Anthony Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn has insisted a fight between the former heavyweight champion and YouTuber Jake Paul is a “very real” possibility, putting the odds at “50/50”.
Joshua, who is eyeing his next fight after undergoing elbow surgery in spring, has been linked to Paul in recent weeks, as the latter eyes another huge crossover bout.
In November, the 28-year-old American beat heavyweight legend Mike Tyson, 58, on points, while most recently he outpointed ex-world champion Julio Cesar Chavez Jr in June.
Meanwhile, Joshua’s last fight was a knockout defeat by fellow Briton Daniel Dubois in September, as “AJ” failed to regain heavyweight gold.
“This is very real,” Hearn told The Ring on Monday (4 August), referencing a potential Joshua vs Paul fight. “I had a good chat for about an hour with Nakisa [Bidarian, Paul’s adviser] on [30 July], and now I believe they want the fight. I really do. Nakisa was very honest, and he’s concerned about the fight, but Jake truly believes he can win the fight or at least be competitive in it.
“And now because of the size of the fight, it leads me to believe there’s a very good chance it could happen. If I had to rate that chance, I would say it’s 50/50. It was a very positive conversation, and we expect that conversation to extend over the coming weeks. If they really want it, it will happen.
“There wouldn’t be such a huge difference [in size]. Jake would be a heavyweight on the night. But look, I can’t even necessarily justify it to you. It’s a mismatch in my opinion, it’s dangerous in my opinion, but this is a guy… a cruiserweight who will be a heavyweight.
“I think Joshua is probably yet to get his head round it, until he knows that it’s a possibility. After my call this week, I’d say it’s definitely a possibility. AJ understands the commercial world and will look at this and see that it’s huge.
“It would probably be the biggest fight that could ever happen anywhere. It would be right up there with his biggest purses ever. You can talk about the boxing world, but this would be the outer world.
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“I said to Nakisa the other day that this is about the fear factor. This is dangerous. This is like tuning in to watch [magician] David Blaine but much more dangerous and much more real. You’re not trying to escape from a box in three minutes, you’re in there with one of the biggest punchers of all time, and it isn’t a game.
“It’s never [that] I’ve called for or told people we’re targeting this, but I do also understand the colossal size of this fight commercially – and probably the appetite from a lot of people to evaporate Jake Paul from the boxing world. That is probably what this does.”
Paul is 12-1 as a professional with seven knockout wins, his sole loss having come against Tommy Fury – half-brother of heavyweight Tyson Fury – in 2023.
Joshua’s record sits at 28-4 (25 KOs), with the former two-time world heavyweight champion, 35, still desiring another title run before he hangs up his gloves.
Joshua’s current trainer Ben Davison said recently that he would not like to see AJ box Paul, telling Boxing Scene: “I don’t like all that. First and foremost, how can people even talk about that? Two, where’s the safety aspect in boxing?
“Do you know what I mean? There is a serious risk with something going wrong. Unfortunately, it might take something like that for people to be like, ‘Hold on, we’ve got to reconfigure this’. But somebody would pass it, someone would allow it, somebody would sanction it.”
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