S Poddar
For example, boxing fans like me often scratch our heads while watching something that could be considered weird: Mike Tyson against Jake Paul. On paper, this is the main mismatch; this relic of the past faces a social media star. However, this odd pairing has captured the public’s imagination, raising questions about how sport and entertainment increasingly blur over one another.
Mark Borkowski, a seasoned PR guru, sees this circus from a very different perspective. He likens it to some sort of PT Barnum production, one engineered for the masses. Borkowski says it’s at the crossroads between the two big demographics, the Boomers and Gen Xers who hung on every swing of Tyson’s heyday, and the younger crowd transfixing on the social media personality of Jake Paul.
While it does not strictly fit the historical boxers’ standards, it is, without any doubt, a unique mixture of sport and entertainment. Borkowski does a very wise comparison regarding WWE by stating that this is much more about performance or presentation rather than raw athletic competition.
Another sports industry veteran, Adam Kelly, shares the same view. He says Tyson vs. Paul is all a testament to changing the world of sports media. Streaming giants like Netflix are significantly investing in more live sports because it represents that new avenue for attracting subscribers and revenue generation.
Such battles, Kelly writes, albeit embarrassing and widely debated within the sport, may be the alternative to increasing the audience of boxing. So this would be more sure to prolong and make the sport relevant for generations.
Still, no amount of commercialism could have been convincing or helpful enough to overcome the crippling objections of the skeptical critic against this fight, which really was filled with it. Indeed, hyperbolic promotion, the utterly exaggerated claims about Tyson’s body, and the circus-like atmosphere conjured up issues of sporting integrity.
The Tyson vs. Paul fight is a really interesting case study on the intersection of sport, entertainment, and commerce. Ultimately, it has brought to the fore the long-term desirability of celebrity, the transformative might of social media, and the insatiable appetite for spectacle. Only time will tell if it will become history or a footnote in the context of boxing.
