So first, here’s what happened.
https://twitter.com/BoxingNbt/status/1109932458584100864
Now, we going to go out on a limb and say boxers aren’t the sharpest tools in the shed. They do, after all, get punched in the head for a living. But in today’s climate, it might not have been such a great idea to boldly kiss a woman — even if you were a bit punch-drunk at the time.
Bulgarian heavyweight boxing champion Kubrat Pulev was doing an interview with Jenny Ravalo, a reporter for Vegas Sports Daily, when an exuberant Pulev planted a kiss right on her lips. As you see in the video, the pair laughed as Pulev walked away. Pulev was pumped after knocking out Romania’s Bogdan Dinu in California, and later took to Twitter to explain.
“You may have seen a clip of me kissing a female reporter after I won my fight on Saturday night,” he wrote on Twitter. “The reporter, Jenny is actually a friend of mine and after the interview, I gave her a kiss. Later that night, she joined me and my other friends at my post-fight celebration. On that video, after our kiss, we both laughed about it and thanked each other. There really is nothing more to this.”
But Ravalo apparently didn’t think the kiss was a laughing matter.
Vegas Sports Daily said Ravalo was the “victim of an unwanted, unexpected and unsolicited forceful kiss” and announced it will investigate.
“What happened to [Ravalo] was completely blindsiding and unwarranted and we share in her shock, hurt, embarrassment and general outrage,” the news outlet said in a statement. “We want to make it clear that women should feel safe and comfortable to exercise the duties of their job, free of abuse, advances, harassment, etc in the workplace.”
Ravalo also hired Gloria Allred, famed women’s rights attorney who takes on high-profile cases.
In a press conference on Thursday, Ravalo said she met Pulev for the first time the day before her interview and said “we were not friends.”
“I did not encourage or consent to Mr. Pulev grabbing my face, kissing me or grabbing my backside,” she said. “Kissing a woman on her lips without her consent and grabbing her is not acceptable. … What he did was disgusting.”
Allred, for her part, wants the boxing commission investigate and asked for Pulev’s boxing license to be revoked. “A woman has a right to consent or say no,” she said, “and a man has to ask.”
You can watch the press conference here.
https://www.facebook.com/fox11la/videos/276419039942206/
