Teddy Atlas says Anthony Joshua should retire if he’s only focused on continuing his career just to get another “150 million” following his loss to Daniel Dubois last Saturday night.
Joshua’s promoter, Eddie Hearn, wants him to fight Tyson Fury twice in 2025 and possibly rematch Dubois. Those three fights would earn AJ a gazillion dollars, adding to his massive fortune. If Joshua loses all three of those fights, he will still make massive money.
Atlas believes that Joshua (28-4, 25 KOs) got “exposed” in his fifth-round KO defeat against IBF heavyweight champion Dubois (22-2, 21 KOs). He says the mistakes Joshua had made in past fights and gotten away with didn’t work against Dubois, and he took advantage of those flaws.
It goes back to Joshua’s trainers. AJ’s tactics during the Dubois fight were ones he’d been practicing on sparring partners during training camp. Joshua’s trainer, Ben Davison, should have known that he wouldn’t beat a wrecking machine like Dubois fighting passively or by throwing uppercuts.
“He’s got to decide, ‘Do I retire?’ He doesn’t have to fight again. Ricky Hatton said he should retire. I agree with Ricky if it’s just about getting another 150 million pounds,” said Teddy Atlas on his YouTube channel about Anthony Joshua needing to retire if he’s only fighting for money.
Joshua’s fans believe he shouldn’t retire because they feel that his defeat wasn’t a big deal and that he can continue to enjoy success if he gets his tactics right. They could be right.
If Joshua fights on the front foot, attacking his opponents with a barrage of punches like he’d done earlier in his career, there aren’t too many heavyweights that could stand up to that kind of firepower. However, Joshua hasn’t fought like that in many years, making him vulnerable.
“If it’s that, you’ve got enough. Go off into the sunset,” said Atlas about Joshua.” People love you. But if there’s something that keeps you up at night, then you’ve got to fight again for you. Otherwise, no.”
There’s too much fan interest in a clash between Joshua and Fury for AJ to retire now. It’s more than money with Joshua; he wants to compete to show that he can still win at the highest levels. Joshua will need a better trainer, though, and it doesn’t appear that he’s interested in making changes to his team after his loss to Dubois.
“Joshua got exposed. If you do come back, you have to see what you did wrong and what you’ve done wrong in the past. Even if you’ve gotten away with it, it’s still wrong. It has to be corrected. If you correct it, maybe you can come back and do something huge again,” said Atlas.
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