THE deadline for Mike Perry to replace Tommy Fury against Jake Paul is set to pass.
The celebrity boxing rivals have rescheduled their grudge match for February 26 in Saudi Arabia.
Tommy Fury ahead of his fight with Jake Paul
Jake Paul has Mike Perry on standby in case Tommy Fury pulls out
It comes after Fury, 23, was twice forced to pull out before, due to a rib injury and US visa issue.
So Paul, 26, prepared for lightening to again strike by having ex-UFC welterweight Perry on standby.
But the current Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship star faces missing out on the mega-fight payday with a deadline now up.
BKFC president David Feldman told The Mirror: “He is the back-up fighter but I don’t think it’s going to happen.
“We were supposed to know by the end of Monday (13th) as that was the deadline.
“I’m hoping it doesn’t happen, but for Mike I am hoping it does happen as he will grab a very nice payday and get a lot of exposure.
“We have something planned for him in BKFC as we are announcing a big opponent for him on April 29.
“Does he beat Jake Paul though? I don’t know, Jake Paul is actually a pretty decent boxer but Mike Perry has got something inside of him that I’ve never seen before, he’s a different type of animal.
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“I don’t think there’s anyone you can put in front of Mike Perry that’s going to blow him out.”
Perry, 31, left the UFC in 2021 to sign with BKFC, where he has had two wins with brutally exposed fists.
And promoter Feldman gave him the green light to potentially save the show if Paul needed it.
He said: “I was open to it because of the notoriety that Mike Perry was going to get and BKFC, because they also have to do some branding for BKFC for this to have happened.
“If Perry does step up, BKFC gets branded to fans that haven’t watched it yet so it’s an opportunity for us too.
“I thought it was an opportunity for him to make a good payday, he gets paid very well with us so it’s not much more than that.
“It’s also an opportunity to expand the growth of our promotion. At the end of the day it looks like Tommy Fury is going to show up and I think he’s going to put on a hell of a fight.”
Mike Perry left the UFC for bare-knuckle boxingGetty