This was a frustratingly okay fight for Joshua. Not because he necessarily did anything wrong, but because of Jake Paul’s antics which went unaddressed for 5 rounds.
The first round was lackluster as both fighter threw less than a dozen punches. The first round also showcased Jake Paul’s overall fight strategy: him running around, occasionally tripping over his feet, and grabbing Joshua’s legs anytime Joshua built up any slight momentum.
Joshua controlled the center of the ring as Paul continued to circle around the outside.
The second round was the mostly the same as the first. Paul circling around the outside, Joshua controlling the center of the ring and walking him down, and if Joshua got settled in…Paul would go the ground and grab Joshua’s legs and pull him down as well.
This went on until round 5 where Paul went to the ground and then the referee, Maura Ranallo, finally called a stoppage to bluntly address the bullshit by telling Paul “the fans didn’t come to see this.”
In my opinion, that should have happened earlier and Paul should have had a point deducted.
This was a major turning point in the fight. Paul already looked fatigued at this point and Joshua spent the rest of the round tuning him up, scoring 2 knock downs. Paul comes out in round 6 stumbling around in an attempt to avoid Joshua’s punches, unable to go back to the ground as he had been doing in the previous rounds, and ended up knocked out at 1:30 in round 6.
If Paul’s performance wasn’t annoying enough, you had the Netflix announcers who seemed to be carrying whatever water their could for Paul, overselling punches that landed on Joshua’s gloves and ignoring several of Joshua’s strikes which landed square and frequently backed Paul up by several steps. The ending of the fight, they declared it an overall victory for Paul for “surviving 5 rounds” and tried their hardest to sell their viewers on Joshua’s underperformance.
I think this fight should have ended in the first 3 rounds, but I don’t fault Joshua for this. I’m sure he didn’t expect a wildly unorthodox fighter who would hug his legs and take him down to the ground several times. For Joshua, as I said in the beginning, this was a frustratingly okay fight and definitely not the loss that the Netflix announcers were trying to pain this as.
As for Jake Paul and the announcers? Two thumbs down. I concur with Ranallo. “The fans didn’t come to see this.”