YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul made a damning admission about his bout against Mike Tyson during the post-fight press conference.
27-year-old Paul went into the ring against 58-year-old Tyson at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas as the favourite due to his age.
After eight two-minute rounds, the fight had to be settled by the judges’ scorecards.
In the end, Paul was announced as the winner via a unanimous decision, with the judges scoring the fight 80-72, 79-73 and 79-73 in favour of the 27-year-old.
During the fight, fans spotted one particular moment which led them to believe the entire bout was ‘rigged’.
Speaking after the fight, Paul admitted that he didn’t want to hurt Tyson as he revealed he took his foot off the gas.
A reporter asked: “At any point did you start to take your foot off the gas just a little bit because you noticed he (Tyson) was tiring out?”
Paul replied: “Yeah definitely, definitely a bit. You know, I wanted to give the fans a show but I didn’t wanna hurt someone that didn’t need to be hurt.” You can watch the footage below.
Jake Paul confirms that he decided not to KO Mike Tyson during their fight: “I didn’t wanna hurt someone that didn’t need to be hurt.” [
@MostVPromotions]
Paul added: “There was a point where I was like he is not really engaging back. So I don’t know if he is tired. I can just tell his age was showing a little bit.
“I just have so much respect for him and that war thing between us after he slapped me, I wanted to be aggressive, take him down and knock him out. But that kind of went away as the rounds went on.”
Reacting to the fight, promoter Eddie Hearn said: “I didn’t really watch it, I was in Katie Taylor’s changing room. I watched the first 30 seconds which were quite entertaining. After that it was horrible to watch.
“It was hard to watch and it was always going to be like that… Mike came out like a raging bull, but after that he was gassed. Mike’s a legend and he showed a load of heart, but you just don’t need to see it.”
