Misfits Boxing Doesn’t ‘Respect The Sport’

On the eve of Misfits Boxing 007, Jake Paul shares his concern that ‘influencer boxing’ is ruining the sport of boxing.

When Jake Paul first got into boxing, he was the freakshow. Now he’s got nothing on the current crop of ‘influencer boxing’ offerings like Misfits Boxing, and he’s the old guard trying to protect the sport’s reputation

Misfits Boxing 007 goes down this weekend, headlined by KSI vs. Joe Fournier. Further down the card there’s a bout between two 400 pound men, and their weigh-ins devolved into silliness when Alexia Grace threw a bucket of water onto Astrid Wett. It’s all pretty silly, and that’s fine to Paul … so long as we’re not getting this confused with ‘real’ boxing.

“I think it is definitely on the WWE-side of things,” Paul said in an interview with The Sun. “And it’s definitely a separate thing than the boxing purists should be interested in. But I do see how it has entertainment value. The problem with it is that they call it ‘boxing’ and ‘influencer boxing.’”

“It’s just more like this circus spectacle, which is fine but let’s not ruin the sport of boxing,”

“Because I think influencer boxing added fans to the sport,” Paul said. “And brought more respect and credibility when people were taking it very, very seriously and putting on really good fights. Now they’re doing tag-teams and it’s all these different weight classes, they’re only fighting like two or three rounds. Like, that’s not a sport.”

“Go in there, fight six rounds, do a proper f—ing training camp, get f—ing good and respect the sport.”

Paul is set to fight Nate Diaz on August 5th in Dallas, Texas. It’s his first fight since a split decision loss to Tommy Fury, the first real professional boxer he’s faced in his seven fight boxing career. Now he’s back to taking on smaller, older MMA fighters. It’s something boxing purists had labeled a spectacle, but now it’s looking pretty respectable in comparison to stuff like Misfits Boxing.