Anthony Joshua plans on not just beating Jake Paul but breaking him.
This Friday, former unified heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua takes on Jake Paul in an eight-round heavyweight boxing bout, live on Netflix. The event figures to be one of the biggest combat sports events of the year as Paul is finally stepping in to fight someone heavily favored to beat him, but Joshua isn’t looking just to get a win; he’s looking to destroy Paul.
“I think Jake is someone where I’ve got to beat him mentally, because he’s a mental person,” Joshua said in during a face-to-face media spot from Most Valuable Promotions. “If I can break his soul, and I can break his mentality, then I’ve broken Jake. That’s why I say I’ve got to take his soul. It’s not just physical, I’ve got to take your soul in the ring.
“I’ve just seen in fights where I can see someone’s, let’s call it energy, frequency, leaving their body. That’s what my goal is: to do the same to you. You have that instinct. You can see it when you’re fighting. You can just see a small glimmer of someone that’s just about to start fading, and then you just keep exploiting that, keep exploiting that, keep exploiting that until some people give up. Some people get knocked out. We’ll figure out.
“I want to break him down spiritually and mentally.”
Paul was originally scheduled to face Gervonta Davis in November, but a civil allegation against Davis of domestic violence led MVP to cancel the event, and Joshua stepped in as a new opponent.
A two-time unified heavyweight champion, Joshua also won Olympic gold in 2012, and remains one of the top heavyweights in boxing today. Joshua’s most recent fight was a loss to Daniel Dubois for the IBF heavyweight title in September of 2024, making this a fairly large step back in competition, and “AJ” was at least honest aboutwhat drew him to the matchup.
“I’m not a YouTuber, a social media expert; I’m a fighter first and foremost. But I understood how to navigate my way through this industry, and from day one, I knew how to make money,” Joshua said. “Before I come into boxing, I knew how to make money. So, it’s always been a money grab, 100 percent. And I think now, this generation are really showing you have to have your Ps and Qs in order, get your money, and also work hard, and leave the game with your brains and your money intact. So, it’s a money grab, it’s legacy, it’s a fight, it’s war. That’s what we’re going to war for, to get the goods.”
But, while this may be a “cash grab” for Joshua, he does at least give Paul credit for the seriousness with which he’s pursued boxing.
“I see someone who is trying to perfect his skills, someone who is trying to perfect his boxing skills,” Joshua said of Paul. “… Jake’s trying to become a boxer, and I respect it. I think that’s one of the hardest styles to perfect. Hit, be slick, not get hit, look for that knockout punch, and he’s taken the hard road doing it that way, because most people will go into a gym and just try to fight. But Jake’s taking that road, and I respect it.
“Now, he’s going to come up against someone who took that road as well. … So, he’s going to come against someone who has been doing exactly what he’s doing, for a lot longer.”
Subscribe to my channel
