Jake Paul defeated Mike Tyson by unanimous decision in a heavyweight match streamed by Netflix. The event occurred on Friday at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, TX, the home field of the Dallas Cowboys. The fight lasted the full eight rounds with all three judges scoring the fight for Paul, 80-72, 79-73 and 79-73.
Netflix reported that the event peaked at 65 million concurrent streams saying it “dominated social media” and “shattered records.” However, many viewers experienced technical difficulties with over 88,000 reports of streaming problems made to Down Detector on Friday night.
The fight was sanctioned by the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation, was set to two minute rounds instead of the usual three minutes and both fighters wore 14 ounce gloves instead of the standard ten ounce gloves for heavyweight fights.
Per CompuBox, Paul landed 78 of 278 total punches and connected on 31 of 179 jabs. Tyson began to look sluggish in the later rounds, only landing 18 of his 97 total punches to go along with five of 62 jabs.
Tyson and Paul were originally scheduled to meet on July 20, but the fight was postponed after Tyson received medical attention in May for an ulcer flare-up.
“This is one of those situations when you lost but still won,” Tyson said. “I’m grateful for last night. No regrets to get in ring one last time. I almost died in June. Had eight blood transfusions. Lost half my blood and 25lbs in hospital and had to fight to get healthy to fight so I won.”
Paul shared a moment with Tyson at the end of the fight in which he bowed to him as a sign of respect.
“First and foremost, Mike Tyson—it’s an honor,” Paul said in a post-fight interview. “Let’s give it up for Mike, bro. He’s a legend; he’s the greatest to ever do it.”
BetMGM claimed that the fight was its most bet combat fight in history, with 67% of the money on Tyson to win.
The two fighters’ careers have looked drastically different with Tyson (50-7, 44 KOs) becoming the youngest heavyweight champion at age 20 in 1986, and within a year, winning all three major belts to become the undisputed heavyweight champion. He effectively defended his belts six times before he was upset by Buster Douglas in a 10th-round KO in 1990.
Paul (11-1, 7 KOs) started his boxing career in 2020 and has mainly fought against retired MMA fighters with his only loss coming against professional boxer Tommy Fury.
“I thought it was rigged,” senior Cash England said. “I thought Mike Tyson wasn’t throwing as many punches and was keeping his guard down. I feel like it was all for money or views.”
The excitement for the main event was also evident in the co-main event where defending junior welterweight champion Katie Taylor defeated seven weight division world champion Amanda Serrano in a controversial decision which saw Taylor booed by attendants.
Despite the stats being relatively lopsided with Serrano landing 324 punches compared to Taylor’s 217, with a higher accuracy of 44% versus Taylor’s 41%. All three judges scored the fight 95-94 to Taylor. “
“She kept headbutting me,” Serrano said. “We knew from the first fight it’s what she does. Not only my fight, she did it with Chantelle Cameron. She uses her head.”
