Jake Paul addresses failed negotiations with Canelo Alvarez, Gervonta Davis and if he would fight Logan Paul

Jake Paul’s boxing career has drawn plenty of criticism, but the social media influencer-turned-fighter was planning to take some big swings in 2025. Unfortunately, plans to fight Saul “Canelo” Alvarez and Gervonta “Tank” Davis fell apart during negotiations, leading to Paul taking a fight with former middleweight champion Julio César Chávez Jr. on June 28.

When news broke that Paul and Alvarez were deep into negotiations, it was a shocking moment. Paul was coming off a predictably one-sided win over 58-year-old Mike Tyson, so a fight with a pound-for-pound elite fighter like Alvarez seemed like Paul may simply be cashing in his lucrative boxing career for one final big fight.

But almost as soon as the news of Paul vs. Alvarez broke, the deal fell apart. Alvarez instead chose to work with Turki Alalshikh and Saudi Arabia for a multi-fight deal. Alvarez defeated William Scull in his first fight of that deal, winning Scull’s IBF super middleweight championship to become undisputed champion for a second time at 168 pounds. That fight was the set-up for a planned September showdown with fellow elite fighter Terence “Bud” Crawford.

“We were on the one-yard line, and we got a pick-six,” Paul said of the negotiation breakdown with Alvarez during an appearance on “The Ariel Helwani Show.” “An interception going the other way, man. Fourth quarter, game-winner, and we just got intercepted. I understand it, you know, basically they threatened to pull Canelo’s $300 million contract if he was to fight me. That’s how bad they want me out of boxing. They understand I’m the one doing the biggest events so they threatened to pull his $300 million contract if he was going to fight me. I understand where Canelo was coming from wanting to secure that bread for his family.”

Paul went on to claim that the move by Alalshikh was made because the Saudi chairman of the General Entertainment Authority was trying to undercut Paul’s position as a power player in the sport.

“If you are someone spending billions of dollars in an industry and you aren’t number one and having the biggest events, and meanwhile, there’s a little Disney kid running around and spending zero dollars and having the biggest events,” Paul said. “As a competitor, you’re going to do anything to stop that person and be the biggest. That’s the nature of this dirty business of boxing.”

Similar to the Alvarez situation, most fans were surprised when reports emerged that Paul was working on a fight with Davis. Davis is another highly-skilled and accomplished fighter, but he also currently competes at lightweight (135 pounds), while Paul has fought primarily in the 200-pound cruiserweight division.

On “The Ariel Helwani Show,” Paul said the fight, should it happen in the future, would be a 10-round exhibition contested at 185 pounds. But those plans are on hold while Davis looks to win a rematch with Lamont Roach, who battled Davis to a controversial draw in March.

“I mean, that was on the one-yard line as well but he has to rematch Lamont Roach,” Paul said. “He wants to get that one back and then we’ll be back in discussions with Mr. Gervonta. This is the nature of boxing, you have massive fights on the one-yard line and things just fall through.

“I never really thought Tank was that good. It would just take the right fighter to pick him apart, to be honest. Someone who has high activity and isn’t afraid of his power. I always saw so many holes in his game. To me, it wasn’t that surprising that someone finally gave him some good work.”

During the interview, Paul expressed interest in a rematch with Tommy Fury, the lone man to hold a win over Paul in the ring, as well as shrugging off talk of a fight with fellow influencer KSI.

One fighter Paul would be interested in fighting is his older brother, Logan Paul, even if he believes it would never happen.

On Logan’s podcast, the older brother said he would consider fighting Jake in a mixed martial arts bout, saying, “He’d definitely win [in boxing] at this point. He’s got a heavy hand. We would need an insane amount of money.”

When asked about the idea of fighting his brother, the younger Paul said, “I didn’t see him say that, but I’m guessing that’s very real. For him, that would level the playing field because we both have never done MMA. … I’d be down to do it just for fun, but I don’t think it would ever happen, no.”