Josh Pieters/YouTube
Ed Sheeran lookalike trolls YouTubers at KSI-Logan Paul fight
Josh Katzowitz
Some observers might have thought the KSI vs. Logan Paul rematch was YouTube's chance to troll the boxing world. But one YouTuber and an Ed Sheeran lookalike used the event as an opportunity to troll other YouTubers.
Josh Pieters, who has about 1.1 million YouTube subscribers, hired a Sheeran impersonator to walk around Los Angeles on Saturday night to see if he could fool anybody. As it turns out, it absolutely did.
The lookalike, Ty Jones from Manchester, England, wore a red flannel shirt and a black ski hat with black-rim glasses to the Los Angeles boxing match. And yeah, the red-headed (and red-mustached) Jones looks nearly identical to the pop star.
Beautiful day to be stuck in work lol
A post shared by Ty Jones (@ty1991ed) on Jun 28, 2019 at 10:07am PDT
Parklyfe
A post shared by Ty Jones (@ty1991ed) on Jun 9, 2019 at 8:32am PDT
During the video uploaded by Pieters on Monday—which, as of this writing, has already surpassed 1 million views—Jones is bombarded by people who believe he's actually Sheeran. Pieters' rationale was that Justin Bieber and Wiz Khalifa were already going to be in attendance at the fight, so why not try to fool thousands of people to show that Sheeran also was there?
After walking into Staples Center with much fanfare, Jones and Pieters made their way to a VIP area. YouTube star Roman Atwood was fooled. So was Instagram star Amanda Cerny. And British YouTuber WillNE. And RiceGum, Keemstar, and FaZe Rug. And Jake Paul's make-believe wife, Tana Mongeau.
The rest of the video shows highlights from the fight and the absolute madhouse reaction caused by Jones' impersonation.
"We had tricked the world's best YouTubers, a stadium full of boxing fans, and the internet into believing he was a world-famous rock star," Pieters says in the video. "I took a 25-year-old bloke 6,5000 miles across the world to take him to a boxing match between two YouTubers and convince everyone there that he was Ed Sheeran. And it worked. Ty said he had one of the best nights of his life."
So did everyone else who met him that night. Until, of course, they watched Pieters' vlog.
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*First Published: Nov 12, 2019, 10:21 am
Josh Katzowitz is a staff writer at the Daily Dot specializing in YouTube and boxing. His work has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times. A longtime sports writer, he's covered the NFL for CBSSports.com and boxing for Forbes. His work has been noted twice in the Best American Sports Writing book series.
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