Mike Tyson looked every on of his 58 years when in the ring with Jake Paul this weekend in Arlington, Texas.
Paul, 27, largely coasted through the eight rounds to win a unanimous decision, proving that not even ‘The Baddest Man on the Planet’ can defeat Father Time.
Thankfully, any pre-fight worries of serious injuries to Tyson were not proven correct, but the event left a sour taste nonetheless as he stumbled his way around the ring and took a number of unnecessary blows to the head.
It was a shell of the man who beat the likes of Michael Spinks, Larry Holmes and Razor Ruddock. The relentless ferocity on show when he blasted out Frank Bruno in five rounds back in 1989 was nowhere to be found.
Bruno took to Instagram the day after the Netflix streamed event to give his post-fight reflections, which he summed up as ‘challenging to watch.’
“Well, it was a challenge trying to watch the fight!! It was not great was it? But if as a business deal for Mike it worked good luck to him.
The former world champion also said that, despite record viewership, it wasn’t good for the sport of boxing.
If it bought millions of people who don’t watch boxing to watch out of interest okay, but for me what was always called the noble sport lost a bit of its nobility.”
After hinting otherwise in the ring, Tyson has confirmed it was his last fight.
Paul moves ahead with an 11-1 record that now includes a heavyweight icon, but of course the whole story isn’t told on paper. He is adamant that he will soon fight unified super-middleweight world champion Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez in the cruiserweight ranks. The Mexican has shown little to no interest in the past.
