Hasim Rahman Jr. hits back at Jake Paul’s “internet cap” following fight cancellation
After Jake Paul blamed Hasim Rahman Jr’s team for canceling their fight set for August 6, Rahman hit back claiming Jake’s explanation of the situation was “internet cap”.
Late on July 30, Jake Paul’s company Most Valuable Promotions announced the fight between Paul and Rahman Hasim Jr. would be canceled. There would be no new opponent, no reschedule, and ticket/PPV purchasers would be refunded.
Shortly thereafter, Paul would take to Twitter to post a video explaining his side of the situation. He claimed Hasim refused to lose the required to drop down to 205 pounds. Jake Paul, a cruiserweight, normally fights at around 190 pounds, while Rahman campaigns as a heavyweight at around 230 pounds.
Paul claimed Rahman refused to fight unless the weight limit was bumped up to 215 pounds resulting in Rahman’s team pulling out of the fight. But Hasim is telling a different story, blaming Paul for the fight being canceled, and accusing the problem child of being “too scared” to fight a real boxer.
Rahman Jr claps back at Paul over fight cancellation
After a flurry of tweets and retweets calling Jake Paul a “fraud” and denying that he was the one who backed out of the fight, Rahman posted a two-part video explaining the situation.
“Let me go ahead and kill all of this internet cap Jake Paul has going on for you all,” Hasim began. He stated that he had signed the contract to cut his weight down to 200 pounds within the 3 1/2 week period before the fight, but claimed his body wouldn’t let him get below 215 within that time frame.
Note that Rahman was meant to lose 30+ pounds over the course of three weeks. He continued, “Where in boxing do you see them canceling fights a whole week in advance? I didn’t even get my last week to get down as low as I could.” He also mentioned in a tweet that he didn’t get the chance to weigh in on August 5 which was stipulated in his contract.
“There’s penalties involved. Keep the purse. I’ll fight [Paul] for the $5,000 minimum. That’s how much this means to me,” Rahman Jr. stated. He went on to call out Jake Paul who often claims he bodied Rahman Jr. while sparing. “If you beat me up while I was 230 pounds, what’s the problem with fighting me while I’m at 215?”
Rahman Jr. denied having backed out of the fight and claimed Jake Paul’s team was the ones who didn’t want to fight. “The only thing I can conclude is that they’re scared,” stated Rahman Jr.
He backed this up with the fact that his team had another boxer in place if he couldn’t get down to 200-205. “If I wasn’t able to make that weight, they knew that we had a replacement on the side the whole time. He’s been everything I’ve been doing. The Muslim boxer Muhsin Cason.”
Cason, a 10-0 professional boxer, campaigns at cruiserweight which is the same weight class as Jake Paul. However, Rahman Jr. claims Paul backed out because he doesn’t want to fight a real fighter that he can’t drain.
Fans are taking sides as Paul and Rahman defend their camps. Many of them believe Rahman shouldn’t have signed the contract if he knew he couldn’t cut the weight. Interesting enough, in an interview that took place two weeks ago, professional boxer Shawn Porter predicted that Rahman wouldn’t be able to make the cut and that Paul’s team would cancel the fight while placing all of the blame on Hasim’s team.