Well, it's my honor to bring in for our second appearance on this podcast
together none other than Jake Paul. Jake, I know you're getting ready for
a fight coming up December the fifteenth, live on Desown at the carib Royale
Resort in Orlando, Florida against Andre August. Thank you so much for doing
this, Welcome to the show. How things going, getting ready for your
fight? Thank you for having me, man, it's always great to speak
and feeling good, you know, locked in. I have had an amazing
camp, which every fighter says in every interview, but it is true.
I'm ready to fight and just falling more and more in love with this sport
and the training and the details and bettering myself as an athlete and increasing the
sparring and just man, it's just been an amazing time and I'm excited to
show my new new skills set from this camp on December fifteenth. What is
it that you like the best about boxing? As you've come to the sport
without a big amateur career, not something you did as a small child,
like a lot of the great pros do. What is it about it that
you like the best? Wow? That's tough. Wow, you know that
there's so much, but I would say the fight night first and foremost,
like just the anticipation, all the hard work that goes into that one moment,
you know, showcasing the sacrifice, and you know, hopefully most of
the time coming out with the with the win, and that feeling of the
satisfaction afterwards, knowing what you accomplished, I think is something that I've never
experienced before. I don't think there's a greater form of satisfaction or a greater
feeling in the world than ultimate sacrifice for a long period of time and then
it picking off on a on a global state. So you had your fight
with Tommy Fiery earlier this year in February. You know, you took your
first loss. It was a very close fight, did good business for everybody,
I guess and from what I understand, but it was the first time
you fought against a guy that was mainly a boxer, not an NNA fighter
or some non combat specialist. I wonder coming out of that situation, what
did you learn the most about in that Because you seem to brush it off
fine when you had your fight after that, Yeah, I learned so much,
you know, hindsight is twenty twenty, and I think mostly learning that
you're not invincible like a certain you were all human, and I was going
through so much during that time. I don't even want to get into it
because people, oh, it's excuses whatever. But and I just powered through
because I would never want to like reschedule a fight or pull out of something
whatever. And so that was a big learning lesson in realizing how important it
is to have the right people around me to prepare for these big moments.
And you certainly brought Yeah, I mean you certainly bounce back. Well,
I mean you fought your next fight against Nate Diaz in August. Obviously he's
an MMA fighter, but a big star in that sport, kind of a
grudge match. I guess it was a big pay per view. You guys
did a huge gate at the American Airline Center in Dallas, big crowd.
You guys talked about doing a rematch. I think I heard you say you
maybe you'll do a rematch in a cage with him, and nothing really seemed
to come of that. Is that still something in your mind about a possible
rematch, either in boxing or in nick martial arts? Yeah, I wanted
to run it in MMA. We had, you know, the ten million
dollar offer to him, and there's still silence on his end other than some
you know tweets that right rays clearly high and say like random things. But
you know, I think he got the page from our fight. It was
like Wow, that's big, that's massive, and then wants to do it
again. But it's just not willing to risk it in MMA. I think
he knows what would happen there and I believe I would clearly dominate him and
ruin his legacy. So I don't think he's willing to risk it for the
money. So now you go into this fight a different, different kind of
animal altogether as far as the kind of event, it is, the kind
of opponent you're facing. You're taking on a fighter named Andre August, staying
true to your word that you would fight an actual boxer again, not an
MMA fighter or non combat person. He's ten and one with a draw as
a boxer. He has I looking at his record, he won five in
a row, he has a win. He had a long layoff, but
he came back. He had a fight victory over the summer in August.
Can you just talk me through your decision to go this route as in terms
of an actual boxer, not a big name with you know, but a
guy with similar professional experience to you. It's not a pay per view like
most of your fights have been. It's not in a huge arena. We
know where you've done big business. It's it's what most prospects in boxing do
is take on an opponent of a similar sort of level number of fights and
try to continue to build up their experience and their skills. But talk me
through a little bit your decision to go this route instead of you could have
easily done some other Diaz ish kind of event. Yeah, this is just
my road to world champion. And I've said it since day one that I'm
gonna be a world champion and fighting the biggest fights in the world and everyone's
gonna see that. I'm gonna beat Canelo and all of these things. And
now it's just me putting that into action, gaining the experience, and it
not being about the business side or the entertainment side of things anymore. This
is about me, my team, my skill set, and getting better and
staying sharp in camp as a young boxing prospect like you alluded to and just
taking the more traditional boxing route, which is what I'm here to do because
I believe, you know, it's gonna be one of the greatest sports stories
ever world a world champion. So you would acknowledge then that for doing this
fight. And I'm not saying that Jake Paul's not making money on a fight
like this. Obviously you wouldn't be doing it if you weren't. I don't
believe. But by not doing a pay per view against a more known name,
be it boxer or MMA person, that you are leaving money on the
table by doing a non pay per view, by not doing the fight in
a big arena. Yeah, for sure. You know, I don't even
know how much money I'm making for this fight, to tell you the truth,
and could care less. And I've grossed you know, two hundred and
fifty million dollars in interview in three years. And it's just not about the
business I have, you know, money coming in so many other ways,
like and so many businesses that it's just like, yo, we don't need
to do that. It's sure, it's great, but I'm truly focused on
the sport of boxing and my skill set. Yeah, I think it's just
like the entertainment and the pay per views and all of that's fun, but
I'm serious about becoming a world champion and this is the route to that.
I kind of look at your career as backwards from what most would do,
Whereas most fighters would start out doing what you're doing now, which is taking
on an unknown opponent but with a certain level of experience, trying to build
up your career, your skills, your popularity, et cetera. But you're
kind of doing it in the in the reverse, where you started off in
huge fights, you know, second or third fight on pay per view,
fighting big names, making huge money, selling huge arenas pay per views,
and now it's going the other direction. What are your thoughts about doing in
that order as opposed to the more traditional order, because you could have done
this at the beginning. Yeah, it's very interesting. It's weird, dude.
I mean, I gotta be honest with you. Yeah, no,
I don't think this has ever happened in the sport of boxing, but it's
just how things played out, right. This all started with you know,
YouTubers talking shit to each other and then you know, decided to fight,
and then one thing led to another. I'm fighting more YouTubers, Then all
of a sudden, I'm fighting Nate Robinson. Then I'm fighting a UFC you
know, undefeated guy, Ben Askering. And this is just how the cookie
crumbled. And I didn't know I was going to fall in love with the
sport. I didn't know this is going to become my love, my passion,
my destiny, and there's something beautiful about that, and I hope to
set the precedent, you know, moving forward. So do you think after
this though, then you'll go back on pay per view against another like bigger
name, or are you ready to do like a few of these types of
fights in a row, to do what you want to do, which is
to put yourself in the best possible position to get a big time, you
know, legit world title fight at some point. Yeah, I think it'll
be a balance as things come through the door. But for now, it's
focusing on fighting prospects and gaining experience. But yeah, let's say one of
these idiots who calls me out wants to get smoked up in a blunt for
ten million dollars, Like, of course I'm gonna go and do that.
But my main focus, you know, that's I call those the side quest
this this is the main quest, and the main destination is being a world
champion, and for now it's fighting real boxers with real skill and challenging myself.
This is the key. But just to add, he's still making a
seven figure payday on this fight. I'm sure he's still gonna be either the
first or potentially second, but most likely the biggest gate in Orlando history for
a boxing event. Right Like, the business is still great for someone with
his experience, and a big part of that is the profile he's built through
his first aid fights to then be able to do this. At the same
time, he never wanted to charge his fans for a pay per view to
fight a guy that no one's ever heard of, and no one is saying
this is, you know, a true gatekeeper to a championship. Oh for
sure. Personal decision to do right by his fan base, I understand,
and I'm glad to hear that that's actually a good thing. I actually have.
I have two more questions for Jake. One of the things, and
it's not about your career so much, Jake, but you have a women's
world championship fight on the undercard between shadez A Green and Franchion Cruiz deserned.
They're fighting for the vacant WBC Women's Super mid awaight title. Franchion Cruse.
Of course, she's the former undisputed champion in that weight class. You've been
a huge supporter at You and Nikisa been big supporters of women's boxing. You
guys have helped make Amanda Serrano went too a big star into a big draw.
I'm wondering, Jake, from your point of view, what was it
about it that made you decide to throw your name and your weight, so
to speak, behind the women's side of the sport. Yeah. Look,
I think it started with Amanda Serrana and just becoming friends with her and how
amazing she is as a person, and her coach and other manager, Jordan,
and our relationship with them growing, and then seeing how needed it was
to help the women in this sport, and I started to speak about it.
I started to get them big paydays, and then all of a sudden,
it's like Jake Paul is the spokesperson for women's boxing, and so it's
like this responsibility almost that was taken on my shoulders, and there wasn't equality.
There was you know, they were being taken advantage of. They weren't
getting the same opportunities blah blah blah. And we have the ability, because
of our unique positioning and marketing and skill set to help and change this for
And that's exactly what we've done, and that's what we love to do,
both the Keisa and I when we have conversations, it's how do we make
history first, and then the business side they comes second. Jake, thank
you very much for taking time to talk to me today about your FROD.
I wish you the best of luck and I'm interested to see how you can
against a non uh and an a guy, a guy that's a boxer like
yourself that's done the things in the gym and is trying to also better himself.
Awesome men, No, appreciate it, appreciate the time today and yeah
and look forward to it. All right, Thank you very much to take Paul MHM