Influencer-turned-boxer Jake Paul takes on his toughest test to date, by leaps and bounds, on Dec. 19 in Miami, Florida. Paul faces the 2012 Olympic gold medalist and former two-time unified world boxing champion Anthony Joshua at the Kaseya Center.
Oddsmakers have Paul as a considerable underdog. Some combat sports analysts think Paul could shock the world while others are scared for “El Gallo.” Former UFC middleweight champion Michael Bisping called the matchmaking ‘dangerous’ and fears Paul could get hurt.
“When you look at Jake Paul, you’ve got to give him his credit because he’s put in the work,” Bisping said on his YouTube channel. “He showed a video on Twitter where he’s hitting the bag, and he looks smooth. He looks fast. He looks powerful. He’s ripping the bag. But of course, bags don’t hit back. We know that, but he looks good.”
Paul (12-1) has seven knockouts on his record, but they were not in the heavyweight division. Paul’s been the bigger fighter in nearly all of his fights. The 58 year-old at the time Mike Tyson weighed in a pound heavier than him. Joshua towered over Paul in their first face-off.
“All of a sudden Jake Pau’s the smaller guy and Anthony Joshua is towering over him. He’s got way more experience. He hits harder. He’s the bigger man. He’s got the longer reach. He’s an Olympic champion. Jake Paul is not going to go out there and turn this into a real life David and Goliath. That’s ain’t going to happen, and everybody knows that,” said Bisping. “There’s no way on this Earth that this fight ends with Jake Paul knocking out Anthony Joshua.”
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“This fight has been frowned upon … from people in the boxing world that look at this as a spectacle and look at this as a circus, a sideshow, a freak show attraction. And also, something that is extremely dangerous because if this is a real fight, and apparently it is, so we’ll go with that, there’s a very good chance that somebody gets hurt, and it ain’t going to be Anthony Joshua,” Bisping continued.
“Boxing, people die. This is not a game. You don’t play at boxing.”
