There are a great many boxing critics, willing to say anything behind a screen. Almost all of them, however, would be shown up as soon as they lace up the gloves themselves, which is exactly what happened here.
Former world champion Shawn Porter is set to livestream his spar with internet troll Ray Jackson, but this is not the first time a fighter has invited a critic into their gym for some work.
Just over two years ago, a British flyweight world champion invited an internet troll much larger than him into his gym for a spar, to show him how boxing really works.
As you can imagine, it did not end well for the troll.
Sunny Edwards leaves internet troll begging for a bucket to vomit in
Ahead of the spar, Sunny Edwards‘ troll, Fabrizio, actually praised the flyweight, stating he has impressive skills and has never been knocked out, but that he believes he was able to beat him, despite never boxing before.
Fabrizio said: “The dream is to make him sit one time in four rounds.”
When the interviewer, Boxing King Media, told Edwards this, he said with a smirk: “Much bigger and much better have tried. […] You can’t actually come up to my gym and challenge me, like I can’t believe I was sat at home and someone was at my gym, my head went.”
The rounds were about as one-sided as anyone would expect, and Fabrizio’s lack of boxing experience really did show.
The boiling point came when Fabrizio was left leaning over the ropes, on his knees, saying “I need to vomit.”
Edwards summarised the spar: “This is the difference between someone who trains five or six times a day, for 17 years, and someone who hasn’t done any boxing before in his life.”
Edwards, who is now retired after his stoppage loss to Galal Yafai, did give Fabrizio his respect though. Teddy Atlas believes Yafai ‘knocked the fight out of’ Edwards, and Edward’s coach revealed he was gutted after Edwards claimed ‘I don’t even want to be here’ in between rounds against Yafai.
‘Lesson learned’… Fans react to Sunny Edwards vs internet troll
Fans were quick to react to the spar, with many praising Edwards’ restraint, opting not to seriously hurt the troll despite him challenging him.
One said: “I like how Sunny punished him while still taking it very easy on him. I know some other fighters that would’ve flattened him badly or seriously hurt him (which would still be his own fault for showing up to challenge a pro), but I definitely respect Sunny’s restraint. Lesson learned (hopefully)”
Others showed respect to the troll, noting it takes a lot of courage to show your face after trolling on social media, let alone to step in the ring with a world champion:
“Fair play to both guys. The twitter troll for actually showing some bottle and turning up, and Sunny for how he handled the situation. Lots of pros would have really dished out a beating, but Sunny showed a lot of good character and class by not doing that.”