YouTube star Deji is about to face Floyd Mayweather, after overcoming his self-admitted laziness to earn a massive showdown with the boxing legend.
As recently as this March, Deji was unable to beat fellow influencers such as Alex Wassabi, Vinnie Hacker and a young, debuting Jake Paul. He was stopped by Paul in 2018 and male model Hacker in 2021, before facing Wassabi this year and looking improved, if not quite ready for main event action.
But he appeared to be a new man when he squared off with Yusef 'Fousey' Erakat, a hard-hitting American who had gotten in the shape of his life for a fight in August on the undercard of his brother KSI's boxing comeback. Deji landed a brutal stoppage that included putting down Erakat with a jab, and is now set to face Mayweather in a big money exhibition in Dubai.
Deji was infamously considered to be a solid natural boxer, with no discipline for training, and showed up out of shape for his fight with Hacker last year. He was still a heavy favourite, but couldn't keep up the pace and after taking a knee despite not being hit in the third round, was ultimately stopped.
"When the Vinnie Hacker fight came around I took the p*** again," he explained during an appearance on the True Geordie podcast. "I am lazy, not as lazy as I used to be, but I was always handed things quite easily and even boxing I grasped quite easily. I essentially got things given to me.
"It's not that I wanted them given to me because I remember saying at the beginning of my whole YouTube thing with JJ [his brother KSI] that I don't want it to be where I got everything from him. I wanted to kind of show that I can do things myself as well."
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Deji moved camps with just weeks to go until the Wassabi fight, and showed instant improvements even though the result didn't go his way. He trains boxing under renowned professional coach Daley Perales, and has levelled up his fitness by bringing in personal trainer and former kickboxer Leon Wills.
The no-nonsense trainer has given him a new lease on life, and played a huge part in Deji's fitness improving massively for the Fousey fight, in which he looked fresh during gruelling three minute rounds. "When we first started I had no strength and conditioning coach," he recalled.
"I was too afraid to approach Leon because I knew Leon didn't rate me. My friend Shane was telling me 'just contact him, just contact him', but I was too afraid. So he took my phone and messaged JJ instead and then he contacted Leon for me and that's how I got in contact with Leon. He put me through a very gruelling session and that's what spurred me on."
