UFC icon Conor McGregor throws his support behind BKFC star Mike Perry ahead of Jake Paul fight
It should come as no surprise that Conor McGregor is backing Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship’s golden boy Mike Perry to come out on top in his highly anticipated clash with YouTube sensation Jake Paul.
On Saturday, July 20, ‘Platinum’ will strap on the 10-ounce gloves for a boxing match with Paul at Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida. It will be Perry’s first traditional boxing match in nearly a decade.
Since then, the Flint, Michigan native has made a name for himself in both the UFC and as the premiere bare-knuckle brawler for BKFC, securing wins over a slew of former world champions, including Eddie Alvarez, Luke Rockhold, and Thiago Alves.
McGregor, who shocked the combat sports community in April by announcing that he’d purchased a piece of the BKFC, offered his support to ‘Platinum’ on social media while sharing a clip from Perry’s face-to-face interview with Jake Paul from earlier this week.
“@bareknucklefc in the house!” McGregor wrote on his Instagram stories.
Conor McGregor and ‘Iron’ Mike Tyson see their summertime returns delayed
Originally, ‘The Problem Child’ was scheduled to square off with former unified heavyweight world champion ‘Iron’ Mike Tyson. Unfortunately, Tyson was forced to bow out of the bout due to a medical emergency during a cross-country flight in May.
Luckily, the medical issue turned out to be nothing more than an ulcer flare-up. Still, Tyson was advised to discontinue training for the time being, forcing the pair to push their fight to November.
Meanwhile, Conor McGregor is still on a quest to take his “greatest comeback in combat sports history” from fantasy to reality. The former two-division titleholder was booked to headline UFC 303 on June 29 against former Bellator MMA champion Michael Chandler. However, McGregor withdrew from the bout after suffering a broken pinky toe in training.
Only needing a few short weeks to heal, McGregor suggested an August or September return date would be optimal. But with the UFC’s dance card pretty much full for most of 2024, who knows when or if we’ll actually see ‘Mystic Mac’ meet MMA’s version of ‘Iron.’
