MMA Fighting - Reaction: Jake Paul vs. Tyron Woodley Press Conference

Episode Date: July 13, 2021

MMA Fighting's Mike Heck, Shaun Al-Shatti and Damon Martin react to Tuesday's press conference featuring Jake Paul and Tyron Woodley ahead of their boxing bout on Aug. 29 in Cleveland. Follow Mike Heck: @MikeHeck_JR Follow Shaheen Al-Shatti: @shaunalshatti Follow Damon Martin: @DamonMartin Subscribe: http://goo.gl/dYpsgH Check out our full video catalog: http://goo.gl/u8VvLi Visit our playlists: http://goo.gl/eFhsvM Like MMAF on Facebook: http://goo.gl/uhdg7Z Follow on Twitter: http://goo.gl/nOATUI Read More: http://www.mmafighting.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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What are you willing to lose to save the ones you love? The Downloaded 2. Ghosts in the Machine. Available now, only from Audible. All right, everybody. It's July 13, 2021, and this date has significance because this is the date that featured the press conference for the upcoming boxing match, we thought we would never see. If you told me this if I was happening three years ago, I would have laughed in your face. But Jake Paul and Tyron Woodley, the former UFC welterweight champion, are going to box on

August 29th in Cleveland, Ohio. And we are here to react to the press conference that just wrapped up as we record this. I am Mike Heck, and I'm being joined by my colleagues here over at MAAfighting.com. We got Sean Alshaddy and David Martin joining us. Sean, you are a word smith. If you can describe the press conference we just watched in one word, what would it be and why? Is giant robot one word? Because that's really my biggest takeaway from this.

Like I have so many questions. Is that a gigantic man inside of there? Like a seven footer? Or is this like, you know, two four foot tall people sort of standing on each other's shoulders? Like the kids in the trench coat trying to get a drink at the bar? Like I have way too many questions. No one asked a single question about the robot. and I'm actually kind of mad about that.

Like, we need some answers. That's my takeaway. Same question for you, Damon. He stole the robot right from underneath you. And right underneath me, too. I might go back to that well, but how would you describe that press conference in one word? The only word I can use, and I think this describes it perfectly, is wow. I think that's about the best way I can describe it as wow.

Boxing press conferences are something special. I'm still getting used to them being a mixed martial arts guy for the last year, a 20-some-odd years. So boxing press conferences all kind of get the same reaction for me. Wow. My word is robotic because that giant robot stole the show. And I'll be honest with you, I think it's stolen a little piece of my heart as well, gentlemen. Jake Paul is a lot of things.

Most of them not great. But he is smart and he's a showman. And as silly as that press conference was, once I started listening to the words, but just focusing solely on the robot as they were going back and forth at each other, man that would have been one of the more enjoyable press conferences I've ever watched just focusing on the robot the words didn't mean much it was hilarious let's not get too crazy calm down here I will have to say I think it was as bizarre as we sort of all expected right like this is very much a circus and we know that it's a circus going into it so that kind of like lends you the ability to enjoy it maybe a little bit more than if this was something serious and we were having to act like we're serious journalists breaking down something here but it's a I felt like it was relatively bizarre, but I don't know that either man really came away from that winning the press conference, right? It felt like Tyron really held his own pretty okay there. I don't know that Jake Paul came with too much that that was some hot fire lines or anything like that.

Altogether, the takeaway for me was like the bet, right? Because that, I really hope that bet isn't real. Like it seems like it's already out there in the ether now. So I guess it is real. But I have really hope that if Tyron Woodley loses this fight, which I think he might. And I'm scared that he might, that he doesn't just actually do this. Because to have that on his skin, I love Jake Paul for the rest of his life. That that is something none of us need.

Yeah, I think, I think, I think honestly, this sounds terrible. And I don't mean to, like, continue to take a shot of the guy who's already having a bad weekend. But like, I think the guy who came away worse from his press conference was Connor McGregor, because Jake Paul, like, took a shot, like took several shots at him. Obviously, Connor's not there to defend himself. And then he revealed that the special. chain, the $100,000 chain he had made with the Connor model

on it, he's sending it to Dustin Porre, and Dustin Porre is going to sell it for the Good Fight Foundation. I was just like, of all the people that kind of came with the worst from this thing, poor Connor was the one who got the worst because he's not there to defend himself. Because, you know, as Sean said, you know, Tyron held his own.

Jake had some couple, you know, Jake had a couple good lines in there. Tiron fired back pretty effectively. The bet is wow, I, again, that's kind of my word here, the bet. You know, I have a lot the tattoos myself. That's kind of like the no-no of the tattoo. You never want to get a tattoo like that put on you.

So that's a serious deal. So that's interesting. But yeah, I think that's, that was like one of my biggest takeaways was poor Connor because he got slammed by Jake and had no way to defend himself. Yeah, then I propose a bet right now here on this reaction podcast.

We each pick one story of ours, whichever story does more traffic. The loser will get I love Sean O'Shti on his body. I propose that. What a shit show this whole thing is. I do have to say, Jake Paul, for everything that he is, he is incredibly, I think, smart and astute when it comes to needling MMA fans.

Because he knows MMA fans hate him. He knows MMA fans can't stop talking about him. And the disrespect that he continues to show MMA and generally the fan base is exactly what's going to get people to watch this fight, right? Like we saw it when Tyrant's, naming off Robbie Lawler, Darren Till, all of this, and Jake Paul just flippantly, like,

oh, I don't know who any of those people are. And, like, Tyrant was almost taken aback for a half a second of like, you fool! How do you not know all these Hall of Famers, these dudes I've beaten? Jake Paul knows how to play this game, man. He really does. I will say this. If Tyron Woodley can get a robot,

this might be my favorite fight build ever. But be that as a man. I'm going to try to make this as serious as possible. Damon, we know... That's not possible. I'm going to try. I am going to try here in some way. take a deep breath.

Damon, like Sean said, we knew what this press conference was going to be like. Robot aside, we know what the entire bill to this fight on August 29th will be like. But did this presser do its job? I mean, the job of this presser is to get people interested in the fight, and there are a lot of people who are already interested. Do you feel like those 30 minutes or so that it got some extra potential buys based on what came out of it? I would say it didn't do any harm, and that sounds weird saying that. I don't think there's going to be anybody else not tuning in that wasn't already tuning in. And, yeah, you probably got a few more people to get interested in this because, you know, there was some pretty good back and forth.

You know, Tyron Woodley, you know, obviously we've all covered Tyrant's career for a lot longer than we've ever covered Jake Paul. And Tyron's never been really known for Trash Talk. He's not a bad interview. I've interviewed Tyrant dozens of times, you know, good interview. I like talking to Tyron. I always got along with Tyron, but he's not like a prolific trash talker. That's not his business. He's never been the guy to go out there and out trash-talking opponent.

He held his own. He didn't like, you know, he didn't let Jake kind of talk through him or talk over him. He had some pretty good lines in there, you know. And, again, it was fun. It didn't get ugly, you know. I mean, obviously I know Jake made that one comment about, you know, his baby mamas or whatever, which is kind of like you roll your eyes at that kind of stuff, kind of going back to the, you know, the Conor trash talk before UFC 264 when you bring families into it.

But outside of that, like, I thought, you know, Tyron handled it all well. It was some good back and forth. It didn't get ugly, which I think sometimes when pressers get really ugly, when it gets really personal or it just ends up being shouting at each other for 25 minutes that you kind of lose interest. But for the most part, it wasn't that bad. I mean, they kind of talked over each other at the beginning, but then once the questions actually started being aimed directly at each one of them, I thought it kind of turned around. So, yeah, I don't think they lost anybody and they probably gained a few more people. Yeah, Sean, I know it's hard, like you said, it's hard to find winners and losers with these things. But if, like Damon said, if you compare this press conference to McGregor Porier from last week, I mean, it was different.

I mean, there was a few jabs here and there. But like Damon said, no one was really yelling and screaming. I thought the jokes and the shots and the trash talk was a little dad joky, but I don't mind dad joky stuff at my old age. So let me ask you this, shot. if you were given $100,000, but you had to sit in a room for 12 hours and watch one of those two press conferences on loop over and over again to get that $100,000, are you watching Jake Paul Taryn Woodley? Are you watching the UFC 264 presser between Connor McGregor and Dustin Porier? Oh, the former. Not even, like, that's not even a question, right?

Like, Jake Paul, Tyra Woodley, I never want to watch that Connor McGregor Press conference again. That was just that was a shit show of a different level. I do think, though, just talking about today, like, I, in terms of did people, did this sell more people on it or push people away from it? I do think it sold at least a few more people on it because I think one aspect of this, that this fight that wasn't apparent and wasn't really there for the Ben Ascgren fight is there's a level of seriousness to it, right? Because we all know who Tyron Woodley is. Tarron Woodley is the guy who knocked out Robbie Lawler in one round. Like, Tyron Willie's the guy who nearly killed Josh Costcheck. Like we've seen Tyrone Willie do really damaging things to human beings' brains with his fist.

So like there's an element of danger just inherent to this whole fight that hasn't really been there before for this whole circus ride that we've been on with Jake Paul. And I do think today Tyrant did a really good job of just impressing that upon the audience of just like, dude, this is not the same thing, man. Like you like I still again, I think Tyrant might lose this fight, but it's definitely not nearly comparable to anything we've seen before when it comes to this kid just coming here and pick it. opponents and just kind of styling on people. I don't know that that's what this is going to be. And again, I think Tyrant did a really good job of impressing that upon the audience of just like, this is not going to be as easy as you think, man. Well, let me also raise that good point, Sean, and actually to that point, I'll say

this. In the Ben Ascran fight, it was all Ben talking himself into the fight, right? Like, Ben was never a striker. He had no highlights. His one highlight in the UFC throwing a strike was the really, really bad spinning backfist. I think he threw against Damien Meyer or whatever. like Ben Ascran and Ben Ascran's a tremendous trash talker Ben Ascran can get under your skin. He's done it numerous times. Ben Ascran talked his way into that fight.

There was nothing on tape that made you say Ben Ascran legitimately should have been boxing anybody, much less Jake Paul. This time around, Tyrant's holding his own in the trash talk. He's not getting, it's not a one-way street. It's not, you know, he's not getting run over by Jake Paul, who is not bad at trash talk. He's holding his own. And then you add in the extra element, the real dangerous level that Tyron Woodley brings into this fight, the legitimacy. He's a former UFC champion. He has legit critical.

And a good champion, too, like, right? Like, he's like a top five welterweight of all time. He's not just some rambot champion. Yeah. So you got the animosity, which is always nice. Obviously, that helps build a fight. But then you've got the legitimacy of Tyron Woodley. Like, no one can say, even though Tyron's on a on a four-fight losing streak in the UFC, no one can say he lost a bad competition.

no one can say he didn't fight great fighters. No one can say he didn't beat some of the best people in the world and knock out a lot of them. So, yeah, you add in the extra layer of that, like this becomes even bigger. And Asker and Paul was huge. So this, in a lot of ways, should be much, much bigger. And now the real question, because let's be honest, gentlemen, we're all going to be watching this fight. There's a great chance everybody listening to this right now where they comment negatively or positively or say, stop talking about Jake Paul. they're still all going to be watching this fight.

This is FOMO City at its finest. So, Sean, you made some really good points. So I'm going to go back to you from an actual fight fan perspective. Like not media member, not deputy editor, Sean Al Shadi. I'm talking like vacation mode, have the whole week off. Sean Al Shadi, what am I going to do with my time? Are you excited for this fight? Like, there's intrigue.

There's questions. But are you actually excited for this fight on August 29th? So the way you phrase that is interesting because excited is, is a very particular specific word, right? I don't know. I get excited for, you know, Sun's Game 4. I get excited for Connor McGregor versus Dustin Poirier 3. I don't know that I'm excited for this.

I'm certainly compelled by it. I'm intrigued by it. I am morbidly curious by it. And I'm sort of, if my face was anything, it would be eyeball emojis right now, just sort of peering over the top of like a wall doing that. Just looking at this, I'm certainly going to, I would watch it if I'm on vacation just to see where this goes.

Because at this point, I do feel like MMA is weirdly invested in the Jake Paul story in a way that I honestly never expected. I was so anti-Jake Paul, anti-Paul brothers from the beginning of this whole weird saga. And at some point during the Ben Ascran lead up, I guess I just caved and gave in and let myself enjoy it because I do love me a good circus fight every now and then. So I don't know that I'm excited for it, but I'm definitely incredibly intrigued by it. And again, the way that Tyron is talking, the seriousness with which he brings to this fight and this, this whole matchup and the idea of like, dude, you, you have not even begun to face anybody of my caliber and stepped into this world yet. Like, that's the type of thing that will get me. Because let's be honest, we all, all three of us on this podcast, want to say Jake Paul get his comeuppins. Like, we kind of do.

We can admit that. This is, I don't, I'm not a boxing journalist. I'm not covering this from some objective, you know, place. Like, I would love to see Jake Paul get knocked out. It would be fantastic. I'd really enjoy it. So I'm absolutely curious to see if that's going to happen, but I don't know if excited is the right word.

Yes, and if you want more on Tyron, Willey, go to our YouTube page. Our colleague, Stephen Morocco, had a round a 20-year-so-minute conversation with Tyrant. So go check that out after you listen to this. But, Damon, have you reached the point of excitement ahead of August 29th? You know, honestly, and I agree with Sean, it's kind of a tough word to use for a fight like this. But I'm going to go as far and say, yeah, I am kind of excited. They got you. They got you, David.

Maybe part of that is because, like, I know I'm going to be in attendance, and there's a part of me that's, like, kind of excited because this is in my home state. Obviously, the Paul brothers are from Cleveland. I'm in Columbus. So, you know, I'm kind of excited. It's coming to Ohio. I've been to the field house, rocket mortgage field house, when it was quick and loans arena. Yeah, I was there for UFC 203 when Steve Miochich defeated Alice Rovere.

I know what that crowd was like. I know what Cleveland fans are like. It's a passionate fan base, and it's going to be interesting to see all the people that will come out for Jake Paul. He is a local hometown guy. That's absolutely true. We went to Westlake High School right down the road. So it's going to be interesting.

So, yeah, I do have a bit of excitement. And here's why, because the show, I enjoy a show like everybody else. Is it the most compelling boxing match in the world? No. Is it, you know, am I expecting this to turn out to be, you know, Arturo Gotti and Mickey Ward? Absolutely not. I don't expect any of that. But I know that going into it.

But when I've watched the trailer shows and I've watched some of these other kind of like side show fights, I've had fun. And at the end of the day, fighting is about skill, fighting is about, you know, obviously competition,

but it is also fun. And I enjoy the fun of it all. I don't need this to be, you know, Anthony, Joshua and Tyson Fury. What I, you know,

I don't need it to be that. I just need to be a fun fight, and I'm intrigued by this fight. I'm interested in this fight. So, yeah, on that level, I'm kind of exciting.

Listen, I'm not going to name names because I don't want to, like, insult anybody. But you and I, all of us know, there's been a lot of UFC cards that have been put together over this last year where the main event,

when we're going in, we're literally like, oh, my God, I cannot believe they're headlining a card with this fight. Or they're putting a card on ESPN with this main, oh, my God, like, we're all, we've all been there. We're all kind of like, what are they doing? Like, what is going on with a sport where you got this particular fight? Now, again, I'm not trying to name names, but at least with this one, I'm interested. I am legitimately interested to see what happens. and that, that to me is a certain level of excitement. I think I'm more with you, Damon.

Like, I'm not going to say I'm all in, but I love it, man. I'm intrigued by it. It's the perfect step up for Jake Paul. You can make arguments for both guys winning. And I don't agree with Stephen Espinoza on many things, if ever, but 50-50 fight, I agree with them there. I think this is a 50-50 fight. So I can't, honestly, I cannot wait to see what happens on August 29th.

But last thing quickly, Damon, the reports. are out. You wrote about it earlier today. UFC 264 did around reportedly 1.8 million pay-per-view buys. Is there any chance this card gets anywhere close to that? No, I don't think it'll come close to that.

Obviously, we don't know what they're charging for it yet. So I think that's going to be part of the question. Are they charging 40 bucks? Or they charge it in 50 bucks? What do they charge it for this thing? But, yeah, like, I mean, I think they'll do well. I mean, it's absolutely going to do well. I mean, the trailer card with Jake Paul and Ben Asker, despite what Dana White continues to say, they did pretty well.

That was a good car, and they sold a lot of pay-per-views. Again, not at the, you know, not at the higher cost. They weren't charging $70, like they were charging for Connor and Porey, nor should they. Obviously, this fight isn't going to be that, but I think they'll do well. I think they'll do good business. I mean, Jake has proven to be he is a box office draw, whether you like him or not. People are intrigued enough to want to pay to watch him fight. You can't deny that at this point.

And Tyre Woodley does present enough of a danger. and enough of a name to where people are like, you know what? I want to see this happen. So no, they're not going to touch 1.8 million buys. They're not going to come close to that. But could they do well? And I don't know what well means. I don't know what that means 500,000 buys.

I don't know what they consider to be like a good number. But I think they'll do a good number. I agree with you, Damon. I think they'll do well. I don't know if they'll hit a million. I think a lot of that's going to come down to price point and how much they're going to charge for this thing. But yeah, there's no way in hell that they're going to be.

the McGregor-Poree number just because I mean, Jake Paul isn't even the most successful brother in his family, right? Like Logan Paul is the more popular, Paul. We saw the numbers that Logan Paul versus Mayweather did. Like those were absurd. So I don't even think they'll come close to touch in that. But I do think

this will beat what Ascran did earlier this year. And I agree. I think it's going to do well. I think this is going to continue to do well until somebody stops this guy, man. Yeah, I think it'll be a massive success. But if this does 1.8 million buys, I might get I love Jake Paul tattooed on myself.

I mean, I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I think at this point we just have to, like I said, I've come around. Like I said, I'm fully, I have completely come around on this because at the beginning, I'm like, oh my God, you know, it's ruined the sanctity of the sport. And then I think about it. I'm like, you know what, this is going on forever. We need to kind of let that down and just enjoy it for what it is. And it's a show. Listen, I don't mean to insult other boxes out there, but there's been a ton of good boxing matches out there that there was zero promotion for. I had zero interested.

I'm not as big of a boxing fan as I am in a, and A obviously. There's been great boxing matches where I'm like, okay, they're boxing great. Tell me why I should care. And they can't. They're not like, oh, well, this is, you know, like, I know Canello, I know Errol Spinelli. I know the big name boxers, but like, there's a lot of great boxing matches that happened that there's zero promotion behind. I couldn't tell you why I should care about this.

I know why I care about this fight. So whether you like it or not, I'm at. interested. Yep. I think one... It's funny. I just have to add this real quick. Because it's funny, you just said, ruining the sanctity of the sport. I think that was the same reason I was sort of holding out for as long as I did on this whole subject. I'm just like,

man, this feels dirty. I don't really want to be involved in this. But you know what, man, I've got to reach the point where it's just like, yeah, ruining the sanctity of a sport, maybe, but not our sport. Like, this is ruining the sanctity of boxing. I'm not, like, I'm not, I'll watch boxing. I consider myself

a minor boxing fan, but I'm not some huge boxing guy. I don't watch that many boxing fights other than the huge ones. So like, hey, if they want to go over there and ruin that sport over there, well, I can kind of just sit over on this side of the fence and watch and maybe giggle a little bit. Like, that's fine with me.

This thing's happening on showtime. Like, this is unbelievable. Like, if it happened on Triller, like, this is no surprise, but it's on freaking showtime. To your point, Sean, though, just to be fair, you know, we can't really hold our sport in that high regard either. We've had play. I mean, the same arena

the same arena where Jake Paul is about to fight Tyre Woodley a few years ago was CM Punk fighting Mickey Gall and CM Punk and I'll actually I've interviewed him a few times Sam Punk is a super nice guy I'm not trying to take a knock on him but that guy had zero business being anywhere near a UFC cage when he fought you know and obviously what we've seen out him in that fight with Mickey Gall proved that but uh you know weren't trust me this point like I said I remember when they signed brandon Lee Hinkle after er not bradingley excuse me, Sean Gannon, after he fought Kimbo Slices at a street fight in a basement somewhere in in Massachusetts or whatever, and then he ended up fighting Brandon Lee Hinkle and the

UFC and got demolished. James Tony coming over and fighting, rain. So we're not above this, guys. We can't admit, we're not above this. We're not above anything. I'm under no illusions that we are some high class people over on this side of the fence. My favorite fight that I've, the most fun I've ever had at an MMA event was Kimbo Slice versus Dada 5,000.

So I'm not above anything. This is right up my wheel. else. Casey Liden approves of what you just said, shot Al Shadi. But yeah, 1.8 million. There's no chance that's happening. But this fight will go down on August 29th. I think it'll be very close to a million if it doesn't do better than a million. But Jake Paul versus Tyron Woodley, the Sunday time slot, don't forget about that. But I do want to mention kind of lost in all of this. There's actually a title fight going down between Amanda Serrato and Yamlet Mercado,

which should be a really good fight. It's going to be sort of buried in this whole storyline between Paul and Woodley, but that is an excellent fight. And we look forward to that before the circus comes to town on August 29. We, of course, will have you covered heading into and on August 29th. Damon will be there here for M.A. fighting. With that, we're done. We gave this 21 minutes, and that was about seven minutes more than I thought we would. So for shot all shoddy, David Martin, I am Mike Eck.

Thank you so much for listening and enjoy the rest of your week.