Jake Paul has a big fight Sunday in Saudi Arabia with Tommy Fury, a matchup of — being real here — two novice professional fighters who are, indeed, a fair fight for one another at level, or at least it plays that way on paper.
Fury, of course, believes he’ll prove he’s a real pro boxer and that Paul just isn’t, and there’s a lot of potential intrigue in the matchup.
But Paul has diverted some of his attention to addressing criticism from former super middleweight world champion Carl Froch, who is 45 years old and has been retired since a 2014 win over George Groves in front of 80,000 screaming fans in Wembley Stadium.
“Carl Froch mad because I made more in one year than he made his whole career. You want the payday. I get it,” Paul wrote on Twitter.
“So let’s do this, fight Anderson Silva on my next card and if you get lucky and beat him, then we can step in the ring and you make your career payday. Let me know.”
Froch was quick to respond in a video posted to Instagram.
“Jake Paul has called me out on his social media, apparently he wants to fight me. Listen, just in case you didn’t know, my last fight was at Wembley Stadium in front of 80,000 fans,” he said.
“So I won’t be fighting the mixed martial arts legend, Anderson Silva, on your undercard. I’ve got too much respect for him. And your punch when you boxed him, did that even land? Very dubious.
“But anyway, you’ve got a job to do against Tommy Fury. If by some miracle you manage to beat Tommy Fury, then I’ll listen to you, I’ll have a little chat with you, see what garbage comes out of your mouth, see what you’ve got to say. Until then, don’t talk about me in the same league as you.
“I’m a four-time world champion. Two WBC titles there, you’ll never, ever have one of them. You’re not good enough. You’re not a professional fighter. You’re a performing clown. That’s all you are. Keep my name out of your mouth until you’ve done something in the game.
“I think this (Sunday), your world ends. If it doesn’t, and you are stupid enough to take a fight with me, when this right hand lands on your chin, it’ll put you into fucking orbit and knock that stupid bonnet off the top of your head.”
It’s not the first time the idea of Jake Paul vs Carl Froch has come up. Froch was asked about it just about two years ago, and was dismissive at first, then figured he’d probably do it for an absurd money offer.
“Jake Paul, Logan Paul, whichever other YouTuber you want to pull out of the bag, I’ve got absolutely no interest at all, unless, I don’t know, unless they want to call me out. Then I’ll go and smash them all to bits,” he said then.
“And it’s risk-reward, even though I think it’s an easy fight with any of them YouTubers, you’ve still got a chance of getting hurt,” he continued.
“Boxing’s a dangerous sport. … I wouldn’t be fighting anybody for any amount of money, including $50 million for who, who’s the other geezer? Who’s the other guy? Jake Paul. Yeah, I’d probably fight him, actually. I’d probably fight him for $50 million, actually.”
As an aside, former middleweight titlist Darren Barker also threw in a reply to Paul, too:
You must be sick of living ♂️
— Darren Barker (@DarrenBarker82) February 19, 2023