Just five months after knocking out Nate Robinson and going super viral for it, Jake Paul was once again the biggest topic on social media after he knocked out former UFC fighter Ben Askren in the first round of their Saturday night pay-per-view bout at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta.
With 1:18 left in the opening round, Paul landed a right hand that sent Askren to the canvas. Although Askren would get up, the referee called the fight off at the 1:59 mark of Round 1 as Paul improved to 3-0 as a professional boxer.
Afterwards, Askren made no excuses for his loss and invited the criticism that he is getting for knocked out by a YouTuber.
“It’s probably deserved,” Askren said when asked about the ridicule he’ll receive following the loss. “Because I got knocked out by Jake Paul. It’s f*king embarrassing.
“I didn’t let the MMA community down, I let the world down. People f*cking hate Jake Paul and they wanted to see me make him miserable and I didn’t do that. So I didn’t let the MMA community down, I let the world down.”
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Askren also recognized the mistake he made when Paul was setting up his combinations:
“I heard my coach Mike [Rhodes] he was saying I was definitely overreacting to his feints and that was the beginning of the end,” Askren said. “I probably shouldn’t have reacted that hard to the feints. If that ref would have let me grapple a little longer, maybe that would have helped out a little bit but at the end of the day no excuses. I got in a f*cking boxing match and it didn’t go so well.”
Askren said he didn’t feel any nerves or anxiety when he made his walk to the ring last night.
“I wasn’t nervous at all because, at the end of the day, my life doesn’t change one way or the other. In MMA I was always pursuing, or defending, a world title, really. And today I was doing a fun boxing match and if it turned out great, then great, and if it turned out shit, then my life is the same. So there were really no nerves whatsoever.”
“It is unfortunate, I really thought I could be better,” added Askren. “Yeah that was not fun.”
