In this week’s mailbag, we tackle your thoughts on Jake Paul, his victory over Julio Cesar Chavez Jnr and his future in the cruiserweight division; the recently announced fight between welterweight titleholder Brian Norman Jnr and Devin Haney; whether Gilberto Ramirez’s status as a unified titleholder reflects poorly on the talent pool at 200lbs; and just how shot or not Deontay Wilder is.

Want to be featured in the mailbag? Comment or ask a question in the comments section below. Submissions may be edited for length and clarity. We also may select readers’ comments from other BoxingScene stories.

Brian Norman by left hook decapitation, or Devin Haney by a quarter mile. 

-CPNutKnockoutFreshmart

David Greisman’s response: Concise and witty! Between your pithy prediction of how Haney would defeat Norman and Bob Arum’s social media post calling Haney a “track star,” it’s clear that the former lightweight champion and junior welterweight titleholder has damaged his reputation by moving his feet more than he moved his hands during his May victory over Jose Ramirez in New York City’s Times Square.

The Haneys have pushed back on the blowback. Yes, this is a sport where the point is to hit and not get hit in return. But this is also a business. And most boxing fans mostly are allergic to aesthetically displeasing styles. If a fighter is going to excel with defense, they still want to see that fighter punish his opponent with offense. Or as veteran boxing judge Tom Schreck put it in a column here on BoxingScene: 

“The goal of professional boxing is to strike your opponent, and employing good defense will set you up to do just that. Think of Pernell Whitaker or a young Hector Camacho. Both fighters had great defense, but that defense didn’t win them rounds if it didn’t lead to offense. You can’t win at boxing without a solid defense, but you can’t win at boxing with only a solid defense.”

Jack Reiss, who recently retired from refereeing but remains a boxing judge, said something similar in an interview with boxing writer Adam Abramowitz in The Ring magazine:

“If a fighter is not putting himself in an offensive position with his movements, then he or she is not to be given credit. Ring generalship leads to clean punching and effective aggression. If you can’t draw a line from what a fighter does to a successful offensive position, then it’s not effective ring generalship.”

I would have loved to see if Devin Haney could learn that marketability is not just about ability. Fortunately for them, the fight with Norman is being funded by a promoter whose main purpose isn’t profit.

Maybe Haney will come out and look better against Norman than he did against Ramirez. Maybe he will try the same tactics against Norman and just hope that having the WBO welterweight title around his waist will open up further opportunities. Or maybe Norman will finish the job that Ryan Garcia started.

JAKE PAUL WILL NEVER FIGHT A CRUISERWEIGHT TITLEHOLDER

Even 42-year-old Badou Jack would ice Jake Paul in five rounds. Jai Opetaia or Gilberto “Zurdo” Ramirez would knock his head clean off his shoulders. There's no way Paul gets into the ring with any of those guys. He knows he can’t even beat Tommy Fury. 

-famicommander

Tris Dixon’s response: I think you’re right, though I’d favor Jake Paul over Tommy Fury now, surely. Fury has all but disappeared and seems to have far more pressing concerns than boxing. Paul seems to have a real appetite for it – the business and the sport – and good for him in that respect.

And while I agree with you about Paul and the top cruiserweights – that they would all beat him, and the likes of Opetaia would likely savage him – Paul looks tough, durable, and heavy-handed enough to cause a few of the ranked guys some issues. 

I’m not saying Jake Paul is the next Ali or Holyfield, but he’s playing a long, lucrative game, and it is one that will only see the head removed from his shoulders for the right price – and I don’t think that price would be met against a legitimate name without a big profile. Anthony Joshua, on the other hand: He could decapitate Jake Paul and sell out Wembley Stadium and probably break a few pay-per-view records in the process.

BOXING’S FLAWS LED TO THE RISE OF JAKE PAUL

Jake Paul is not to blame for his surge of popularity in the sport, so there’s no reason to dislike him. Many fans and their favorite boxers are the reasons why he’s reached this level of popularity. The “faces of boxing” have let the sport down by refusing to take the real fights and have milked their idiot fan bases into paying for shit fights instead. 

Rather than not supporting trash fights, these groupie fan bases defended their favorite fighters ducking, mainly due to tribalism. So gradually, more people got turned off by boxing, and that opened the door for Paul to create these circus-type events that brought in fans, who otherwise had no reason to have interest in the sport, because boxing wasn’t creating any major events. He’s done what many of your favorite fighters have failed to do, which is make major events that captivated fans beyond the typical ones. 

-Jab jab boom

Kieran Mulvaney’s response: Since losing on the one occasion he has fought an active pro boxer, Jake Paul has faced an MMA veteran making his pro boxing debut; two boxers who between them had fought twice in the previous four years; an MMA veteran with an 0-1 record in boxing; a 58-year-old man who had recently suffered a major health scare and last won a fight in 2003; and a once-competent boxer who was largely recognized to have pissed his career away 10 years ago. 

If boxing is failing its fans – and on many levels it certainly is – is what Paul is doing really the answer? 

Would Paul be less popular if boxing were catering better to its fans? I don’t know. “Influencer” boxing appears to be thriving in the U.K., where the sport as a whole seems healthier than in the U.S. My own personal reaction to Paul’s boxing career has gone from disregard, to acknowledgment of his considerable improvement as a boxer combined with recognition of his self-promotional abilities, to where I am now – bored with the act and waiting for him to put up or shut up.

If Jake Paul wants to be treated seriously as a boxer, then he should be subjected to the same degree of critique as any other fighter. If he is arguing with seriousness that he is at world-level, then he is being given every opportunity to prove it. He has true drawing power to fight literally whomever he wants. He’s being given rankings he hasn't remotely done enough to justify; if he believes his own hype, he should do what any other boxer would do and jump at the chance to fight for a world title.

Whether he will or not, I don't know. He may feel there is more to be gained by continuing to fight big-name, barely-warm bodies and complaining he isn’t being taken seriously, than he would gain from challenging the likes of Zurdo Ramirez and running the risk of being annihilated – likely for no more money than he is presently earning. 

None of which is to in any way diminish what he has done to improve himself as a boxer or sell himself as an attraction. Full credit to him for that, and I also like very much what he’s doing as a promoter and as a supporter of women’s boxing. But I don’t see how we can criticize boxers for allegedly not taking the best fights available to them and praise Jake Paul for doing the same.

PAUL VS. CHAVEZ JNR HAD TO BE A FIXED FIGHT

I didn’t watch this YouTuber’s fight. But a quick look at these stats, surely this had to be a scripted fight. I know Julio Cesar Chavez Jnr is washed, but still, throwing only 14 punches combined in the first three rounds and the YouTuber over 100? I have no interest in watching it back. It must have been scripted. No way is even a washed pro only throwing three punches in a round vs. a YouTuber. 

-Boxing 112

Owen Lewis’ response: Want a stat to show just how crazily low Chavez’s output was early on? In the first three rounds of his fight with Paul, a 58-year-old Mike Tyson threw more punches than Chavez did in the first three rounds on Saturday – 55 to 14. It wasn’t even close. 

Only Chavez knows why he chose to superglue his fists into their holsters, because it was bizarre to watch. And his explanation – that his low activity was a tactic to tire Paul out – made no sense. You tire someone out by landing body punches or forcing them to throw more punches than usual to win rounds or keep you off of them. 

If you are Muhammad Ali, you might even be able to shell up, bob and weave on the ropes, and let your bloodlusted opponent punch themselves out. Chavez is certainly not Muhammad Ali, and he certainly didn’t throw enough punches to make Paul work for the first seven rounds. 

What made Chavez’s inactivity all the more galling is that when he did let his hands go in the last quarter of the fight, he landed several telling blows and appeared to have Paul in trouble. Had he started fighting earlier, or simply made a plausible effort to win rounds, it’s not hard to picture him defeating a fatigued Paul. 

Again, only Chavez and Paul know what that contract looked like, and I’m not in the habit of suggesting corruption without proof. Chavez has enough weird performances on his record that this one wasn’t out of character, even if it was surreal. But even those piling credit on Paul for his performance should be able to agree that Chavez only fought like he was interested in winning for the final two rounds and change.

GILBERTO RAMIREZ REFLECTS POORLY ON THE DIVISION

Zurdo is making the most of what he has, which isn’t much. He is a fat, feather-fisted, plodding fighter with decent boxing skills, no pop, and a bunch of arm punches. His body looks terrible. The fact that he is a unified titleholder is an indictment on the entire cruiserweight division. 

-fistandfury

Jason Langendorf’s response: In principle, I mostly agree. The cruiserweight division is down, and I would have preferred to see Gilberto Ramirez stick around at light heavyweight and take on the best it had to offer beyond Dmitry Bivol (who handily outpointed Ramirez in 2022 for Zurdo’s only career loss).

Then again, “fat,” “feather-fisted” and “arm punches” doesn’t take into account what Ramirez has done to get here (30 KOs in 49 fights) or the natural progression of a 34-year-old’s body. First, you’re ignoring a lot of wonderful body work, counterpunching and in-fighting from Ramirez. 

Also: I’d rather see a fighter enter the ring comfortable, clean and ready to perform than drained, juiced to the gills or unable to draw on the best of his skills. You don’t have to love the division or the man’s, uh, curves. But wherever he’s at, Zurdo keeps winning. A 48-1 record and belts in two divisions have to count for something.

ALL DEONTAY WILDER HAS LEFT IS HIS NAME

Deontay Wilder is totally washed. But watch him get a big fight or even one of those joke interim title fights, thanks to the ghost of his name. It’s that bad. You try to be a promoter and attempt to sell “Fabio Wardley vs. Murat Gassiev” or whatever to a global audience, not just the beltholder’s home. It’s that much of a yawn when you scroll down, even with legitimate ratings. 

-VislorTurlough

Lucas Ketelle’s response: It is clear Wilder isn’t the same. It is partially the wars he went through in the last half-decade, and partially age. Wilder is now 39. It is hard to be in your prime at that age. 

Wilder is in a spot that many fighters once got to. He is no longer what he was, but he really meant a lot to a subsection of fans who supported him 10 years ago. That fan (in theory) has a bigger income 10 years later, and now Wilder fits the bill of a rock band going on a reunion tour. So, for that fan, it is still fun to relive their past. The only fights Wilder should be in are nostalgia-inducing classics. That reminds you of what he once was. 

Want to be featured in the mailbag? Comment or ask a question in the comments section below. Submissions may be edited for length and clarity. We also may select readers’ comments from other BoxingScene stories.