The recent spectacle pitting online celebrity Logan Paul against retired boxing legend Floyd Mayweather Jr. drew a ton of eyes and made both men a lot of money. It also led to interest in Logan's younger and more pugilistically-adept brother Jake Paul also one day facing Mayweather.
Much of that interest was brought on by Jake himself, who stole the show at the media events in the run-up to Logan vs. Mayweather by getting in the welterweight's face and even stealing his baseball cap, which led to angry claims by Mayweather that he would "beat up both brothers in one night" and very fast disclaimers from Mayweather Promotions CEO Leonard Ellerbe that any such event would be spread over two nights, not a buy-one-get-one-free.
Nonetheless, it now looks like such a follow-up is unlikely.
Mayweather said last month in an interview: “Jake Paul talked about me and him fighting in a real fight. If it’s a real fight, then I’ll go down to my real fighting weight class, which is 147 pounds or 154 pounds. If Jake Paul can come down to 154 pounds, then we can see his skills.”
Many will recall Mayweather emphatically stating that he is done with competitive boxing. He maintains that he will keep his 50-0 record exactly how it is, and only pull on the gloves for non-competitive exhibitions such as Logan Paul and his destruction of Tenshin Nasukawa.
This has led to some reading those quotes as Mayweather effectively saying the Jake Paul fight will never take place, and Jake himself is one of those people.
“I don’t think it’ll happen,” Paul told esports publisher Dexerto.
“He wants me to cut down to 147 pounds, and then he’ll fight me. So, before he fought my brother, we were ‘fake fighters.’ And now, he will only fight Jake Paul if I cut to 147 pounds, which is physically impossible for me to cut that much.”
Jake, who is 3-0 as a boxer so far in cruiserweight clashes with three novices, faces former UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley — also making his pro boxing bow — on Aug. 29.