Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov recently said that he and his team over at Eagle FC had officially sent an offer to Jake Paul to compete for the upstart MMA promotion.
According to “The Problem Child,” nothing of the sort has come across his desk.
“Khabib [Nurmagomedov] said, ‘We offered him a deal’ – it’s not true,” Paul said during a recent interview on The MMA Hour (via MMA Fighting). “They never offered me anything. Eagle FC has never even done an event. Not to hate on anything they’re doing but I would need more than what I make in boxing to risk going into MMA right now,” he said. According to the YouTube star, it would take a massive amount of cash just to even get him to the table to discuss a crossover.
“People would have to come $25, $35 million dollars to just start the conversation with me.”
As far as a potential fight against “The Eagle” himself, Paul says he is open to it because it excites him, and it has to be something big to pique his interest.
“I would fight Khabib in MMA if they wanted to make that offer. Cause that would be exciting. That would excite me, especially if I had more time to train. That would be a massive fight. Probably a million, 2 million pay-per-view buys and all I would have to do is work on my wrestling skills. Cause I could outstrike him standing up.”
While Paul has shown he has boxing skills, it’s going to take some time for him to brush up on the rest of his MMA arsenal and a period of two years would be a nice start, he said. As far as his boxing career, Paul is currently 4-0 and is coming off a knockout win over former UFC Welterweight champion Tyron Woodley (highlights).
For the time being, “The Problem Child” doesn’t have the urge to get back into another training camp. When you couple that with the fact that he doesn’t see anyone worth of his time at the moment, one man he would be interested in boxing is another former UFC champion.
“Yes, definitely, I would love that fight. Interesting story, I think he was the first celebrity I ever saw. Right when MMA was blowing up, my dad was a super big fan and we went to this local MMA event and they must have paid Anderson Silva to come because it was in Ohio so I don’t know why he would have been there.
“But I actually asked for his autograph and we took a picture with him. I’m maybe like 12 years old but I think he was the first celebrity that I met. So it would be fun to bring it back full circle and fight someone who was one of my first idols.”
For now, Paul will put on his promoter hat as he is about to embark on a press tour to promote the upcoming boxing match between Lightweight champion, Katie Taylor, and Amanda Serrano, who are set to throw down on April 30, 2022 inside Madison Square Garden in New York City.