Mike Tyson needs Jake Paul for one last monstrous payday as £77.5m controversial fight looms – how did the Problem Child become boxing’s payday king and rival Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua at the box office?

Watching Jake Paul and Mike Tyson have a fight – with a 31-year age difference no less – is like urinating in a swimming pool. You know it’s wrong, but you do it anyway (so I hear).

Why is Iron Mike lacing his gloves up again nearly 20 years after his last professional bout? This contest will count on his professional record of 50 wins and six losses (with two no contests) – who could have thought a charismatic YouTuber turned somewhat professional boxer could entice one of the sport’s giants to don the ring once more?

Remember when Tyson quit on his stool against Kevin McBride and proceeded to tell everyone he only fought for the money and he didn’t love boxing anymore?

I’m sure he’s rekindled his love for boxing over the years just as I’m sure his love for a payday burns strong. And make no mistake; Tyson was the box office sensation in his prime that carried boxing to new heights but in today’s landscape, Paul is the pay-per-view king.

Despite evidence suggesting the event is struggling to sell-out the AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas – or even half selling it out – the fact that Netflix have paid big money to secure the fight means not a single soul could turn up on the night and both men will take home tens of millions of dollars.

Paul will reportedly bank $40million for his troubles in Texas while Tyson will walk away with at least $20m, a number which could almost double depending on how how the fight performs. Even Amanda Serrano and Katie Taylor II in the ‘co-main event’ will take home around $15m between them.

Back in the late 1980s and early 90s, Tyson was a tsunami blitzing his way through the sport. A devastating knockout artist seldom seen with such speed and ferocity that showcased his explosive peak-a-boo style, Tyson made it so you just had to buy his fights.

The world was much smaller then. Being the most famous man on earth was the rarest of air. Now the same level of fame can be attained from doing something stupid on a stream. Back then, Tyson dominated front and back pages of the newspapers as his high profile romances ended in costly divorces and ultimately, prison.

The New York-native spent three years in prison after being convicted of rape in 1992. Of course, with the fall of a hero comes the intrigue of his redemption and Iron Mike would sit on the heavyweight throne once more after being paroled. Within three fights of his release, he defeated Frank Bruno for the WBC heavyweight title. Within four fights, he had unified that with the WBA title.

The very first major pay-per-view event went down in 1981 between Sugar Ray Leonard and Tommy Hearns, but as if he were a superhero franchise ripe for making a movie, Tyson burst onto the scene and shattered all previous records for years of box office dominance.

Conor McGregor did it in UFC if you need a more recent reference point. His star shined so bright that he raised UFC with him. A rising tide lifts all boats and all that. Well, Tyson did the same with boxing.

Floyd Mayweather took over the mantle once Tyson retired, but the latter still has several fights with over one million pay-per-views sold and nearly $500m made in just fight revenue during his career.

His first fight out of prison against Peter McNeeley in 1996 grossed 1.55m buys. His 2020 exhibition against fellow legend Roy Jones Jr is said to have garnered 1.6m, a fraction under what his first clash with Evander Holyfield attracted. The second bout – fresh after Tyson bit a chunk out of Holyfield’s ear – banked 1.99m buys and earned him $30m.

But now, at 58-years-old, Tyson is going to stand toe-to-toe with Paul. A man who has forged a career out of beating relatively famous athletes from other sporting worlds – mostly MMA – in a boxing ring.

Paul has a net worth of reportedly $80m and he made a whopping $38m from his three professional fights against Ben Askren and Tyron Woodley twice. That only moved him to 5-0, a time in Tyson’s career where he would have been earning peanuts.

Tyson’s first big payday was a $27m, eight-fight contract with HBO in 1987, some 28 fights into his career. Adjusted for inflation, that’s worth about $74m today and took him right up to his first career loss, the infamous humbling at the hands of Buster Douglas in 1990.

The Problem Child, as Paul, a man storming towards 30, has donned himself, has parlayed his 20.8m YouTube following a massive social audience (currently sitting at around 50m people across all platforms) into pay-per-view customers. He has consistently broken 500k pay-per-view orders, including showdowns with Tommy Fury (which reportedly did around 800k), Nate Diaz, Anderson Silva and Mike Perry.

As a reference point, Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez is among the leading names in the sport today and his last fight with Edgar Berlanga did a reported 650k buys.

That’s arguably the biggest name in the sport at present. Paul, a man who has only ever fought three ‘true’ boxers – and he lost to one of them – is right there rubbing shoulders with him,

Anthony Joshua vs Daniel Dubois raked in 850k buys and the Undisputed heavyweight title fight between Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk saw 1.5m buys, according to ESPN.

Although breathing similar kind of air, Paul’s numbers are a little lower than the tippy-top names in the sport. However, his skill level is not in the same realm as the aforementioned names. So if Iron Mike wanted to make a buck or two and actually have a chance, of course Paul is his man.

More to the point, how is Paul the box office star over Tyson in this equation? The numbers appear lower, but Paul takes home more money because of his deal. Most Valuable Promotions is his own company and deals he has worked out with Triller, DAZN and Showtime have meant he pockets far higher percentages than typical fighters.

The $40m he is about to take home from his clash with Tyson is a fee the Gypsy King had never seen for a single outing prior to his undisputed heavyweight title fight, in Saudi Arabia no less. He had to head to the Gulf State and partake in the apex of his profession to secure that payday and all props to him for it. We want to see fighters paid.

Paul? He’s had to fight a 58-year-old legend. Tyson’s appeal will play its part in this rapacious marketing; can the once Baddest Man on the Planet finally be the one to knock out the very deliberately annoying YouTuber trying to be a boxer?

But in reality, Paul has and can get paydays without Tyson. It doesn’t work the other way around; you can’t put the former two-time world champion in there with AJ and Fury, he needs the younger Paul brother to get his biggest available payday.

It’s the perfect marriage in that sense. Sure, it’s an uncomfortable idea having Paul pulverise a living legend. It’s a worry for him physically, let alone the idea Paul will tell us about it for eternity, like beating up a 58-year-old man, even a formidable being like Tyson, is a coup.

You’d hope we get one last rabid Tyson display, one last animalistic finish that satisfies the Paul hate-watchers and Tyson-adorers alike. More likely, we get a contest that meanders after an early onslaught and both men safely see their way through proceedings.

Whatever the outcome, both men will be paid generation changing sums. They won regardless. And for that, Tyson will have to celebrate how Paul has disrupted the boxing industry as many of his peers have sternly opposed.