Fury Stuns Paul With Split-Decision Win
By Alden Smith ‘23
On Sunday night, at Diriyah Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Tommy Fury handed YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul his first career loss. Fury defeated Paul through a split decision in the eight-round fight, despite being knocked down in the final round. The judges scored the fight 76-73 twice for Fury and 75-74 once for Paul. Although Paul disagreed with the judges' decision—drawing boos from the crowd—he admitted that he lost and didn't perform his best. Both fighters had a point deduction for hitting the back of each other's head in the later rounds. Fury almost doubled Jake’s punch output, with Fury landing 88 compared to just 49 from Paul. Fury threw several blows of his own to keep the advantage and grab the split-decision win.
This fight was Paul's biggest to date, having fought only MMA fighters, another YouTuber, and a former NBA player in the ring. With most people, Jake Paul’s notorious reputation precedes him; Jake’s opponent, Tommy Fury, however, has a much lower profile.
Tommy Fury, whose nickname is TNT, made his professional boxing debut in 2018. Since then he’s fought and won eight matches, four of them by knockout. Tommy is the half-brother of boxing’s former heavyweight champion Tyson Fury. The Fury brothers’ father, John Fury, was a professional boxer as well, and is who inspired the brothers to enter the sport as teenagers. Despite his already successful career and famous family, Tommy Fury is most known for his role on the British reality television hit series Love Island. In 2019, he stepped away from his boxing career to join the show, and he ended up finishing in second place, garnering attention from fans of the show across the world. Shortly after the show’s season concluded, Fury returned to the ring scoring a first-round technical knockout victory. Fury was originally scheduled to fight Paul in December 2021 but pulled out due to a “severe chest infection and broken rib”.
The fight was rescheduled for August 2022 in the US, but Fury was not allowed entry to the country. In the weeks before the match, both fighters trash-talked heavily over social media and in press conferences. “Boxing is about skill and class and this man doesn't have any of it,” Fury said about Jake in an interview with Sky Sports.
Paul entered Sunday’s contest with a lopsided fan advantage over Fury, but Tommy displayed better boxing skills and secured the win nonetheless. The bout was sold on the premise that it would settle the question of whether Jake Paul, a social media influencer with wins against a retired basketball player and retired M.M.A. fighters, could defeat a legitimate boxer. Tommy Fury proved haters wrong around the world and gave Jake Paul his long-awaited welcome to the real world of boxing.