Jake Paul has stirred controversy by breaking an unspoken boxing rule, sharing a video of himself knocking down a sparring partner.
Paul is currently training for his much-debated fight with Mike Tyson, set to take place in Texas next month. The match was originally scheduled for July but had to be postponed when Tyson developed an inflamed ulcer and was advised to rest.
The ex-undisputed heavyweight world champion has resumed his training but hasn’t shared any videos of his sessions since returning to the gym. However, Paul has been keeping his followers informed and recently uploaded a video on his social media account showing him knocking down his sparring partner, DeAndre Savage.
Savage, a heavyweight, has won six out of his eight professional fights, each time stopping his opponents. His other two matches were declared no-contests, one due to an injury to his opponent and the other after an accidental blow led to his most recent match being stopped early.
However, by sharing the video, Paul has disregarded the generally accepted boxing code that what happens during sparring stays in the gym. In 2016, Chris Eubank Jr faced criticism from his then-upcoming opponent Nick Blackwell for posting a video of himself knocking out one of his sparring partners.
“He put a video up on social media, for the whole world to see, of him knocking out a kid who hasn’t even had a pro fight and it’s disgusting,” said Blackwell. “The amateur kid is building his confidence and trying to learn from a so-called professional, but somehow Eubank Jr takes pride in exploiting him like that.
“I’ve put more than one world champion down in the gym over the years but I don’t go around bragging about it. And the idea of filming it and putting up a clip on social media is just embarrassing. I think Eubank Jr is so disrespectful. He should be ashamed of himself. But this is the sort of thing the Eubanks do. They like to be controversial, they like to get people talking, and they don’t care what anyone thinks of them. They’ve also got nobody around them brave enough to pull them up on any of it.”
