Anthony Joshua faces Jake Paul on Friday in the biggest and strangest boxing matchup of 2025.
Miami's Kaseya Center will host the showdown between former two-time world heavyweight champion Joshua and YouTuber disruptor Paul.
It will be Joshua's second professional outing in the United States and his first in six-and-a-half years.
The London 2012 Olympic gold medalist facing Paul under the Queensberry Rules is utterly implausible as it is.
Had Joshua's first visit to America gone to plan, it's arguable that this late career cash grab at the start of another rebuild would never have happened in a million years.
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What happened the last time Anthony Joshua fought in the U.S?
On Anthony Joshua's U.S debut in June 2019, the then-undefeated IBF, WBA and WBO champion was knocked out in the seventh round by Mexican-American Andy Ruiz, who dropped the Brit four times in one of the biggest shocks in heavyweight championship history.
Ruiz, who was 31-1 at the time after suffering a sole career defeat to future Joshua victim Joseph Parker in December 2016, only got the gig a month out from the fight.
Joshua's U.S. Coming-out party at Madison Square Garden was slated to be against Jarrell Miller, only for the motormouth Brooklynite to test positive for several banned substances.
Ruiz was priced as wide as 25-1 to win by some bookmakers and everything appeared to be going to plan when Joshua dropped his foe with a crunching left hook off the right uppercut in round three. But when AJ went in to close the show, Ruiz caught him with a shot to the temple and he crumpled to the canvas.
Joshua was down again before the end of the round and never recovered from the initial knockdown, fighting through a concussed fog. Ruiz put him down again with plenty of time to spare in the seven and when Joshua was forced to a knee once more, his dazed responses to referee Michael Griffin persuaded the official to wave off the contest.
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What happened after Anthony Joshua lost to Andy Ruiz Jr.?
Even though Joshua beat Ruiz in a December rematch in Saudi Arabia -- becoming only the fourth man in history after Floyd Patterson, Muhammad Ali and Lennox Lewis to regain the heavyweight title in an instant return -- there's an argument that Joshua's career has never truly recovered. Instead of plotting a path to indisputable greatness, he has charted a rocky road that has led to Friday's bizarre matchup with Jake Paul.
Heading into the fight, Joshua was 22-0 with 21 knockouts. From the first Ruiz fight
onwards, he's 6-4. It's been a period of confusion, during which he has had more coaches than wins. Angel Fernandez and Joby Clayton were brought into camp to work alongside his long-time trainer Rob McCracken. They oversaw the return win over Ruiz, boxing successfully behind the jab for 12 rounds, and a successful defence against Kubrat Pulev.
However, a defeat to Oleksandr Usyk lead to more substantial changes. Fernandez remained under new chief second Robert Garcia. Despite an improved showing in the Usyk rematch, another defeat persuaded Joshua to rip it all up again. He decamped to Texas to work under Derrick James, an alliance that lasted two fights before Joshua teamed up with Ben Davison for an impressive return to form against Otto Wallin.
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A two-round blowout against MMA star Francis Ngannou prompted a false sense of confidence that the old Joshua had returned; an impression that was blown apart as Daniel Dubois dropped him repeatedly and knocked him out at Wembley in September 2024. Iegor Golub will run Joshua's corner against Paul after the former champion joined up with Usyk's training team.
Had Joshua beaten Ruiz for a successful American rollout, it likely would have been full steam ahead to a showdown with the then-undefeated Deontay Wilder for the undisputed heavyweight title. It remains the most frustrating fight to have gotten away this century.
Putting Joshua together with countryman Tyson Fury has been similarly complicated, not least by Fury's trilogy with Wilder and AJ's initial defeat to Usyk. When a showdown with the 'Gypsy King' was signed. Again, the confused and listless manner in which Joshua approached that fight at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium would have been unfathomable until Ruiz stripped him of his mystique.
In fight week, talk sparked up again that a Fury vs. Joshua fight was close. If Joshua propels himself into a restorative 2026 by taking care of business against Paul, in some respects he will be righting that wrongs of a U.S. Debut that has plagued him ever since.