Jake Paul and Cedric Doumbé will share a stage in Dubai next week. The PFL announced on X that a Paul vs. Doumbé press conference, paired with the PFL Dubai press conference, goes down Thursday, Nov. 12 at the New Covent Garden Theatre. Admission is free and the doors are open to the public, which means anybody in town with a phone and a grudge against either man can walk in.
The fight card itself lands two days later. PFL Dubai takes place Saturday, Nov. 14 at the Coca-Cola Arena, so the promotion is folding its biggest crossover story of the year into a regular fight week. That’s a smart bit of scheduling. You get the cameras for the Paul circus, and the rest of the PFL roster gets to stand near the cameras.
How we got here
Doumbé, a PFL welterweight, wasn’t the first name attached to Paul’s return to boxing. Darren Till was in talks for the spot before Paul went with Doumbé, according to MMA Fighting, which left the former UFC title challenger looking elsewhere. Till is 2-0 under the BKFC banner, and BKFC president David Feldman told MMA Fighting he thinks Till “can hang in there with Jake Paul, has a very good chance of beating him as well.” Feldman also said the promotion has big names lined up for Till and an announcement coming in the next couple of weeks. That’s a promoter’s sentence if I’ve ever heard one, but fine.
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MMA Fighting’s Between the Links crew framed Doumbé as Paul’s Christmas Eve opponent, so the clock on this one is short. Doumbé has already started the trash talk. “JAKE PAUL, GET READY FOR YOUR FUNERAL,” he posted on X on Nov. 4, with a coffin emoji for anyone who missed the subtext.
Paul, for his part, has put something real on the table. Per an MMA Fighting headline, he said he’ll “hang up the gloves” if Doumbé beats him. He’s also been busy picking fights online, taking a shot at Dana White on X over the Deontay Wilder vs. Jai Opetaia booking on the Tyson Fury vs. Anthony Joshua undercard. And the McGregor speculation never dies. MMA Fighting’s Morning Report closed its Nov. 5 edition by predicting Conor McGregor boxes Paul before he ever gets to BKFC.
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Sal’s take
I don’t have a number in front of me on this fight yet, and I’m not going to pretend I do. What I’d want to know is simple. How short is Paul, and does the line move after Thursday? Press conferences in this genre exist to move money, and a free, open-door event in Dubai with a guy promising a funeral is engineered to do exactly that. The retirement promise is the detail I care about most. When a fighter tells you he quits if he loses, he’s either very sure or very good at selling tickets, and in my experience Paul has been both at once. I’ve lost money betting against a man who controls the marketing. I’ll be watching the board Friday morning, Nov. 13, to see who blinked.
