Fortune, as they say, favors the brave. But not every time, as Martin Bakole found out in his February 2025 clash against Joseph Parker in February 25, which he took on the shortest of notices, and the fight did not end well for him. But then again, there were good reasons why the fight was so disastrous for the heavyweight standout. The man was dealt a very, very bad hand. But what was his payment situation for stepping up at the last minute to save the highly touted ‘The Last Crescendo’ card? Let’s find out!
Martin Bakole’s purse for fighting Joseph Parker as Daniel Dubois’ replacement
Daniel Dubois, of course, sprung one of the greatest upsets in boxing history in September 2024. At the sold-out Wembley Arena, ‘Triple D’ absolutely demolished former unified heavyweight champ Anthony Joshua en route to a knockout victory and won the IBF strap. But before he could have his undisputed clash with Oleksandr Usyk (who holds the other three belts), the British heavyweight champ thought a tune-up fight was in order.
And they chose Joseph Parker, who himself was coming off great victories over knockout merchant, Deontay Wilder, and Zhilei Zhang. Dubois-Parker was set for February 22 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on ‘The Last Crescendo’ card. But fate had different plans. Dubois, just two days from the clash, was forced to pull out, and the fight was offered to Martin Bakole. But why in his right mind would the DRC native take the fight on two days’ notice, with literally zero preparation?
Well, we can think of two compelling reasons. One, Parker-Bakole was for the interim IBF title, so there was gold to fight for. But more importantly, reports suggested that the Saudis offered Bakole nearly $4 million to fight Parker on short notice. “Just keep in mind that 4 million USD was the lure for Martin Bakole to take that fight with Joseph Parker on 2 days’ notice,” said Rick Glaser in his tweet.
Moreover, a report shared by ‘The Sun’ confirmed what Glaser mentioned. According to the report, the purse for the Parker-Bakole hovered at the $11.4 million ballpark. The lion’s share of $7.6 million for the interim heavyweight champion, Joseph Parker, and $3.8 million for the challenger, Bakole.
So there were no expectations from Bakole to win the fight, which means there was no pressure on him. In addition, he was fighting for a title (an interim title, but a title nonetheless) and was getting potentially life-changing money for the fight. The real question should be, why wouldn’t Bakole take the fight? But let’s be clear, the African heavyweight was in no shape to fight, as was evident from his weight for the fight.
Martin Bakole’s shocking weight against Joseph Parker
Martin Bakole is a big guy, to put it mildly. And he didn’t have any time to cut weight for the Joseph Parker fight. In fact, Parker was still travelling by the time Joseph Parker was weighing in. But still, the Democratic Republic of Congo native’s weight did come as a shock to some.
Usually, Bakole fights in the 280-300 pound range, but for the Parker fight, he weighed in at a whopping 310 pounds. Thankfully, the heavyweight division in boxing (unlike MMA) has no upper limit, so that wasn’t an issue. If anything, some were hoping that all this extra mass might help the African fighter knock out Parker quickly.
But unfortunately, that was not what happened. In fact, quite the opposite! Parker knocked out Bakole in the second round with a fantastic overhand right. All in all, Parker-Bakole was pretty strange and wild. But no one can deny that it was also pretty memorable precisely because of its strangeness. What are your thoughts on the purse situation on Bakole-Parker?
The post How Much Was Martin Bakole Paid for Joseph Parker Last Minute Fight? appeared first on EssentiallySports.
