Ben Askren has denied his fight with Jake Paul was rigged.
The former UFC star was knocked out inside two minutes of the first round in his boxing bout when Paul hit him with a massive right hand.
After Askren was floored the referee quickly waved off the contest, giving YouTuber-turned-boxer Paul his third professional victory inside the squared circle.
But considering Askren survived much more punishment from Robbie Lawler in his UFC debut and was seen laughing and smiling with his wife backstage shortly after the fight, many felt as though there was something fishy about the bout.
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UFC stars Colby Covington and Aljamain Sterling both tweeted that they felt the contest was a fix.
However, a few days following the defeat, Askren has confirmed that the fight was very much legitimate and that he would not have gained anything from throwing the clash.
The 36-year-old told ESPN: "That's human nature [to question the fight] but it definitely didn't happen, I got hit.
"I guess the question I have for people is what do I gain from it? I told you guys what I made for this fight, it was a very nice pay cheque but I'm also not destitute and poor, so what do I gain by that? The answer is nothing.
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"I think in fact I would lose a lot and it's not something that would ever cross my mind.
"I said if they guy's a good boxer then I'm going to lose. There was a fear he had around me and there was a feeling that maybe he wasn't very good.
"In the locker room I was pretty confident I was going to win but... the result afterwards is irrelevant to me, my life is going to be the same either way."
According to Paul, the fight did 1.5 million PPV buys and generated $75 million (£54 million).
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He is said to have collected reported fight purse of $690,000 (£500,000) not including PPV points.
Askren made $500,000 without PPV sales being taken into account - giving him the biggest pay cheque of his career by some distance.
He added: "I thought about this, and it's utterly depressing, I made more in the Jake Paul fight, just on my base purse, than all of my fight purses in Bellator combined, that's nine wins."
Topics: Ben Askren, Boxing, Jake Paul
