable.
“I wanted to give the fans a show, but I didn’t want to hurt anyone who didn’t need to be hurt,” Paul said.
It was the first sanctioned fight since 2005 for Tyson, who will face Roy Jones Jr. in 2020. fought at a much nicer exhibition. Paul started fighting a little over four years ago.
“I didn’t prove anything to anyone but myself,” Tyson said when asked what it meant to complete the fight. “I’m not one of those guys who wants to please the world. I’m just happy with what I can do.”
The fight was originally scheduled for July 20, but had to be postponed when Tyson was treated for a stomach ulcer after falling ill during a flight. His record is now 50-7 with 44 knockouts.
Tyson punched Paul in the face at the weigh-in the night before the fight, and they traded insults at various hype events, before and after the postponement.
By the end of the anticlimactic fight, the hatred was long gone.
“I have so much respect for him,” Paul said. “That violence and war stuff between us, like after he punched me, I wanted to be aggressive and take him down and knock him out and all that stuff. That disappeared as the rounds progressed.
The fight set a Texas record for combat sports with a gate of nearly $18 million, according to organizers, and Netflix had issues with the feed in the streaming platform’s first live combat sports event. Netflix has more than 280 million subscribers worldwide.
“This is the biggest event,” Paul said. “More than 120 million people on Netflix. We crashed the site.”
Among the celebrities were basketball Hall of Famer Shaquille O’Neal and former NFL star Rob Gronkowski, along with Cowboys owner Jerry Jones.
Evander Holyfield and Lennox Lewis, two foes in Tyson’s heyday, greeted him in his dressing room before the fight.
Tyson infamously bit Holyfield on the ear during a 1997 fight and appeared to have one of his gloves in his mouth several times during the Paul fight. He was asked if he had any problems with his mouthpiece.
“I have a habit of biting my gloves,” Tyson said. “I have a biting fixation.”
“I’ve heard of that,” the interviewer responded.
Mario Barrios retained the WBC welterweight title in a draw with Abel Ramos on the undercard. Barrios was in control early before Ramos dominated the middle rounds. Each had a knockdown in the 12-round fight.
It was the first fight for the 29-year-old Barrios since being named WBC welterweight champion when Terence Crawford began the process of moving up from the 147-pound division.
Barrios, who is 29-2-1, won the interim WBC title last year with a unanimous decision over Yordenis Ugás. The 33-year-old Ramos is 28-6-3.
