Jose Aldo improves to 1-0 as a professional boxer, faces Jeremy Stephens next at Gamebred Boxing 4

Former longtime featherweight king Jose Aldo made his professional boxing debut yesterday, February 10, 2023 at the Nova Uniao Upper Arena in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Aldo retired from mixed martial arts competition roughly one month removed from his clash against no. 3 ranked UFC bantamweight contender Merab Dvalishvili at UFC 278, which marked his first defeat in four fights.

Many of us were left believing Aldo had some fight left in him, saddening us once we heard news of his retirement.

However, he didn’t retire from combat sports entirely, as he just improved to 1-0 as a professional boxer with his six-round unanimous decision victory over Emmanuel Zambrano, the scoring totals reading 60-54, 60-54, and 59-55.

Crowd loving every punch thrown#ShootoBoxing pic.twitter.com/mhIeEzPj4i

— UFC FIGHT PASS (@UFCFightPass) February 11, 2023

Aldo showcased the elite head movement he’s always possessed, and showed up with some great, accurate combinations yesterday.

Death, taxes, whiffing on punches against Jose Aldo#ShootoBoxing pic.twitter.com/5LwAFJXvtP

— UFC FIGHT PASS (@UFCFightPass) February 11, 2023

The fight took place at 140 lbs, and Aldo’s already slated for his next match up, as he takes on Jeremy Stephens in another six-round affair on April 1, 2023.

This is to be a rematch of their first encounter that happened back in 2018; Stephens hurt Aldo with some heavy punches early on in the bout, up until Aldo landed a vicious left shovel hook to the body that folded Stephens immediately, seeing Aldo victorious via knockout late in the first round.

Jose Aldo’s hands were always incredibly fun to watch, and even more effective and devastating.

Then Jose Aldo for the first time of the fight decides to exploit Jeremy's high guard and destroy his body with a beauty of body shot. Both punches landing on the same exact spot. What a powerful punch (followed by ground strikes) Jeremy was done there. Nasty. Aldo shine again. pic.twitter.com/BIhItOxnml

— Sweet Punch Memories (@SPM_staff) July 16, 2022

Now they go at it again in the boxing ring at Jorge Masvidal’s boxing event, Gamebred Boxing 4.

Aldo has also stated an interest in facing Floyd Mayweather Jr in an exhibition bout, as he recently said the following in an interview with MMAFighting:

“(Mayweather’s) side has already agreed, my side too. We’re now waiting for (promoters) to get the deal done. It might be exhibition on (Mayweather’s) side, but not for me. It’s punch to the face like always. He knows that.”

The 36 year old legend isn’t done yet, and it couldn’t be more exciting to see him in a brand new sport.

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Brady Ordway

I became a fan of combat sports when I was 12 years old. I was scrolling through the channels and landed upon Versus, where WEC was televised. Urijah Faber fought Jens Pulver for the second time that night. That's the first fight I ever saw, and I was immediately hooked. So eventually, I began covering the sport in the fourth quarter of 2018, and have since started writing about animals as well. If you'd like to see those pieces, be sure to check out learnaboutnature.com!

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