Jake Paul boiled the world of combat sports after his last victory Sunday night. Paul defeated former UFC champion Tyron Woodley by split decision in Cleveland, going 4-0 as a professional boxer and raising his fighter profile once again. Paul, despite tweeting that he is a “retired boxer“On Monday, he is expected to return to the ring later this year, but is it his biggest challenge right now to find the right opponent? Of course it’s a tie in the pay-per-view space, but to keep – an adequate balance of appeal and challenge will be required in an opponent.
Although this weekend the boxing world’s attention was focused on the show, Teofimo Lopez, one of the sport’s most promising young champions, will make his debut in the payroll this October against George Kambosos . Lopez’s fight for the four belts will take place on a Tuesday night at New York’s Madison Square Garden Theater, as Triller faced numerous challenges to reschedule the event after Lopez hired COVID-19 earlier this summer. The IBF has ordered both fighters to be vaccinated in hopes of avoiding another delay in that fight. So, is this the direction of boxing? And if so, is it good for sports?
On Saturday, Josh Warrington hopes to bounce back in a rematch against Mauricio Lara after a shocking knockout defeat in the ninth round. Warrington still has aspirations for the title, but is a win enough to get him back on track? Before Warrington enters the ring, Katie Taylor makes another defense of her undisputed lightweight championship on the bottom plate. After Amanda Serrano’s victory on Sunday, does Taylor have anything to prove in terms of pound-for-pound supremacy?
Marc Raimondi, Mike Coppinger, Ben Baby, Mike Rothstein and Nick Parkinson separate what is real and what is not.
Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley was a win for the sport of boxing
Raimondi: On Sunday night, he was sitting in the press row on the floor of Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse in Cleveland over the fight between Jake Paul and Tyron Woodley. During the inner card, a young spectator (who could not be more than 16 years old) approached reporters sitting there and asked, tossing a $ 10 bill, if he could buy a bottle of water from one of us. He said, that the concessions were not taken in cash nor did he have a credit card. A few minutes later, a 21-year-old YouTuber with a baby face running through the ConnorTV handle came out with his dad to ask if we had a USB-C cable that he could use to charge the camcorder.
For almost a decade, I have covered combat sports as a full-time life. The first fight I dealt with was in 2006. I have been in fights in dozens of cities, countries and a few different continents. And Paul vs. Woodley had, by far, the youngest crowd I’ve ever seen in MMA or boxing. ConnorTV told me that this was his first boxing show and that he had started to get interested in combat sports because of Paul, the award-winning YouTube sensation.
It might be hard for some of us who have been understanding this for a while, but what Paul and his team are saying is true. He’s really putting his younger eyes on boxing and there’s no way to see it other than winning for the sport. So, I’ll tell you “real” to this statement, absolutely.
Here is another key to mention. The Cleveland crowd didn’t fill up for the main event between Paul and Woodley or the co-feature, which pitted the big female woman pound for pound with Yamileth Mercado. This would be the norm for a boxing card of this magnitude. No, the arena was almost full for the first fight between Charles Conwell and Juan Carlos Rubio at 7 p.m., local time.
When Tommy Fury came out to open the pay-per-view portion of the proceedings, the crowd was large enough to give him a huge pop. Fury hadn’t even fought in the U.S. before, but Showtime, Paul and his team took the star position last week. And he was treated as such. Of course, his family name and his status as a former member of the Love Island cast in the UK didn’t hurt. But usually, at that point in a boxing show, the venue is half full, at best, and there’s little interest in fights in the ring.
Paul attracted a young, captive audience at Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse Sunday night: young men and women. His main fight with Woodley was not the best boxing performance possible. They’re both neophytes in this world, and frankly, it didn’t seem like a high-level fight at all. But the fans there treated it as it was. And they put them on their feet like Fury, Cleveland prospect Montana Love and Serrano.
Half the battle in entertainment is just getting people in the door and looking at the product. Say what you want about Paul, but there were a lot of 20-year-olds and teens coming out of the building Sunday night entertained by a night of boxing. For a sport with a fan base that scares the oldest part, this is a win. Regardless of how you feel about Paul, his personality and his antics.
Mandatory vaccination for fighters is good for boxing
Baby: real. Big fights are already a risky proposition. All that is needed is an injury and a fight is scrapped or devalued (see Pacquiao-Ugas). And a fighter who contracts COVID-19 and delays a fight can have serious economic repercussions – a situation that a vaccine can mitigate in the short term or avoid directly. Look what happened to Triller regarding Lopez-Kambosos. After winning the candidacy, Triller was left with the bag when Lopez tested positive for COVID-19 just days after the fight. Now the IBF has stated that both Lopez and Kambosos will have to be vaccinated before their fight in October.
A quick look at big sports and big business should tell people everything they need to know: when it comes to big money, vaccines are needed. Of course, there may be a legitimate reason for someone not to want the vaccine in specific circumstances, but the broader debate about vaccinations is often thrown away when this becomes a threat to profit margins.
It is worth noting that Lopez also had potential long-term financial success. Initially, Triller sold pay-per-view at a price of up to $ 60. After the adjournment, the price dropped to $ 20 for a single purchase, the fight will take place on a Tuesday instead of a Saturday, and the venue went from inside Marlins Park in Miami to the side theater of the Madison Square Garden.
It’s a brand success and a heat test that Lopez could have avoided if he hadn’t hired COVID-19 and fought Kambosos in June. Instead, he has been relegated to a midweek card with significant questions about his power to lure forward.
Even with his KO streak, Edgar Berlanga is still the obligatory television
Copper: real. Even in his first fight that marked the distance, the first time he lived the second round, of course, Berlanga proved that his power is genuine with four defeats in eight rounds. Nicholson was his toughest enemy on paper and as the competition continues to harden, the playoffs will be harder to come by.
However, Berlanga will always be in danger in the ring, which will make watching television a must. If he wants to maintain that status, he will need a KO from Marcelo Esteban Coceres on October 9th. He will return on December 11 if all goes well, before another fight in March. If he manages to eliminate his opponents again, the June fight, which is expected to be a big step in competition and promotion, could be the fight that catapults him to stardom.
Plans are already underway to combine him with a former weekend champion of the Puerto Rico fashion show in New York next summer.
One thing is clear: Berlanga knows how to market outside the ring.
Katie Taylor is the funniest female boxing fighter
Rothstein: It’s not real. Amanda Serrano, who fought Sunday night, remains the sport’s most entertaining fighter. The best? It remains to be seen. But his way of fighting is incredibly observable. That’s not to fire Katie Taylor, who is the best pound-for-pound fighter in the world. He beat Jessica McCaskill. He defeated Delfine Persoon twice. It has very good speed and endurance. But from a pure entertainment factor, no one beats Serrano.
The reality is a fight between Serrano and Taylor, as long as Taylor beats Jennifer Han this weekend, it’s the fight to do. Serrano told me last month that he wanted to unify his division first before fighting Taylor, but at this point it may be worth fighting Taylor next.
Women’s boxing could use a superleague like that, and it would be an incredibly entertaining fight between two of the best in the sport.
Josh Warrington will regain the title of candidate for the title with a victory over Mauricio Lara
Parkinson: Real, if Warrington promoter Eddie Hearn can convince Gary Russell Jr. to defend his WBC featherweight world title against Warrington in the next six months.
Warrington (30-1, 7 KOs) is upset that the first defeat of his career, the shock loss of the ninth round by unknown Mexican Mauricio Lara in February, would be so costly. Warrington, 30, faced Lara, who was supposed to have been a warm-up for a bigger job this summer, as ESPN’s No. 1 featherweight. But that defeat, after he decided to voluntarily give up the IBF world featherweight title in January so he could fight his own fights, has left Warrington out of reach to win a title. The Leeds boxer follows the ranking of governing bodies: he is number 6 in the WBC and does not appear at all on the list of candidates for the other three bodies.
Warrington has watched in frustration as his English rival Kid Galahad went straight to the IBF world title eliminator, after losing by split decision to the IBF world title in Galahad’s previous fight in June of 2019. Warrington believes that victory over Lara should catapult him back into the title race, occupying perhaps one of the top two places in the IBF, which are currently vacant.
However, Warrington has no interest in a rematch with Galahad – it was one of the reasons he left the IBF belt earlier this year. He is more likely to pursue a title with one of the other division champions: Russell Jr. or Emanuel Navarrete. ESPN’s Mike Coppinger recently reported that Los Angeles-based Navarrete (34-1, 29 KOs) has agreed terms with Joet Gonzalez to defend his WBO featherweight title on May 16. October, which excludes Navarrete for Warrington until 2022.
But Russell would be available for this year and, as he has not fought since February 2020, it would be logical for him to be receptive to the offers. Russell (31-1, 18 KOs), 33, a 2008 American Olympian, has not been a busy fighter, after making an appearance a year from 2015 to 2020. He has not yet announced an opponent for 2021 and would be Warrington’s best hope – and first choice – for a title fight.