This summer’s meeting between YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul and former world champion Mike Tyson has been officially sanctioned as a professional fight.
It means the outcome of the bout, which is scheduled to take place in Texas on 20 July, will appear on both their records.
However the fight will have certain conditions, including that the contest can only be eight, two-minute rounds and 14oz gloves must be worn, rather than 10oz.
The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation said it has conducted a review of Paul and Tyson, evaluating the records to date of both men as well as their medical history before approving the pro fight with “certain waivers”.
“The safety of the contestants competing in the ring or the octagon is always the primary concern,” the TDLR said.
Tyson, who will be 58 at the time of the fight and whose professional career ended in 2005, most recently competed in an exhibition bout in 2020 and will turn 58 three weeks before facing Paul.
Paul, meanwhile, beat Ryan Bourland in his 10th professional fight in March.
“Mike Tyson and Jake Paul signed on to fight each other with the desire to do so in a sanctioned professional fight that would have a definitive outcome,” Nakisa Bidarian of MVP Promotions said.
Tyson was the first heavyweight boxer to simultaneously hold the WBA, WBC and IBF titles in 1987 but his reign as unified champion came to a shock end in 1990 as he was beaten by Buster Douglas in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history.
Although he briefly regained the WBA and WBC titles in 1996, he then suffered back-to-back defeats to Evander Holyfield – the second ending as Tyson was disqualified for biting part of Holyfield’s ear off.
Tyson’s legal issues have included a rape conviction in 1992, for which he served three years of a six-year prison sentence, and in 1999 he served a third of a 12-month sentence for a road rage assault.
He got back into shape to play his part in an exhibition bout with fellow former world champion Roy Jones Jr in 2020, and his fight with Paul will take place in Arlington’s AT&T Stadium, home of the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys, which has a seating capacity of 80,000.
Paul has won nine of his 10 fights, mostly against ex-UFC fighters, with his solitary defeat coming against British boxer Tommy Fury in February 2023.
By BBC News
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