Mike Tyson may be almost 30 years older than Jake Paul, but with that experience, comes a little wisdom when it comes to the fight game — and that includes trash talking.
Just days after a fairly tame encounter between the fighters who meet in the ring on July 20, Tyson and Paul reconvened for a second press conference on Thursday and this one featured a whole lot more animosity. Rather than hugging and paying each other compliments, Tyson struck the first salvo when he noted how big Paul has gotten in his preparation to fight at heavyweight.
Well, Tyson actually questioned how much work Paul’s been doing, at least judging by his size.
“I don’t know if he’s in his prime. He’s fat,” Tyson said with a raucous crowd cheering him on. “He should be lean and mean. He’s fat and funky. I saw him with his shirt off the other day, he’s fat. Did you start training already?”
Paul, who actually encouraged the crowd to chat “F*ck Jake Paul” at him several times during the press conference, fired back with a reminder from Tyson’s first professional loss and arguably one of the biggest upsets in sports history.
“Buster Douglas was fat, am I right?” Paul shouted. “I’m going to end you quicker than he did.”
There was no anger in Tyson’s voice when he responded but rather a chuckle and a laugh that Paul actually compared himself to a former boxing champion.
“I know but you’re no Buster Douglas,” Tyson said.
The back-and-forth continued with a constant loud ovation from the audience in attendance with Tyson hyping up the crowd with every answer.
At one point, the former undisputed heavyweight king questioned the references to Paul’s power after he demolished his past two opponents in the first round. As quickly as Paul scored knockouts in those fights, Tyson didn’t seem all that impressed.
In fact, Tyson rattled off several names from Paul’s past who he didn’t finish and yet none of them have his size, power or pedigree.
“He couldn’t even knock out [Nate] Diaz,” Tyson said. “[Nate] Diaz is 40 pounds. He’s going to knock me out? Anderson Silva, he couldn’t even knock out the little guys? How’s he going to knock me out?
“Who did he knock out? Little children. He never knocked out a real man, come on. He didn’t knock out Tommy Fury. I’m going to f*ck Jake up. How am I going to lose if he couldn’t beat Tommy Fury?”
Answering that challenge, Paul didn’t offer up excuses or denials regarding his past fights where he couldn’t put his opponents away but he promised that wouldn’t be the case when he sets foot in the ring with Tyson.
“Look, he’s right. I can’t stand here and say I did those things but what I promise to the people on July 20, Mike will be put to sleep and he will feel my power,” Paul said. “I will go down as the man who put Tyson to sleep for the last time.”
While Tyson was much more vocal this time around, Paul had some lines cooked up in response, although it’s safe to say he didn’t go over with the audience quite as much as his opponent.
“I respect Mike, he’s a legend,” Paul shouted. “But it’s time, it’s my time now. There’s a reason why I have the same birthday as Cus D’Amato, because I’m going to teach you how to f*cking box, Mike.”
Invoking Tyson’s late trainer didn’t get under his skin as Paul surely hoped it would but it did make the one-time “baddest man on the planet” laugh again.
“I can’t even get mad at this guy,” Tyson said. “Because everybody knows this guy is talking out of his ass.”
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