Prior to last night’s boxing match between Jake Paul and Tyron Woodley, there were a lot of questions swirling around the main event, mostly related to whether or not people would be interested. The two men already fought once before and were only brought together again after Paul’s original opponent, Tommy Fury, had to pull out due to an unspecified injury. Well, the social media star turned boxer put those questions to rest with an all-time vicious knockout of Woodley in the sixth round. Footage of the punch immediately ripped through social media after it happened, and now the alternate ringside angle is running around too.
Jake Paul posted the alternate angle to his own Instagram account, along with some taunting because of course, and it’s really a sight to behold. Say what you will about the boxer and his brash and abrasive attitude, but this is the type of punch boxers dream about landing. You can watch it below. I highly recommend turning on the sound…
First and most importantly, Tyron Woodley is okay. He was down for a bit following the punch (and the fight was obviously stopped immediately), but he was moving around fine after it was over and even responded to the above video saying “Respect War Took Place Tonight.” It’s always fun to see knockouts in boxing and MMA, but you never root for someone to get hurt. So, everyone is obviously very happy he’s doing well.
But what a tremendous moment for Jake Paul’s career. This shouldn’t have been the most exciting entry into Paul’s fight log. No one really asked for this rematch (outside of Woodley), and there wasn’t a ton of hype generated in the two week lead-up. I think the hope from Paul’s camp was probably that he could not lose too much momentum with this match and pick up a more exciting name to generate interest on the next card. This knockout, however, was so vicious that it has arguably drawn more attention than any of the other matches, which were very well covered too.
Whether you like Jake Paul or hate his guts, he deserves credit for the tremendous brand he’s built. He’s drawing huge crowds and selling pay per views despite only having five boxing matches under his belt. There’s not many people in the history of the sport who could have done that, and on the back of this huge KO, the future has never looked brighter. Where that future might take him, however, is still unclear.
He called out MMA stars Nate Diaz and Jorge Masvidal after the match, but given their UFC contracts, I’m not sure that’ll happen. He’s long had an obsession with getting Conor McGregor into the ring. That fight could legitimately break the all-time PPV revenue record, but McGregor hasn’t shown a lot of interest in going there despite Paul repeatedly taunting him and even taking shots at his wife. We’ll just have to wait and see. Until then, expect to see this amazing knockout turned into memes and posted a lot of times and from a lot of different angles.
