From Texas to Florida. From AARP to BKFC.
Another Saturday night in the Jake Paul boxing circus.
The "Problem Child" was set to spend this weekend in Dallas battling the 58-year-old husk of ex-heavyweight menace Mike Tyson.
But when the senior citizen principal was waylaid by an untimely ulcer flareup, Paul shifted gears to relative youngster Mike Perry, 32, who was 7-8 in the octagon before re-stoking his own menace with five straight wins sans gloves.
Paul and Perry met atop a five-bout pay-per-view show from the Amalie Arena in Tampa and the B/R combat team took in the extravaganza and put together the definitive real-time list of the event's real winners and losers.
Take a look at what we came up with and drop a thought of your own in the comments.
Winner: Following the Recipe
Another good night for the Jake Paul recipe.
Scan boxing's anonymous outposts or the UFC's list of recent castoffs to find a foe who'll be positively bamboozled by a young, strong, 200-pound kid with respectable fundamentals but no business calling himself a world-class fighter.
Add a crowd of device-addled sycophants, shake well, and scoop up piles of cash.
Saturday night's main ingredient was octagonal reject Mike Perry, who'd rediscovered some level of menace with a five-fight run in the bare-knuckle ranks but arrived with nothing more than a barroom brawler's toolbox to contend with Paul's novice skills.
The ex-MMA competitor was dropped with right hands in both the first and second rounds and took a hellacious beating in the fourth and fifth before being dropped and ultimately stopped in the sixth when referee Christpher Young waved it off at 1:12.
Once Paul apologized to the crowd for taking too long to send them home, he quickly pivoted to the next main course, suggesting to Mike Tyson that their rescheduled bout in November would result in Paul taking the ex-heavyweight champ's throne.
Tyson, for those unaware, retired in 2005.
He'd last won a fight two years before his exit.
And he turned 58 in June.
But you wouldn't have known it based on the celebratory din in Tampa, where Paul also threw in a challenge for reigning UFC light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira after he dispenses with the AARP-eligible "Iron Mike."
"I may get another KO," he said, "and prove everyone wrong again."
Winner: Doing the Job
Let's face it. A boxing promoter's job isn't easy.
So, when Amanda Serrano's planned second go-round with generational rival Katie Taylor fell through along with July's incarnation of the Jake Paul-Mike Tyson show, there was some behind-the-scenes work to get done.
Serrano wanted to maintain a spot on the revamped Paul show to avoid a full year of inactivity heading into the rescheduled Tyson date in November, so in stepped rugged 35-year-old Floridian Stevie Morgan for a career-defining date in her Tampa hometown.
Her "Sledgehammer" nickname and 14-1 record with 13 KOs made for good pre-fight copy, particularly with those not so interested in asking probing questions about her qualifications.
A quick look, though, at Morgan's pre-Serrano run of six straight first-round wins revealed a dubious list of foes with a combined 48-50-5 record, including three who arrived on six-fight losing streaks and another who'd dropped 10 straight prior to meeting Morgan.
The other two, incidentally, were in their second and third pro fights, respectively.
Which made it absolutely no surprise that Serrano, with reigns in weight classes from 118 to 140 pounds, wasted no time in exposing the in-over-her-head pretender barely more than 30 seconds into the second round of their scheduled non-title 10-rounder.
The official time was 38 seconds.
"She's a veteran but she's acting like a young, hungry prospect," analyst Gabe Rosado said. "You say there are levels to this, and that was a master class."
Winner: Making It Count
They were the middle fights on the show, but for practical purposes the lightweight scraps involving Ashton Sylve, Lucas Bahdi, Corey Marksman and Tony Aguilar were the prospects portion of an event otherwise dominated by higher-profile principals.
Sylve was the one of the four with a home-promotional advantage thanks to his tie-in with Jake Paul's MVP apparatus, and the skilled operator was well on his way to another spot on another show when he was cold-cocked by a three-punch combination from Bahdi and left face-down in the ring for a shockingly abrupt sixth-round KO loss.
Two sweeping right hands and a clean-up left hook did the trick for the 30-year-old Canadian, who'd been hit with every conceivable punch from every conceivable angle for 17 minutes before connecting on a sure-fire contender for the year's best finish at 2:27.
"I want to give thanks to my coach," said Bahdi, who'd arrived at a nondescript 16-0.
"He told me 'It (was) going to be tough, but, believe me, you're going to get him.' And here we are."
Sylve had won 11 straight since going pro as a teen four years ago and racking up his first five victims south of the border in Tijuana before coming to the U.S. when he turned 18.
He was also a winner on the undercard of Paul's defeat of Nate Diaz last year in Dallas and rode shotgun to the "Problem Child's" 2022 defeat of MMA relic Anderson Silva in Phoenix.
Meanwhile, the 23-year-old Marksman may have earned himself another turn in the spotlight as well thanks to a spirited eight-round decision over familiar foe Tony Aguilar, whom he'd met twice as an amateur and drew with five months ago in Orlando.
He was sharper and busier for the most part this time around, landing more shots and operating at a higher accuracy than Aguilar while winning on two scorecards to offset a 76-76 call on the third.
"Skyrocket, bro," Marksman said of his post-victory career trajectory. "We are going to MSG and all around the world."
Loser: Late-30's Promises
A 38-year-old Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. said all the right things.
He recognizes the mistakes he made and the opportunities he squandered, and the chance to fight Uriah Hall reinspired him to make one last run at ring glory.
He's admitted it all. And he might even believe it all.
But don't hold your breath folks. It ain't happening.
The fighter who outpointed Hall, a 39-year-old with exactly one pro appearance (against an ex-NFL running back), is but a familiarly named shell of the guy who wore a legit title belt a decade ago and met the likes of Canelo Alvarez, Daniel Jacobs and Sergio Martinez.
He was a fleshy 197.75 pounds against Hall, exactly 11 pounds heavier than he'd ever been for a pro fight, and the plodding, one-punch-at-a-time approach he employed for most of the fight should have precisely zero elite cruiserweights concerned, regardless of intent.
In fact, it's hard to believe even a newbie like Jake Paul would be nervous, though the low-voltage nature of the Hall fight won't exactly push Chavez's name to the top of the influencer's hit list anyway.
"No one thinks that version of Chavez Jr. could beat Jake Paul," analyst Todd Grisham said. "Mike Perry would knock out Chavez Jr."
Full Card Results
Main Card
Jake Paul def. Mike Perry by TKO, 1:12, Round 6
Amanda Serrano def. Stevie Morgan by TKO, 0:38, Round 2
Lucas Bahdi def. Ashton Sylve by KO, 2:27, Round 6
Corey Marksman def. Tony Aguilar by majority decision (76-76, 77-75, 78-74)
Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. def. Uriah Hall by unanimous decision (59-55, 59-55, 58-56)
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