JAKE PAUL has been warned by one of his ex-coaches that piling on the pounds to fight Mike Tyson could come back to haunt him.
The YouTuber-turned-boxer faces the returning Tyson on Friday in Texas for a clash that has attracted controversy due to the age gap.
Not only will it mark Netflix’s first move into live boxing but also Paul’s debut fight at heavyweight.
He has boasted at weighing as much as 225lb (16 stone) which is almost TWO STONE heavier than his last bout at cruiserweight.
BJ Flores – who spent three years as Paul’s head trainer – cast concern over the sudden jump up in weight.
Flores told SunSport: “Sometimes you go where the money’s at and the opportunity was big for Jake to fight Mike on Netflix.
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“Obviously at 225lb – that’s what they’re saying he’s weighing – that’s a little big for me.
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“I like Jake at 200lb, fighting at 200 then going straight to 225, I don’t care who you’re fighting that’s a big jump, but there’s a lot of adjustments Jake’s gonna have to make.
“Hopefully he’s made them in camp but once you get in there, you feel the weight, you do feel the extra weight when your last fight was at 200, now you’re at 225. It’s a big difference.
“So that will be the interesting thing to watch with this fight. Mike is naturally walking around at 235/240. He’s used to that.
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“Jake’s not used to going from 200 to 225 though. And that’s going to be interesting to see how he deals with that if he’s made those adjustments in camp.”
Under Flores, Paul campaigned mainly at 190lb (13st 5lb) and even as light as 185 (13st 2lb).
So he is expected to jump almost THREE STONE by the time he shares the ring with heavyweight great Tyson.
But Paul has talked up a move down to cruiserweight straight after – where he set his sights on a lofty world title challenge.
So Flores is warning ahead of time that his former pupil faces a fight to just to get the weight off first.
He said: “I don’t like it. I think it’s tough to go up and go down in weight. I think it’s very hard on the body, especially at a young age.
“We’ve seen guys try to do it before Chris Byrd. We’ve seen Roy Jones try to do it.
“We’ve seen other guys, other fighters try to go up and then back down. It’s always been tough.
“So I would advise Jake kind of staying up in weight, kind of keeping it up right there and not trying to drop back down to 200.”
Source: Boxing - thesun.co.uk
