Nearly three years removed from his boxing match with Jake Paul, Ben Askren doesn’t have too many bad feelings.
‘Funky’ was one of the first fighters to step up, and call out ‘The Problem Child’. After Jake Paul knocked out former NBA player Nate Robinson on the undercard of Mike Tyson vs. Roy Jones Jr., Ben Askren aimed at the YouTuber. The former UFC welterweight had retired a year earlier and got a hip replacement in retirement.
Naturally, that made him a perfect opponent for Jake Paul. Quickly, the two sides reached a deal and competed for the upstart Triller Fight Club in April 2021. The boxing match was the first, and almost definitely the last, for Ben Askren. Despite training with Freddie Roach and others, ‘Funky’ was knocked out in round one.
Over the following years, several other MMA fighters met the same fate against Jake Paul. With that in mind, Ben Askren doesn’t feel so bad about it. Speaking on Rampage Jackson’s JAXXON podcast, the former UFC welterweight was asked about his brief foray into boxing. There, Askren admitted that he hadn’t even sparred in the years before accepting the fight.
However, Askren was hopeful that the YouTuber-turned-boxer wasn’t good, and that he would be able to outlast him. That obviously, didn’t happen. However, given Jake Paul’s success in the boxing ring, and future victory over Anderson Silva, Askren feels that he did about as well as he could’ve hoped for.
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Image Credit: Triller Fight Club
Former UFC welterweight Ben Askren reflects on boxing match with Jake Paul
“I had no intention of fighting him initially. I was just tweeting, like everyone does right?” Ben Askren stated on the JAXXON podcast when asked about his boxing match with Jake Paul. “Then, they call me and they’re like, ‘Hey, want to fight?’. I don’t know, it kinda sounds fun. But I had my hip surgery, so I had done literally zero exercise, so I was fat as s*it. So I called my doctor, got my clearance from my doctor to start training again.”
He continued, “I was just hoping he sucked. I kind of figured he wasn’t very good, and I would be able to weather the storm for a round or two, he’ll get tired, and then I’ll beat him up. Now obviously, since that point in time, he’s beaten Anderson Silva. He’s beaten Tyron [Woodley], he beat a professional boxer.”
“He’s actually kind of good at it, it’s unfortunate.” Ben Askren concluded. “Most unfortunate for me.”
In the years since Ben Askren’s loss to Jake Paul in the boxing ring, he’s remained retired. However, ‘Funky’ did offer to come out of retirement, to face former rival, Jorge Masvidal at UFC 300.
What do you make of these comments? What do you remember of Jake Paul vs. Ben Askren in 2021?
