At, 58 Tyson was a whisper of the fighter he used to be. He now uses is a walking stick. He now spends more time podcasting than he does fighting. A Mike Tyson who had to cancel the initial bout due to a stomach ulcer. And this is the man who was sold to the public as a legitimate challenger to Paul. After a spirited first round, every second of Tyson’s 40 years of damage can be seen etched into his movements; exhausted, he chases Paul around the ring. In the sixth round, he throws just seven punches, the fight ending in a unanimous landslide decision for Paul. The same accusations of a fixed fight flood the internet with people (whom I’m guessing have no experience boxing) interpreting moments like Mike Tyson not falling for obvious bait as proof of collusion. And then there’s the script. But the only thing the script actually got right was the first round, which was just how Tyson always fights versus how Paul always fights. And it actually got the ending wrong - calling a Paul KO victory in round five but I guess people didn’t read that far. The complaints of a fixed fight are so intense that an official statement is released declaring the fight not scripted, and in doing so perfectly priming the Jake Paul cycle to start all over again. But the thing is, if you know how the Jake Paul Cycle works this fight was easy to predict, as it’s the same manipulation of public perception we’ve been talking about this entire video. And I can say that because I did predict it months before it happened on stream. What Jake Paul does is he just challenges old retired fighters who are like either not trained in boxing or have been not boxing four years.

I think there’s two reasons people so badly want to believe that this fight was fixed and the first is simple: people don’t like Jake Paul. But the second is more complicated as I mentioned one of the things I really struggle to understand and make this video is how so many people judge the fight as hard to predict when, to me, there was only ever going to be one outcome. And I don’t know that much about boxing and I think a part of that was Tyson’s aura and the impact he’d had on the sport but I think there’s also a deeper reason. Watching a decrepit aged Mike Tyson lose a boxing match to a social media influencer is about as devastating a statement you can make on the effect age has on our mortal frames. The most brutal reinforcement possible that the ultimate unbeatable and undisputed opponent we must all face one day is time. And that’s not just hard to accept it’s devastating and a big reason why I think so many people would rather engage in conspiracy. But sometimes there is no conspiracy. Sometimes things are just the way they are and it sucks.