An Olympic gold medalist at London 2012, and it's safe to say he's had an eventful professional career ever since then.
20 stoppage victories from his first 20 fights in the professional ranks, with just 65 rounds boxed from those first 20 bouts - he was averaging just 3.25 rounds a fight. Notable wins over Dillian Whyte, Charles Martin and Wladimir Klitschko at Wembley Arena in that 20 fight KO streak, Joshua was now rightly being touted as potentially one of the best heavyweights to ever lace up a pair of gloves.
Joseph Parker then became the first man to take AJ 12 rounds, before he blitzed past the durable Alexander Povetkin. Then came quite comfortably the craziest and most unpredictable moment of his career so far and one of the most famous moments in boxing history occurred.
The Brit was all but set to fight Jarrell Miller before the American failed a drugs test, so the once-beaten Mexican Andy Ruiz stepped in at late notice and caused one of the biggest upsets in boxing history, by stopping AJ in the seventh round to become the first-ever Mexican heavyweight champion of the world.
This was seemingly the kick up the backside that Joshua probably needed and in the rematch, he made the amendments he needed to make and put in an almost punch perfect 36 minutes of boxing to claim a unanimous points victory over Ruiz.
That was over a year ago and now in his first fight since that victory, he takes on the vastly experienced Bulgarian Kubrat Pulev. So just how will AJ get the better of him?
Well, Joshua showed against Ruiz was that if needed, he can fight off the back foot and use his boxing brain instead of going in all guns blazing and taking his opposition out.
Pulev has only been beaten once in his 29 fights to date, however, when he was stopped by Wladimir Klitschko back in 2014 and that was a much younger fresher Pulev than what he is now.
Joshua can win this fight in a variety of different ways. If he puts it on him from the get-go, he's got more than enough power to get the elder man out of there in a round or two but doing that would leave himself open to another Ruiz moment
AJ needs to think methodically. Pulev stands with a triangle guard which makes straight shots key to breaking him down and taking his focus away from the hooks. The champ needs to get behind that two-inch reach advantage and make Pulev overcommit then counter him on his way in. If he does that and is patient in doing that, the Bulgarian will be lucky to see the second half of the fight.
You can get Joshua to win in rounds 1-6 right here at 6/4!