Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson – where do we even begin? Putting these two names next to each other itself drew the ire of many fight fans, but having them throw down in the boxing ring really sent some alarm bells ringing. Like, how could one match a 58-year-old retired boxing legend with a 27-year-old who made his name off of retired out-of-their-prime MMA fighters? Even on paper, the idea seemed absurd. In practice, however, one talking point making the rounds is whether the fight wasn’t real. This talking point was raised by Josh Brolin on the latest episode of ‘The Joe Rogan Experience’.

In episode #2232 of JRE, the Oscar-nominated actor, Josh Brolin sarcastically raised the question, “The Tyson vs. Jake fight – wasn’t that amazing?”. As soon as he asked the question, the duo burst out laughing as the JRE host winked his eye and clicked his tongue at his acknowledgment of Brolin’s joke. What Josh Brolin was alluding to is that the highly anticipated boxing match between ‘Iron Mike’ and ‘The Problem Child’ was perhaps scripted.

Regardless of whether or not the fight between Tyson and Paul was scripted, Rogan appreciated the amount of money Paul and Tyson pocketed from the bout. He said, “It’s amazing they got paid so much for that – I think 20 and 40 [million dollars], yeah. I think that’s what I heard.” Nevertheless, the relief in Rogan’s voice as he talked about Tyson coming out uninjured was pretty clear. He continued, “You know, which I’m happy Mike got the money, and I’m happy he didn’t get hurt. That was my fear that it was going to be a real fight and he was going to get hurt.” 

Among the many idols of Joe Rogan, Mike Tyson is up there on his list, going by the latter’s three appearances on JRE. In conversation with Josh Brolin, Rogan spoke about him looking up to Tyson as a child – “He was like, larger than life figure of my childhood. When I was a kid, when he was the champ, it was like, people don’t understand what a champ he was. Like, he was a, he wasn’t just the heavyweight champion of the world. He was an executioner. Every fight was just a matter of how long was it going to last.”

Jake Paul faced Mike Tyson on November 15th at the AT&T Arena in Arlington, Texas. While the marketing for this fight was off the roof, the actual fight turned out quite abysmal, with Mike Tyson’s age showing against the young Jake Paul, and him only landing 18 out of 97 shots throughout eight, three-minute rounds. While the whole world, including Joe Rogan, hoped for a miracle in Tyson’s victory, the outcome of the fight reminded us all of life’s ground reality, i.e., ‘age catches up to everyone’.

Joe Rogan faces a reality check after Jake Paul defeated Mike Tyson

In hindsight, one shouldn’t be surprised at the outcome of Mike Tyson’s showing against Jake Paul. After all, where in history have we seen a fight as big as this have two opponents 30 years apart? Furthermore, we can’t blame someone for leaning into rumors of that fight being fixed. For Joe Rogan, the highly-anticipated bout was a stark reminder that past accolades for aging legends do not come in their favor when going up against someone relatively younger and closer to their prime.

On the eve of the fight between ‘The Problem Child’ and ‘The Baddest Man On The Planet’, Rogan took to X (formerly Twitter) to voice his thoughts on the bout. No doubt, the JRE host was rooting for the former WBC heavyweight champion, as he wrote, “I’m getting ready to watch this Tyson vs Jake Paul fight like I’m watching someone cast a spell that I hope actually works. And I don’t really believe in magic. But I want to believe”. 

Even though the UFC color commentator wanted to believe that Tyson had a chance against Paul, he knew that a 58-year-old boxer stood no chance of winning against his much younger opponent. When Jake Paul won via decision against a visibly slower Mike Tyson, Rogan replied to his own post on X, saying, “Magic isn’t real.”

What do you think of Josh Brolin’s speculation that Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson was scripted? Let us know in the comments down below.