Former Boxing Champion Paulie Malignaggi Talks Bare-knuckle Boxing And Are Social Media Influencers Ruining Boxing

What are your other thing? Well, let me tell you this. I've been in over twenty barre knuckle fights before in my life and uh, I never got paid for none of them. So that's what we did back in Prince Orcani, Maryland, where I grew up at. Uh it was just part

of the culture anyway. Got a former boxing champ here, Pauli Mala Nagi UM today it's just a UM was a great fighter, great broadcast or two by the way, and now's working B y B bare knuckle boxing and they got a huge event coming up, I believe sometime in July. So I'll let him talk about it. But it's gonna be great, man. We'll get into uh what happened with my bare knuckle as well. Were part of the country you are right now. I'm on Florida, right, Oh,

you're in Florida. Yeah, I stay down here part of the time. Actually it's been most of the time lately, but but let's stay down here. Yeah. So, so are they still holding the bare knuckle down there? And um yeah in Florida? Right, yeah, yeah they do. Uh uh, I mean a Florida one of the first days to open up to Bare Knuckle, but not there's a there's a lot of action but going on. You know, I just worked on the y B Show last month and I'm working in one next month as well. Uh. So

it's uh, it's getting a lot of popularity. Is picking up a lot of steams down here, and I think you can pick up a lot of momental see. But it's really exciting way of fighting, you know, short fights, a lot of blood, a lot of action, not a lot of space in there, especially with B I B with the trigonell. I mean about that because I'm trying to So it's a it's a triangle, right, it's a it's a tring. It's a triangle with ropes, So think

about it. Think about a triangle. You know, when you're in the corner of the ropes are kind of close to you, you know, So it's not like a square where you can kind of slide from one rope to the other and kind of get yourself out of there. You're stuck on the corners, in one of the corners, and a trygon it's a lot more difficult to get out out of that corner than it is being stuck

in the corner in a boxing ring. I mean, in the boxing ing is already diffult to get out of the corner, but in a try gun it's even harder because the ropes are tight in those corners, you know, I mean, you have nowhere to go. You can't slide

off one side of the rope to the other. So what I noticed with B y B the first car I worked, every single fight ended in the knockout because between the band uncles you see a lot of blood, and the trygon doesn't give you a lot of space for any kind of maneuverability, you know, so you have to kind of know what you're doing and then fight your way out of those problems, or be smarter not get yourself into those problems, and not get yourself backed

up too much because the trygon. Another thing about it is is not that big, so one too steps backwards and all of a sudden getting close to one of those three points in the ring in the try gone, and then you've got a problem. So, uh, it really was good action. I think it's really good for this generation. This generation kind of has that kind of has that it's a gratification. You know, their smart phones, they want

everything at once. They don't have a lot of patients and there's not a lot really a big feel out process and the try goon. Uh, you don't really have a chance to do that. You gotta get right to and you gotta get right the business. So I think it's gonna have a lot of success, not for sure if you think about it, because of how it's how it was built. If you do slide down, the rope is actually pushing you back down to the middle. Yeah, I mean, then you've got no joys but to fight.

You know me, I'm always a kind of guy even want to think my bare uncle, but I'm the kind of got to use a lot of maneuverability and ring generaship. You know. Um, if I was to fight in a try Gone, I think somebody with my style would have problems because the trygon itself doesn't give you a lot of options for that. You know. It's really a very

unique uh fighting surface, uh fighting type of ring. You know. Um, it's very unique and uh if you're not there to fight, if you're there to the waste time, you know, because again that's another thing in the ring, in the in the circle that I bought in with the KFC. Uh, in an octagon, you can maneuver a little bit and waste some time. You know. You can pick your spots to fighting and pick your spots to rest. What I noticed about the Trigon is it didn't give you a

lot of thought that all those options. I mean, you're kind of pushed into a situation where you're either fighting or you're trapped. And then when you're trapped, you're gonna have to fight anyway, but from the worst position. No, and I'll go back to even when you had you a bare knuckle, do you think do you think bare knuckle is more about skill or it's more about because obviously you're you're a more skill fighter when you when you had your last fight. Yeah, Um, I think I

think it's about skill. You just it's just that, you know, uh, you're dealing with the fan base is a little bit stupid and and the judges are a little bit stupid, you know, so they gotta kind of get educated in the art of fist to fifth hand to hand combat. You know. Uh. Actually I'm doing them at the service by telling a little bit stood actually really stupid they live.

They're the dumbest fans of sports. But and then the obviously the dumbest judges too, because I don't think that the fight I had even one hand that I did break my hand, but I didn't think it was that difficult to judge when I watched it over. Um, I thought I wanted pretty easily, uh, despite the fact that I had to fight in a more tactical way because I ended up one handed. But regardless, Um, it does take skill. I don't know if it's gonna be appreciated,

but it does take skill. I mean, you can the ability to hit and not get hit. You need that in any form of combat. You can't just walk be a punching bag and just walk through shots, although in bare knuckles the impact is not as heavy as it is with boxing gloves. And the reason I say this is because you cannot load your shots consistently with a

bare nuncle fight. You are able to load up your shots consistently with a small eight or ten outs glove, where it's enough padding to protect your hands but not enough padding to protect the person getting hit. So therefore it is I think there's more traumatic brain injury risk in boxing and professional boxing, and there is a bare nuncle. So you do sometimes get the thing that some guys just want to walk through the shots, even if they're gonna get caught up and beat up and and and

it does make for a lot of action. It's safer, but it looks more brutal. And so I think from that perspective and the fighters that fights are quicker and you get more action and people can enjoy it. I guess, you know, because that's what they're looking for. Fox Sports Radio has the best sports talk lineup in the nation. Catch all of our shows at Fox sports Radio dot com and within the I Heart Radio app search f s R to listen live. When I signed on to

do my my Barrey Nicle, fight. A couple of years ago, I signed him to do the other bullshit lead the b KFC another big uh C but w b K. I forgot what those plans were. They on Ken Shack Yeah, no, no, not the one with Ken Shamrock. It was another one that was gonna do that was in Wyoming, right, so I and I sned that was the first thing. So

I signed on to do that. And obviously that there were a bunch of scumbags and promoter, you know, the promoters and all that, the owners of the league, um, and I end up suing them and actually you know one and went after them. You know something, you know, it's funny you mentioned that when I thought the b KFC fight, I think everybody, everybody unfortunatelybody gets grouped together. They had kind of given a bad uncle a bad name, those promoters, and they said, yo, make sure you get paid.

A lot of guys didn't get paid. And then the guy Dave felt and assured me that he was like, NA, I'm not the same guy, I'm gonna pay you. And they did pay me to their credit. But I heard I heard about that promotion. Unfortunately gave that. I gave the whole support up bad start. It was, it was bad. Actually, they tried to lower my pay fifty nine days before the fight, so we already got a contract for half

a million dollars. So I said, okay, cool, I was gonna fight Mike Board, right, So you know me, I had plenty of big bare knuckles, you know, for free. You know, I mean the locker room video playing over free. So in my head when everybody was asking me about the bare knuckle, oh man, you're crazy, You're crazy, I said, dude, I have been about twenty five ofties in my life and I ain't got paid for none of them, right, yeah, and honestly for me, And that's why, and that's why

I didn't like. I wasn't for me. I wasn't. It was smart for me because I wasn't gonna go find another boxer. I'm gonna fight you know, guys. Look, he's older, he's an old m m A guy. He's gonna big go these big, wounding punches, and he's gonna move slow, and I can move around him and get in and out of stuff and keep my distes keep tagging off on him. So for me, I was just like, I'm gonna just go and just mop this guy up, get my half a million plus and just walk out the door.

It's light work for me. But you know that whole thing I was like, people want to understand on the on the bare knuckles side, as tactical it is. As tactical it is. You hit a guy in the right spot, it don't take much, not like, so you don't have to load up with him. Yeah. And also I feel like in bare knuckles you notice a lot of knockouts

and aren't really knockouts. What happens is I think the psychology of people getting hit with bare hands, the blood, they they psyche themselves out, you know what I mean. When I was in there, even the shots that did hit me, it wasn't that many, but it didn't me. I mean, I felt like, honestly, I wasn't getting hit, and I felt like, you know, it does not you know, And like I said that, you know, like you said,

I mean, you've been in free fights. I've been in some street fights earlier in my life too, you know, um my high school days and especially I was on the smaller kid. But but I mean, it's not anywhere near the amount of pain that you feel with a hounds glove. I mean those those shots gett loaded off,

those gotta know how to throw punches. Idea to me was a whole different level of pain when it was professional boxing, and I think the statistics will show that because people actually die in professional box people get traumatic injuries and professional boxing, so for me, there's no violence

like professional boxing. But but it was a situation where it's mostly m m A fans, you know, And so because of the most Amain fans I think about m m A fans is and m A the emory culture is because their support is mixed martial arts, they think they have they hold they they kind of hold the final call in anything that has to do with combat.

And when any what has to do is punching and grappling and whatever and whatever, boxing things know that what they're talking about when it comes to hand to hand combat. So the funny thing about there was, you know, you know, you see m A fans kind of trying to be the bll ND goal when it comes to that for boxing.

Fins will know better if the fight, if fight goes to the ground and you don't see a box ifin telling you all abou at it like you know what it's supposed to be this way, this way, but you do seem main fans assuming to know about the hand to hand combat that boxers really understanding. And I think that's where the whole, uh, the whole lack of good judging came in my fight and also the lack of

you know, intelligent fans you know, uh. But I do think when it came to Baron uncle, they they had something against me that because it was never main judges unfortunately doesn't go into boxing, so they're using main judges. And I feel like because I abused their sport um, and I abused their fans and say people that you know, they wanted to kind of get me, and I gave them recently get me by letting that fight be close, um,

but all the day was making abuse them more. I mean, you either know you don't you know what I'm saying, like, you don't know what you're talking about. But you know, when it came to that, h did you find did you so? You and you didn't end up getting to do it, That's what you're saying. No, No, I never I never got to do it, and thank god I didn't, because you know, you go. First of all, I'm not getting on the plane unless you know in my bank account,

like I'm not going nowhere. That that was it, and that's that's what ultimately triggered me not not having to fight, because you know, when they told me why, I start getting word a few weeks before the fight that these guys wasn't who they who they say they were, And so I said, you know what, let me let me check on this. So I had them to try to put fifty of the fight person in in that's grow right, And so I said, you know, put it there and then I'll get on the plane. And then that's when

they try to negotiate with me. And I said, guys, it ain't it's not happening, mind you. I'm spawring all professional boxers for two months leading up to this. Man, at that point, you've committed to the camp too, that's right, you know, I'm spawing with James the Beast Wilson. I got all these pros coming in there, and these dudes are you know, they got fifty plus fight till they go putt You're putting in that work, right? And then

and then what and then for what? Right? You know, that's I always can't stand when the thing to fall things fall out of the last minute because you don't know the work you put in. Sometimes in your mind you already already spending the money in your mind, Like how we can't stand that because then because then it just all comes apart and it's never gonna hit your bain account. How do you feel about what's what's going

on with this? Uh, this whole? Like I would do you necessarily call it boxing with Jake Paul and everybody's doing? I mean, do you do you classify that as boxing? Though? Is that like a freak show? You know? At first I said, you know, when it's a niche um if they generate the money to deserve the money, right, which which general gen con generally speak. Yeah, that's capitalism. You know, if you generate the money, you know, you're allowed you

you're supposed to be paying that money. Right. It's not fair, No, it's not fair as far as if you live in a fail world. The guys who work harder and put in the work and all the better fighters get should get paid that much, of course, But unfortunately life is not fair, and uh, unfortunately the high skill fighters cannot be appreciated this same way. There's always the sayings told me ignorance. Ignorance cannot appreciate that. If you take me to an art museum, I'll see a bunch of paints

on the wall. Sometimes they just throw a bunch of paint on the wall. Obvious that's on art, you know what I mean. And somebody talk you have that paintings work whatever, And for me, I don't get. I don't get how good you know. So so there's the same thing. Will combat supports I think the ly level of combat supports sometimes it's not appreciated because people are too stupid

to appreciate it. And so you know when you got a Jake Paul and you got uh the logan Paul and you got up these YouTubers now, because I'll tell you what I could have. I could be okay with the log with the Paul brothers. They've got years into this now. But now it's like every social media guy he's got a little bit of a following, he's now wants looking to fight because they realize it's like the most popular kid in of high school fighting the other

popular kid in high school. Nobody cares about the nerd, even if he's got a black black brother, and you just but the two more five ular kids in the school of fighting after school, the whole school's gonna be talking about it, right, So this is kind of like a high school mentality where these kids, these guys have a following. It doesn't matter if they can't fight. They got into five people want to see it, you know,

they just go and find another celebrity. Doesn't even have to be a boxing which most of the time it's not even another boxes and uh and all of a sudden, you know, you got fights that people want to watch, and you've got on the other end, these world class fighters battling with each other risk in their lives. You know, you can clearly see the talent if there's somebody like me who understands the talent level, but people can't appreciate

it enough to order it and watch it. You know, so it's generating more money again, dumb generations, stuper generation. You know. So, um, do I think it's gonna last? I mean it may last for a while. I mean, you got had one of these guys who actually started thinking he's got Corey p actually started with me. He's like a TikTok or a YouTuber and had a radio radio show in New York and I feel like, uh, it's not gonna go away until somebody hurts one of

these guys. Hey so so so tell me, man, what what's to tell me a little bit about the next event? Do you all got coming up? It's kind of four long ago in July the sixteen. Uh, all I can tell people is right now. Obviously band uncles new, uh b y p is new, but the band uncle, the sport of band uncle boxing has picked up a lot of momentum. A lot of people didn't literally believe in

it when it first came out. You know, they started having these fights like now it's kind of it's kind of uh dated, you know they were doing a hundred years ago and after it's moved on. But you know something, and I said, I think it's really really good for the modern generation. Why do I say that? Because the modern generation wants that instant gratification, They want that sue,

that that that that instant result. They don't want to sit through a fight where people have to kind of uh kind of uh, you know, you have the patience to see it on fold and understand attack of the aspect of it. They don't understand that and they don't know that. Um. But either way, if you look up B y B B y B bare knuckle extreme bare Nuncle on July sixteen, I'm sure it'll it'll come up in your search engine. But it's quick fights. I mean it's supposed to be five rounds, but the show I work,

none of them last than five rounds. That try Gon is a crazy, crazy thing place to fight in. Man, I'm telling you, okay, hey, al right, my dude. I appreciate you coming old man. I'll let you get back to doing your thing. I appreciate you. Sean, Thank you, man, thank you. Thanks guys, listening to another lights out podcast me Sean Ramon and uh, how was that? You know?

The uh, the bare knuckle look. You know, even though you know I have lights of extremee fighting and obviously I'm always talking to with me and uh, I also love boxing, you know. I look at barre knuckle is is a you know, you gotta have a stomach for this. It's one of these things that if you'd like to see it and and and you like to see uh, you know the viciousness of the sport. Then you know

a lot of people watch it. You know, it's it's also funny what to hear PAULI talk about, you know, Jake paul and when he thinks about the boxing world and how he looked at him and make fighters and so forth. So that was great, man. I appreciate Pauli for coming on. So thank you guys for listening to another lights Out podcast and me Sean Merriman and uh we'll be back with another next week. Thank you, require

I forget. Thanks again for all the great reviews. Um we just passed over a hundred and seventy five thousand monthly listeners. Um so that's that's awesome, all because of you guys. So I appreciate it again