Involved in a post-press conference scuffle ahead of their professional boxing matchup on April 17. — polarizing YouTuber, Jake Paul has boldly claimed he “stopped” himself from knocking out former Bellator and ONE Championship welterweight titleholder, Ben Askren during the altercation.
Set to make his third professional boxing walk on April 17 under the Triller banner, Ohio native, Paul has secured himself a matchup against three-fight UFC alum, Askren — hoping to add the wrestling ace to prior victories over fellow content creator, AnEsonGib and NBA dunk contest feature, Nate Robinson.
Taking part in a pre-fight press conference to promote the event, Paul traded barbs with Askren, even calling Askren’s former opponent, Jorge Masvidal on FaceTime to poke fun at the latter — with Masvidal questioning “is that dude (Ben Askren) still alive” amid his June 2019 flying-knee knockout win over Askren.
Engaging in a face-off post-conference, Paul and Askren got involved in a physical altercation, with Askren pushing his hand toward Paul’s face, who retaliated by slapping Askren to the midsection, before pushing the veteran.
Speaking with ESPN MMA reporter, Marc Raimondi following the conference, Paul reflected on the incident, making a quite bold claim that he stopped himself from knocking Askren out.
“Clearly he’s (Ben Askren) pissed off,” Paul said. “He turns away, goes to put his hand in my face, boom, pull-counter right to the body. He’s lucky I didn’t knock him out. I stopped myself from knocking him out. Everyone says he has this dumpy power, this wrestling strength, and all this athleticism. This guy is made of flubber. Literally, when I pushed him it was like there was nothing there. He flew six feet. That’s not how a wrestler’s base is. And he tried to sucker punch me and he couldn’t even hit me, so what’s going to happen in the fight. He barely nicked my face.“
Whilst he’s got himself occupied with Askren for the time being, Paul has made no secret of his intentions to score a future boxing clash against former two-weight UFC champion, ‘The Notorious’ Conor McGregor, and claimed the Dubliner should’ve taken a fight with him rather than his January tie with two-time opponent, Dustin Poirier.
“If I was Conor (McGregor) he should’ve tooken (sic) the fifty million I offered him to take ‘the easier’ fight,” Paul said. “He got ten million with a little bit of the backend from the UFC event against Dustin (Poirier) but he lost. So why not take fifty million to fight a YouTuber? That’s what he should’ve done, quite frankly. Now he has to fight his way back. That’s the most embarrassing loss of his career. He got knocked out. TKOed. He should’ve taken the Jake Paul fight. More money, more hype.“
As for McGregor, the former lightweight and featherweight gold holder is widely expected to round out his trilogy with Poirier this summer at UFC 264 on July 10. — and Paul has laid out plans to call for a clash with Poirier if the Lafayette native gets the better of McGregor again.
“I just think McGregor has that name where he will be big in this sport for a while,” Paul explained. “But if he loses to Poirier, I’ll be like, ‘Yo, let me fight Poirier’. Why not? He has to win in his own sport first and then maybe we can figure something out. I’m Conor’s money fight right now, as crazy as that sounds. Khabib (Nurmagomedov) retired, he’s all pissed off about it. Jake Paul vs. Conor is the money fight. It’s funny, what world are we living in where that even makes sense?” (H/T MMA Fighting)