Ben Askren is down to tangle with Jake Paul anytime the YouTuber wants.

Jake Paul has become something of a name in combat sports recently after a genuinely decent knockout over Nate Robinson last Saturday night, calling for a match-up with Conor McGregor and Dillon Danis after the fact. While the controversial 23-year old waits for a reply, recently retired Askren is putting his hand up for a chance himself.

“I don’t know if there’s a feud, more than this guy has just said my name a few times. Most people are like, oh, I don’t know why Ben Askren would stoop to that level,” Askren said, speaking to Submission Radio. “It’s like, listen, when I was in high school, one of the fun things to do was, a bunch of dudes would come over to the house, we’d put on some boxing gloves and we’d try to beat the shit out of each other. Like, we did that for free, we just did that for fun. And now you’re telling me you’re gonna pay me a whole bunch of money to beat up a YouTube star. Like, I don’t know, that just sounds like a fun Friday night to me.

“Obviously I’m someone who is a high-level fighter, who has a large following, who was maybe not known for his stand-up. I think that’s probably what he’s thinking. But, I’ve worked out with some other guys, just kind of been around, and they’re not fighters, and they… every fat guy on the couch in America thinks he can fight, right? They really do. And then once they feel what it really feels like, it’s just different. There’s just this gap. Like, they don’t understand what it really feels like.”

And despite Paul earning (measured) plaudits across the boxing world, Askren wasn’t exactly blown away by his knockout victory.

“I watched the highlights, Nate Robinson, good god. I mean, honestly, it looked like he’d never been boxing before,” Askren said. “For someone who’s such an elite athlete – I mean, this guy’s a very elite athlete, he was a great basketball player – he couldn’t box worth a damn. So, I guess Jake Paul has as least enough power to put Nate Robinson to sleep. I don’t really know if that tells us very much.”