Jake Paul Next Fight: ‘The Problem Child’ finally fights an actual boxer

Love him or hate him, Jake Paul is going to continue fighting. The last man to defeat Mike Tyson in a professional boxing match is nothing if not consistent. The YouTube superstar is among the sport’s most active headliners, having competed three times apiece in 2023 and 2024. Now ‘The Problem Child’ is gearing up for his second outing of 2025.

Rumours ran rampant regarding who might stand across the ring from the Disney Channel’s finest. We had the answer. Now we have a different one. Read on to find out all you need to know, and probably more than you want to know, about Jake Paul’s next fight.

Paul knows exactly what he is doing. While elder brother Logan enjoys a surprisingly-okay WWE career, the younger Paul is employing age-old professional wrestling tactics to drive interest in his quasi-boxing journey.

What was his needless desecration of ‘Iron’ Mike but a re-hash of Randy Orton’s Legend Killer gimmick? Tyson boxed with all the grace of the Fabulous Moolah, the 80-year-old relic Orton dropped with his signature RKO back in the day. What was Paul’s ducking of real boxers before succumbing to Tommy Fury but a lift from Hollywood Hogan’s avoidance and subsequent loss to Goldberg? 

Even Paul’s fanbase reacts the same as pro wrestling’s more dedicated followers. In both cases, tell one that they are watching something that is not all that it seems and you get one of two reactions. Either a knowing smirk and a willingness to buy into the circus. Or a teary-eyed defence of credentials.

The difference being that, while wrestling holds its hands up to its place as sports entertainment, high-ranking figures in boxing are willing to buy into the facade. To be crystal clear, I am not saying that any of Jake’s fights have been fixed. Merely that some decision-makers in the sport are determined to read more into his resume than is actually on the page.

Why else would Paul be world-ranked by the WBA? It is certainly not on the basis of his resume. ‘The Problem Child’ lost via split decision to the only active pro boxer he has faced; Tommy Fury. Since then he has beaten:

Andre August (second fight in four years)

Ryan Bourland (first fight in two years)

Mike Perry (MMA fighter who was 0-1 as a boxer)

Tyson (retired for 19 years, 58 years old, recovering from stomach surgery)

Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. (second fight in four years with the other being against an MMA fighter, lost to Anderson Silva in 2021)

Imagine this happening in any other sport. If you could become tennis’ world number-14 by beating three players who have stopped playing, a golfer and 55-year-old Andre Agassi. Boxing has always been where athleticism meets commerce, but even by those lowly standards it is ridiculous.

The ranking was engineered to give Paul a shot at WBA and WBO cruiserweight champion Gilberto Zurdo Ramirez. The pair shared a card back in June in Anaheim. Zurdo outpointed two-time ex-champ Yuniel Dorticos to retain his belts. Then, in the main event, Paul beat decrepit former middleweight champion Chavez Jr., who had not logged a significant boxing win in a decade. 

This sorry state of affairs was designed to create a collision course effect. To whet the appetite for Paul to finally take on a legitimate boxing world champion. In the immediate aftermath of the shared card, both men made noises about wanting to face off. But Badou Jack, the WBC cruiserweight champion, was also mentioned.

The month of July came and went without Paul appearing in the WBC rankings, meaning the Jack fight was impossible, at least with the belt on the line. It seemed to clear the way for the Zurdo fight. But Jake appears to share an attention span with his brother Logan, who mentioned once on his ImPaulsive podcast that he walked out of a screening of Oppenheimer because “nothing happened” and “everyone’s just talking”. 

Out went the Ramirez fight, in came a much stranger assignment. Noises started being made that Paul could fight Anthony Joshua. The former unified heavyweight champion of the world. While AJ lost his last fight via knockout to Daniel Dubois, he does not fit the usual profile of a Jake Paul opponent.

For a start, Joshua is a career-boxer. Not a transplanted MMA fighter, a stray basketball player or a fellow influencer. Secondly, he is an incredibly good one. No disrespect to Chavez and Fury, but Tyson is the only boxer on Paul’s resume to have enjoyed a memorable career and he was born the year Bobby Moore lifted the Jules Rimet trophy at Wembley.

Thirdly, Joshua is 36 years of age. Past his prime? Most likely. Washed up? Far from it. AJ would still be too good for all but a handful of current heavyweights. Meanwhile, Paul has fought once at at the weight. Against a Mike Tyson who had barely taken off his hospital bracelet.

The MVP side wanted it. So too did Matchroom. There was a vague impression that Jake might be simply a pawn in the long-and-boring negotiations to finally get “retired” former heavyweight king Tyson Fury to fight Joshua. But just when it looked like Paul was being played at his own game, he pulled out the most typical move imaginable.

It would have been shocking were it not so utterly, skin-crawlingly Jake Paul. But there it was in black-and-white; Netflix would present an exhibition bout featuring the blonde-haired nuisance against WBA lightweight champion Gervonta ‘Tank’ Davis. The time is Friday, November 14 and the venue is the State Farm Arena in Georgia. 

It was hard to ascertain who the audience for this exhibition mismatch was. Boxing fans would have rather seen Davis face Lamont Roach in a rematch of their controversial draw back in March. Paul fans probably couldn't tell the difference between 'Tank' Davis and Alan Davies. Given the giant size disparity between lightweight Davis and cruiserweight Paul and the exhibition rules, it was a pre-Christmas present that nobody wanted to unwrap.

Then Davis' chequered past surfaced once again, when a civil suit was filed against him for domestic assault. The fighter has a long history with the law and nobody was surprised to see such an accusation scupper another of his fights. No one except Jake, who went on record registering his surprise that a man who had been arrested for domestic assault in July could be accused of a similar crime in October.

So Jake had an empty space on his dance card. Presumably the ghost of Joe Louis and Karate Kid's Ralph Macchio were unavailable, because The Ring's Mike Coppinger reported talks were close to a resolution for Paul to fight Anthony Joshua. The revival of what would be the most shocking outing of Jake's career came out of nowhere.

The reports were confirmed on Monday, November 17 when it was announced Paul will face Joshua over eight rounds in a professional contest. The fight will take place at the Kaseya Center on December 19. The bout will take place at heavyweight, though the contract will limit AJ to a maximum weight of 245lbs. The Brit has not weighed below that figure in three years, when he lost his rematch with Usyk.

On one level, this circus makes a semblance of sense. More than fighting a lightweight, anyway. Paul has fought a unified heavyweight champion before, albeit one pushing 60 who was recovering from stomach surgery. Joshua is likely tired of hearing Fury talk about the fact he is retired, then un-retired if Usyk fancies it, then retired again.

Why not make some money? AJ himself is unlikely to secure a Usyk three-match. Paul perhaps senses the unrest at his cherry-picking of aging opponents or MMA refugees. Questions will be answered. Primarily; what happens when Jake Paul faces a world class boxer who isn't eligible for a free bus pass?

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