Jake Paul is raising the stakes for his Christmas Eve comeback battle.
One day after Paul formally announced a Dec. 24 boxing match against French kickboxer and MMA star Cedric Doumbe in Dubai, the polarizing influencer-turned-fighter said that he intends to “hang up the gloves” and retire from boxing if he loses to Doumbe. In a video on his YouTube channel, Paul made it official:
“Now all jokes aside, this is a dangerous fight. Cedric has been in there with killers his whole career. He’s a two-time [GLORY Kickboxing] world champion and he’s not scared of anybody, including me, ‘The Vanilla Gorilla.’ But this is my sport. No kicks, no takedowns, and no glass on the floor [like in Doumbe’s lone PFL loss] — we checked.
“If he wins, I will grasp up the gloves and call it a day. But if he loses, the man who calls himself ‘The Best’ just got beat up by a YouTuber with a titanium jaw. So Cedric Doumbe, I, Jake Joseph Paul, will knock you out, embarrass you and defeat you on Christmas Eve. This battle is not going the distance and someone is getting put to sleep in the Middle East, and it’s not Santa.”
Paul (12-2, 7 KOs), 29, has been sidelined all through all of 2026 as he recovered from the damaged jaw he suffered in his sixth-round knockout loss to Anthony Joshua in December 2025. Joshua — a 6-foot-6, two-time heavyweight world champion — considerably out-sized the 6-foot-1 Paul en route to handing the American his first loss by knockout.
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Paul’s accidents required a number of surgical procedures to deal with, and even raised questions about his boxing future. Paul admitted on Uncrowned’s “The Ariel Helwani Show” in May that he wasn’t sure whether he’d ever be ready to battle again.
Doumbe, a two-time GLORY Kickboxing champion and star title for Paul’s PFL MMA group, historically competes at 170 kilos, but will be shifting up in weight to battle Paul in the 200-pound cruiserweight division. Doumbe has competed only once as a professional boxer, successful a four-round resolution over Mohamed Fodil in a 2015 bout in France.
In Paul’s video Tuesday, he also mirrored on his loss to Joshua and the damaged jaw that saved him out of the ring for practically a 12 months:
“Why now? Honestly, after Joshua, half of me thought about quitting and never boxing again. He broke my jaw. I have two titanium plates in my mouth. I could not eat for weeks. I could not even discuss or smile at my bank statements. I was just laying in mattress, evening after evening, asking myself, ‘Do I still need to do this?’
“Yeah, obviously I still want to do this. I ain’t no b****.
“Y’all said, ‘Fight a actual boxer,’ so I fought Anthony f***ing Joshua, and people still need to discuss. Y’all do not get it — I will battle anyone, any time, any place. I’ve said it before.
“And my next victim just so happens to be the biggest fighter in France.”
Paul vs. Doumbe is set to take place at Dubai’s Coca-Cola Arena.
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A broadcast companion for the occasion has yet to be announced.
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