When Alycia “The Bomb” Baumgardner steps into the ring at Madison Square Garden on Friday night, she won’t be fighting only South Korean boxer Bo Mi Re Shin for the women’s super featherweight belt.
It will also be another round in Baumgardner’s bout for gender equality as she pushes boxing to adopt the same rules for women’s fighters that it does for men.
“As you grow as an individual and a face and a game changer in the sport like boxing, you want to see how you’re able to implement new changes, right?” Baumgardner told NBC News ahead of Friday’s showdown in New York City. “This is my chance to really showcase who I am.”
A typical men’s prizefight lasts 12 rounds, with each round lasting three minutes. For women, most fights are 10 rounds, with each round lasting two minutes. Baumgardner is pushing for women to fight the same amount of time for a few reasons.
For one, she said, it benefits her as a boxer.
“You would think one minute doesn’t change much, but it changes drastically when you are a fighter who has a set of skills that allows you to take your time and to set up a trap,” she said. “Boxing is about a sweet science, how you can set up a play. It’s like chess. Me being able to fight three minutes has allowed me to slow everything down, set up what I want to set up and take my time.”
Then there’s the business. Self-promotion and boxing have always gone hand in hand. The boxers who are able to attract more eyeballs usually participate in bigger fights. Bigger fights can lead to bigger paydays, and Baumgardner doesn’t want a perception of women’s fights to limit her potential in the sport.
One of the allies in Baumgardner’s push is the promoter she’s signed to: Most Valuable Promotions, the company founded by YouTuber-turned-manosphere influencer-turned-boxer Jake Paul, who has been vocal about earning better pay for fighters in both boxing and MMA.
Paul has also taken a keen interest in women’s combat sports. MVP promoted the first women’s fight to headline Madison Square Garden, when Katie Taylor squared off with Amanda Serrano in April 2022. Next month, MVP will put on its first MMA showcase, when Ronda Rousey returns to the sport in a superfight against Gina Carano.
Baumgardner’s bout with Shin is the first U.S. boxing match for MVP under a new deal it signed with ESPN. Baumgardner said part of the reason she signed with Paul is that MVP ist focused not only on her equality as a fighter, but also on her equality as a businesswoman.
“Boxing is a dog-eat-dog sport at the end of the day. They don’t care about you,” she said. “You have to know that you have to take care of yourself first. And there’s a way of doing it, and that’s teaming with people who see you for you.”
In a recent interview with Sports Illustrated, Paul compared his goal of building up women’s boxing with the WNBA, which he said needed stars like Caitlin Clark to begin competing with the popularity of the NBA. Paul wants to speed up the process by putting on fights such as Friday’s.
“I believe in the long run that all of these women will want to work with MVP,” Paul told SI. “We have the best distribution for women’s fighting and the biggest platforms and the biggest paydays and the most amount of followers to promote these women, too.”
One of the ways Baumgardner can advance her business interests is to book bigger and bigger fights, which she is keenly aware of. Paul told SI he is pushing behind the scenes for Baumgardner to fight Serrano, who is the unified champion at featherweight, one weight class above Baumgardner.
Baumgardner was also recently called out by Caroline Dubois, the unified lightweight champ, who asked for a fight with Baumgardner after she defeated Terri Harper this month.
“People say she hits hard,” Dubois said after the Harper fight. “I know I hit harder.”
Baumgardner said of Dubois’ challenge: “I’m well aware of being called out, but I also am aware that I’m in my division and you’re in your division. The fact that you’re calling me out as a 135 pounder and you’re calling out a 130 just tells me that you’re worried about the recognition and the attention and the clout off of my name.”
She added: “I’m not a charity fighter. I am a prizefighter. Put some skin in the game, build a résumé, have some more stock in your name so that the fight can be built and be bigger.”
What much of Baumgardner’s motivation comes down to is time and how much she values it and how much value can be added when she proves she can fight just as long as men. She’ll get another chance to show how valuable she is at “the world’s most famous arena” on national television Friday night.
“Women are told to be a certain way. They’re put into a box,” she said. “When you tell a woman she can’t do anything, she proves why she can. And I think it’s just a moment of self-belief and also, honestly, to prove a point. I can do this, too.”
