By Keith Idec

Jarrell Miller won’t exactly take a step up in competition in his next fight.

According to an ESPN.com report Tuesday night, Miller will face France’s Johann Duhaupas in a heavyweight fight HBO will televise April 28 from Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The main event of HBO’s doubleheader that night will pit middleweight contender Daniel Jacobs against Maciej Sulecki.

Jacobs and Miller are from Brooklyn.

Poland’s Sulecki is undefeated (26-0, 10 KOs), but will move back up from junior middleweight to middleweight to box Jacobs (33-2, 29 KOs). Duhaupas, however, has been knocked out twice and isn’t considered a true threat to ruin Miller’s move toward a shot at heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua.

Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom Boxing promotes Joshua (20-0, 20 KOs). The American division of his company, Matchroom Boxing USA, promotes Jacobs and is working with Miller, who’s represented by Salita Promotions.

The 29-year-old Miller (20-0-1, 18 KOs) expressed interest in boxing Trevor Bryan (19-0, 13 KOs), an unbeaten but untested former sparring partner from Schenectady, New York. When a deal couldn’t be completed for Miller to battle Bryan, his handlers turned their attention to Duhaupas.

The 37-year-old Duhaupas (37-4, 24 KOs) has won three straight fights against nondescript opposition since former WBA champ Alexander Povetkin (33-1, 23 KOs) knocked him out in the sixth round of their December 2016 bout in Ekaterinburg, Russia. Deontay Wilder (39-0, 38 KOs) also stopped Duhaupas in the 11th round of their September 2015 fight for Wilder’s WBC title in Birmingham, Alabama.

The 6-feet-4, 283-pound Miller stopped Poland’s Mariusz Wach (33-3, 17 KOs) in his last fight, his HBO debut that resulted in a ninth-round TKO win November 11 in Uniondale, New York. In his previous bout, Miller beat American Gerald Washington (18-2-1, 12 KOs) by eighth-round TKO July 29 at Barclays Center.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.