The clues behind Jake Paul’s chances of knocking out Anthony Joshua

Many who work in the boxing industry will surely tell you similar stories about the weeks since Jake Paul’s bewildering fight with Anthony Joshua was announced. It has been a frequent occurrence, getting peppered with questions like probing punches on a boxer against the ropes; you barely get through answering one – or giving your best effort at answering it – before the same voice or another interrupts with a fresh query. One of the most commonly-recurring questions in all this, of course, is the following: can Paul actually beat Joshua? Can this YouTuber-turned-boxer actually knock out a former two-time world heavyweight champion?

There is an argument for simply saying ‘no’ – for simply writing ‘no’ and hitting publish. But the reality is that the questions and debates around Paul vs Joshua may end up being the funnest part of the fight. And there are certain factors that arguably make this particular debate one worth having. So, let’s get into it.

Firstly: Paul believes he can knock out Joshua, and the rules allow a KO in Miami on Friday. That does not mean Paul can or will do it, but anyone who believes Paul is here to collect a rumoured £70m and accept his fate as a meme, well, they’re mistaken.

If you have followed Paul’s 12-1 boxing venture closely, you will know this, but it was a sentiment echoed to The Independent by the 28-year-old’s business partner at Most Valuable Promotions, Nakisa Bidarian. The promoter cited the “delusional confidence” of Paul as one of the American’s greatest assets (love or loathe Paul, it is undeniable that his audacity has carried him a long way) and a deciding factor in taking this fight with “AJ”.

We then get into why Paul believes he can win. It not only relates to the former Disney Channel actor’s belief in his own power, which has seen him knock out and drop the likes of former UFC champions Tyron Woodley and Anderson Silva respectively, but also his belief in a supposed vulnerability in Joshua.

Joshua, 36, has four professional defeats to his name, two of which came via knockout, and Paul has referenced the first more than once. “This is Andy Ruiz 2.0,” he has said. In 2019, Ruiz Jr was a late replacement against Joshua and stunned him at Madison Square Garden, flooring him thrice en route to an upset title win.

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On that occasion, Joshua’s problem was overeagerness; he dropped Ruiz in the third round but was reckless in his pursuit of a finish, and it was in the exchanges immediately after his knockdown of the underdog that he was felled by a left hook. Ruiz’s speed aided him in securing that close-range knockdown, and his next came later in the round, as Joshua slithered down the ropes under a sustained barrage. Joshua recovered over the course of the next few rounds, but not enough, and he was susceptible to another left hook in the seventh frame – a punch that froze the Olympic gold medalist, setting up an overhand right and another prolonged combination that dropped him. With that, Joshua’s American dream was made a nightmare.

His only other stoppage loss was much more recent. In his last outing, in September 2024, the Briton was put down four times by compatriot Daniel Dubois en route to a fifth-round defeat. It might have been this showing that, rightly or wrongly, emboldened Paul.

The first knockdown came very late in the first round, and it could be attributed to complacency; upon hearing the 10-second clapper, Joshua stepped back towards the ropes with his guard alarmingly low, allowing Dubois to land a naked overhand right – no set-up, no feint, AJ simply judged the distance and danger completely wrong.

The second knockdown came at the same time in the third round. Joshua, seemingly still dazed, was tagged by a familiar weapon: a left hook, putting him on concerningly unstable ankles. Just as with the first knockdown, it followed Joshua exiting a clinch then missing with a right hand and ducking off to his left, although this time Dubois capitalised immediately (his first-round knockdown came after the same movement from AJ, but there were admittedly a couple of dead seconds before Dubois attacked).

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The third knockdown, occurring in round four, seemed to be more of a slip in fairness, and there was a similar incident later in the round that was ruled a slip. But the final true knockdown came in round five, as Joshua exhibited the same overeagerness that cost him against Ruiz.

After feinting to the body, Joshua caught Dubois unaware with a piston right cross, sending the younger man skipping away to the ropes in retreat. There, Joshua landed two more right hands, but Dubois took them well, even landing a counter right after the second shot. Joshua tried to mix it up with an uppercut as his third attack, but it was a rear-hand shot thrown nakedly – from too far away, and with AJ’s left hand too low to protect him. This time, Dubois’s right hand did not land after Joshua’s but rather before. Joshua collapsed to the canvas in a heap and, despite his admirable efforts to get up yet again, this particular punishment proved too much.

The only other knockdown of Joshua’s career came against the legendary Wladimir Klitschko in 2017, after the Ukrainian rocked him with the same technique that AJ used to trouble Dubois in the throes of their bout; Klitschko looked low but threw high, a clean right cross spearing through Joshua’s guard as the Briton raced, in vain, to raise it in time.

There will, of course, be readers who see the 900-odd words above as futile analysis, wasted time, pointless effort. It would be silly not to acknowledge that all of these fighters who troubled Joshua were elite heavyweights, and that Paul needs to tag AJ clean to hurt him – a plain mission, but perhaps an impossible one in its own right.

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Paul, more of a cruiserweight than a heavyweight, believes he has the speed to emulate Ruiz against Joshua. But speed, without adequate skill, only counts for so much.

So, does Paul know something we don’t? Had he heard sparring stories of Joshua’s chin having gone, prior to trying to make this fight? That is pure speculation; given Joshua’s training this year was largely inhibited by an elbow injury, which required surgery in spring, there might have been little sparring and next-to-no stories to hear anyway. For what it’s worth, Paul’s own sparring stories include accounts of a black eye dealt by Lawrence Okolie and a broken nose made worse by Frank Sanchez.

Whatever stories and questions there have been, Friday will provide the answers – and yes, those answers could come very, very quickly after the first bell, and they may not be the ones Paul wants.