Jake Paul is making a mockery of boxing – however fighters calling him out are simply as dangerous

Some of the biggest names in the sport couldn’t help themselves last weekend.

They saw the numbers roll in. The 108m viewers on Netflix, the £15m live gate at the AT&T Stadium and they fancied a bit of it. Now retired fighters like Tony Bellew and Carl Froch are almost understandably piping up to keep themselves relevant.

But it is nothing but sad to see the likes of undisputed cruiserweight king Artur Beterbiev and IBF heavyweight title holder Daniel Dubois trying to put their names in the mix to fight Jake Paul. Now we know that Dubois didn’t pick up his phone and send a private message to Paul on social media. He probably had no idea it was done.

The British boxer doesn’t own a smartphone for a start so is not running his social media accounts. But the fact one of his team thought it was a bright idea just shows the sorry state of the sport.

Of course, Paul is going to bring in big numbers when he’s fighting Mike Tyson, even if he’s 58 years old. It’s a YouTube star taking on a figure who transcended boxing and went into the mainstream. There’s kids these days that know him for knocking someone out in a movie more than being the youngest heavyweight champion in history.

But take most sports and throw in an ultra-popular YouTube star and the numbers would fly. Boxing allows these circus acts to take over and disrupt the sport.

You can argue what happened last week is not bad for boxing but, trust me, people were laughing at the sport and when the real fights roll round then punters are less likely to buy in if they’ve been conned by the nonsense. Yet in the days after, the queue was growing for more. There were even people trying to talk Tyson into a third fight with Evander Holyfield.

The likes of Paul have created this mess of the sport being treated as something to play with. But boxing only has itself to blame when it plays along with it.

Have the likes of Beterbiev and Dubois not earned enough Saudi millions? Do they really have to be degraded by their PR arms with the begging bowl out to fight a guy who can’t beat Tommy Fury?

Paul is playing the sport as a collective fool. The problem is so many are playing to his tune now.