Mike Tyson‘s ring return against Jake Paul continues to stir up heated debate in the sport.
The former undisputed heavyweight champion donned the gloves at 58-years-old to face Paul, 27, over eight two-minute rounds in Texas last month.
Despite the considerable hype and subsequent records broken, the main event was underwhelming and a hard watch for big fans of Tyson. He didn’t look in the fight past the first round and lost a wide unanimous decision to the YouTuber-turned-boxer.
In the aftermath, many have said they believe the fight was pre-arranged or ‘scripted’ despite it being professionally sanctioned. Paul’s promotional company, MVP, has come out strongly against those claims.
One such man who still isn’t convinced is James Toney, the three-weight world champion and Hall of Fame fighter. He told the Wise Nuts podcast that Tyson has ‘disrespected the sport’ in his eyes
“F**k Jake Paul. He sucks. He’s garbage. He’s destroying the sport of boxing, period. He won’t f**k with me cause everybody know I ain’t playing. I take my craft serious, I love boxing. Boxing’s my world.”
“I love Mike but Mike knows better than that s**t. Mike disrespected the sport. Jake Paul has disrespected the sport by doing what they did. What kind of s**t is that? … [Mike Tyson’s] getting paid extra money and Jake Paul has the little celebrity thing … They had some kind of deal, some s**t like that … [I realised] as soon as he came to the ring.”
Toney famously knocked Evander Holyfield out in 2003, something ‘Iron’ Mike couldn’t manage over two contests.
