Monday’s announcement that Jake Paul and Anthony Joshua will meet in a sanctioned heavyweight bout on Dec. 19 in Miami was greeted with the usual spectrum of reactions. When Paul is involved, that’s part of the ritual — some welcomed it, some dismissed it, and some outright recoiled at the idea.

But the truth is simple: The facts outmuscle the feelings. And with just over four weeks until “Judgment Day,” it’s time to assess what promises to be one of the year’s most discussed — and most-watched — boxing events.

Who, and what, are the winners and losers of the Jake Paul vs. Anthony Joshua saga?

WINNERS

Anthony Joshua

Prizefighting is, at its core, a perpetual negotiation between risk and reward. And in this case, Anthony Joshua — a former two-time unified heavyweight champion — has judged the trade-off perfectly.

The British heavyweight is entering the final stretch of what has been a remarkable career. Genuine opportunities are thinning out, and the idea of rolling the dice on another top-10 contender — one not named Tyson Fury or Oleksandr Usyk — holds little appeal.

By accepting Jake Paul’s challenge, Joshua satisfies several needs at once: He gets a valuable run-out after a 15-month layoff, pockets a reported purse as high as $ 50 million, and positions himself as the man who, in his own words, will “break the internet over Jake Paul’s face.”

Joshua owes boxing nothing at this stage. Once he retires, the sport’s more unforgiving voices will inevitably consign him to the same pile they reserve for all spent champions. To suggest his legacy is somehow tarnished by taking this fight is, frankly, nonsensical.

And if lucrative detours were good enough for Muhammad Ali (vs. Antonio Inoki, 1976), George Foreman (vs. five men, 1976), Jack Dempsey (vs. Cowboy Luttrell, 1940) and Jack Johnson (vs. Stanley Ketchel, 1909), then they’re more than good enough for Anthony Joshua.

Jake Paul

Paul has been trading punches since 2020 and, 13 sanctioned bouts later, he finally gets the chance to silence the chorus claiming he’s never faced a live, functioning boxer.

Anthony Joshua isn’t just a tick in that box — he’s the whole page. And yet plenty believe “The Problem Child” has truly taken leave of his senses by marching headfirst toward the former unified heavyweight champion.

Paul will earn an astronomical sum for this fight and, provided he isn’t seriously hurt, stands only to gain from it — in both respect and notoriety — for daring to share a ring with one of the division’s most destructive punchers.

Netflix and Most Valuable Promotions

After Paul vs. Gervonta "Tank" Davis fell over earlier this month, Netflix likely put pressure on Most Valuable Promotions and Paul to get another sizable fight over the line before the close of the year.

I’m not sure in their wildest dreams they would have expected Joshua to be the man to pick up the call on fairly short notice and agree to a fight that, in many ways, supersedes the original bout with "Tank."

Netflix’s foray into boxing lives and dies on the steady delivery of top-shelf spectacle. And if raw numbers are the currency they covet, then Dec. 19 should leave the streaming giant purring at the returns.

Internet memes

Jake Paul is one of those figures the public loves to loathe. If — as most expect — Joshua poleaxes him early in their heavyweight encounter, the viral fallout will be ruthless and immediate.

But that’s surely baked into the plan. There’s no such thing as bad publicity in Paul’s universe — though this brand of publicity is likely to sting, leaving him seeing stars.

Don’t be surprised if the creative mind of Paul already has a plan to turn schadenfreude into dollars.

Francois Nel via Getty Images

LOSERS

Jake Paul

Look, for all the credit Jake Paul deserves for his business instincts, he is almost certainly walking into a heavy beating at the hands of Joshua.

His only professional loss came against Tommy Fury — a man several rungs below "AJ" on boxing’s ladder — and that alone should tell you something about the scale of the task in front of him.

Joshua’s knockout of former UFC heavyweight champion Francis Ngannou in 2024 was one of the most savage finishes the heavyweight division has produced in the past decade. It’s difficult, bordering on impossible, to map out a scenario in which Paul avoids an ending that doesn’t look eerily similar.

DAZN

Anthony Joshua posted a thank you on X to DAZN for allowing him to take this fight on Netflix, away from the platform he is exclusive to.

DAZN has spent the past few years tightening its grip on boxing coverage, so watching this fight slip through its fingers and land in Netflix’s lap will feel, on paper at least, like a clear loss.

But DAZN should be telling itself that there’s a bigger picture at play. If Joshua wins — and the expectation is that he will — he’s heading for a huge 2026 campaign, likely ending with the long-awaited showdown with Tyson Fury. That, without question, lands on DAZN.

So DAZN will frame this as a free advertisement: One of its biggest heavyweight assets being paraded in front of a fresh, global audience, before coming home for the main event.

Heavyweight contenders

It’s difficult to deny that Jake Paul is taking food straight off the plates of several heavyweight contenders.

Landing an Anthony Joshua fight is still the equivalent of hitting the jackpot for most of the division's top 20. So if you’re, for example, Michael Hunter, Martin Bakole, Jared Anderson or Jarrell Miller, you have every right to feel more than a little aggrieved watching a cruiserweight YouTuber jump the queue.

But circle back to the risk vs. reward equation and the picture becomes clearer. Joshua has zero incentive to wade in against a hungry, dangerous second-tier heavyweight when he’s been handed a cruiserweight — for a purse that’s more than quadruple the size.

Francis Ngannou

It was only a couple of weeks ago that it seemed former UFC heavyweight king Francis Ngannou might step into the gap left by "Tank" Davis.

But the plan didn’t land quite as expected. Ngannou hit back, accusing Paul of outright “disrespect” for even suggesting the fight.

“No, bro, come on. Don’t disrespect me like that,” he said. “It’s not about the number. I am not interested. It makes no sense.”

Whether he took the proposition seriously or not, there’s little doubt that Ngannou has fumbled a very large payday.