I think at first AJ would have the "UFC jitters" which is natural but it isn't guaranteed to affect his performance. He's a world class athlete that has fought in front of 100k crowds at stadiums like Wembley. Not in arenas which only have a fraction of the capacity.
It's all speculation though. Unless he's made an enormous offer he won't even consider doing a one-off in the UFC. Much less embark on an MMA career. The most money is in boxing. That's why so many MMA fighters are now crossing over. Look at Francis. In just a couple fights he's made exponentially more than he ever did in his entire MMA career.
Bud, I'm not talking about UFC jitters. It's not about the crowd. It's about performing in a sport he never fought in and has extreme lack in skills of, against one of the most skilled guys ever. It's about him getting his ass kicked guaranteed. Lol
Yes, we know. It's the only thing people talk about. There is more money in boxing.
Firstly, Joshua already has enough money. If he wants to prove he is actually a good fighter and not just a good boxer, then he would go into MMA. He might get paid less, but that's not really realistically a problem for someone already loaded.
But he doesn't want to prove that, becauee he knows he would be completely out of his depth, unless they give him favorable match ups, which again doesn't prove much of a point
Secondly, just because it's the same old trope without any nuance, there is only more money in boxing for the absolute top. There is more money for mid and lower tiers of fighters in MMA/UFC.
Yet, in general no boxers of any kind like to go into MMA. It's extremely rare.
And there aren't really many crossing over. A few are. A lot of them were already rerired fighters or they are at the end of their MMA career. They didn't just do it for the money, but for several reasons. Lots of them just like the sport.
Ngannou also didn't just go for the money, it was part of it, but more importantly it was always his dream to box. Fighting isn't just about money, yet so many people think it's the end all be all for these fighters to make their decisions with. Francois Botha went into kickboxing and that didn't pay more than boxing. But the dude wanted to challenge himself. But ultimately couldn't hang with the top, despite being a former world champion in boxing and coming from a much more established sport with a much bigger talent pool than kickboxing, especially back then.
Even Ray Mercer went into kickboxing and MMA he lost twice in kickboxing snd won against Tim Sylvia in MMA, which is kind of the Ngannou idea of having a perfectly suited opponent for him, a slow lunber striker in Timmeh, even though he was a former UFC champion. Though he was much worse, than Ngannou, of course. But then he loses to Kimbo Slice of all people, who himself only started MMA after his 40's if IIRC and he only had a backyard brawling and street fighting background. But with just a relatively short amount of training with Bas, he was already way too skilled for Mercer, a former WBO world champion and Olympic gold medalust boxer. Imagine if he fought Aspinalll, lol.
And against Bonjasky in kickboxing he straight up just quit the match after getting headkicked, because he just has absolutely no idea how to deal with it and that scared him so he just decided it was futile to continue.
That shows how conpletely foreign so much of the other elements of MMA are to a boxer. It's not something that is easily bridged to where they can compete with the highest level of MMA fighters (or kickboxers) who aren't just going to play into their game. Again, some favorable match ups might play into their game, but most won't if they are smart. Ngannou and big Timmeh aren't the smartest fighters (also not the dumbest, not trying to insult them) Aspinall is a very smart fighter.
But overall, I agree, we are never gonna see it.
