The analyst in Paulie Malignaggi came out during his early years, shortly after the angry young teenager joined a boxing gym with the intent of learning how to win street fights. After a few months of training with mixed success, he made the breakthrough realization that if he could corral his emotion and exercise more discipline, more success would follow.
It did. Malignaggi saw immediate results, success that paved the way for his technical style and led to boxing world championships in two weight classes.
His combat sports career appeared to reach its end in the spring of 2017. A few months later, he agreed to help Conor McGregor prepare to fight Floyd Mayweather later that year. The Malignaggi-McGregor pairing proved to be disastrous, leading to a wide-ranging, international feud that has boiled ever since. In March, Malignaggi signed with Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship, partly because of the payday, and partly because he was offered the opportunity to fight McGregor’s proxy, MMA journeyman Artem Lobov. The fight takes place on Saturday, June 22.
On paper, Malignaggi should breeze through Lobov. The New Yorker finished with a 36-8 record and shared a boxing ring with stars like Miguel Cotto, Ricky Hatton, Zab Judah and Danny Garcia while Lobov is a sub-.500 mixed martial artist. Yet, for some reason, fight fans seem interested to see what will happen, or perhaps how things will develop.
In his quiet moments, Malignaggi can’t help but ask how he’s gotten here.
“I don’t think of it in a bad way,” Malignaggi told MMA Fighting. “I think of it like, thank god that this fan base in MMA is so f—king stupid that they actually have made this possible. A fight this easy is possible in a main event situation. That’s how I look at it. I look at it in a thankful way. From that perspective I say yeah, I can’t believe I’m here. I’ve been in the ring with top fighters, main events inside stadiums and the biggest arenas in the world. I’ve been announced as a world champion. Believe me, it all goes through my mind. And now, I’m fighting this guy, who I don’t think has ever fought a guy who’s been a world champion, let alone fight for a title. So I catch myself and say I can only be thankful. There’s no way realistically possible to have a fight this easy against a bum of this level unless there is a fan base this stupid.”
Some of this is pre-fight bluster, of course. Malignaggi has a gifted tongue and knows how to sell a fight, but some of it is genuine, too. He realizes that some MMA fans are just along for what they consider to be a fun diversion, or that they may be in Lobov’s corner in an MMA vs. boxing sort of way. But there is also a serious modern element to it. Regularly, Malignaggi sees the level of contempt, crassness and vulgarity directed his way on social media. His family sees those comments—“this gross s—t”—he wants to remind people.
“As an adult, you shrug that stuff off,” he said, “but I have nieces and nephews less than 10 years old that are exposed to this, and this is one of the things he has to pay for.”
Malignaggi expects Lobov to pay for it for however long it lasts. Some might consider this to be a high-risk situation for him because of his pedigree, but he looks at it differently. To him, this is an unwinnable battle for Lobov, who is in over his head.
That becomes clear when you ask him to put on his analyst’s hat for an assessment on Lobov’s boxing skills.
“Artem’s boxing? What boxing?” he said. “His fighting or whatever he does? I don’t really know. I struggle to find something positive about it. He’s a guy who’s tough, but then again, I know club fighters who fight in front of 500 people who are tough, too. I can’t say there’s anything that worries me past that. The thing is, I don’t have to make it up. Literally, everything he says to pump himself up, he has to make it up. Me? I’m legitimately telling you the truth when I tell you the guy can’t fight. The guy has no respectable boxing ability, and I have a hard time figuring how this fight’s going to be tough. I can legitimately say that, and if you watch his boxing, you know I’m telling the truth.”
Given their respective accolades, it’s difficult to question that assessment. When it comes to straight boxing, he is a maestro while Lobov sits at an intermediate level. There is an undeniable gap. But throw in the bare knuckle aspect and the complexion of the fight changes a bit. Even in his heyday, Malignaggi was never known as a big puncher. He was a technician, reliant on his hand speed, angles and footwork. He was an artist. Given that, he’s had friends and colleagues from the boxing world tell him he is “above this,” to little effect. It’s still a payday that exceeds what he can make commentating, and above that, he’s a fighter at heart.
Even if he is not committing to fighting past June 22, he plans to enjoy his return to the limelight, and to punish Lobov for everything that’s happened over the last two years.
“It’s going to be very bloody,” he said. “I’m going to beat him to a pulp.”
So, is there any chance these two follow the many that have gone before them and bury the rivalry after settling it in the ring? Malignaggi is coming for blood, but he’s willing to offer the shortest of olive branches.
“I expect an apology and an admittance of the lies,” he said. “If I get that, there can be respect, no problem. We’re both men, and we should be up front as men. I’ve been nothing but up front. I think if there was mutual respect, he would admit all they did was lie and were hyping things. Then we could have respect and be cool about it. But if he keeps lying about it, I might beat his ass again after I’m done.”