That's a reasonable point of view to hold, but many felt Stokes behaviour was acceptable because he was standing up to bullies. In any case Fury has far greater mass appeal than he did back then, plus a compelling story of redemption and overcoming adversity. The BBC will use that to bring him back into the fold, truthfully they don't have much choice in the matter.
He may have been standing up to bullies, although his behaviour in the past (mocking a disabled child, abusively confronting a fan at a Test match) suggests that he's a bully as well, but attacking them was totally unjustified. The guy he knocked out was backing off when Stokes hit him and I'm amazed he wasn't charged with assault.
Ultimately, it's a shapshot popularity contest. Wiggins is (was?) more popular than Froome, and reached cult hero status in 2012 due to winning the Tour and the Olympic Trial. While Froome has achieved more over his career on the road, he probably never had as good a calendar year as Wiggins did in 2012. Thomas winning is more inexplicable to me. Wiggins had an exceptional 2012, and there's always more significance in being the first to win something. Thomas won a race that had been won 5 out of the last 6 times by British riders, and only won the Dauphiné outside of that. In purely cycling terms both Froome and Simon Yates had better years, but the public like Thomas more. Froome didn't even make the shortlist in 2016, despite winning a third tour and an Olympic medal. There really isn't any rhyme or reason to any of it.
the point is that Tyson Fury wasn’t even allowed onto the ballot to be voted for. hence the general public didn’t get to vote for him...
But why was he not on the ballot? Was it the BBC's sole decision or was it influenced by public criticism?
Why are people really arsed about this? It’s got to be the worst award going, some obscure sport always wins it and it’s always one that appeases the upper class and pizza express eating royals.
Fury was on the ballot in 2015 and got 7% of the vote. He didn't make the final six in 2018, but it was a reduced shortlist and everyone on it won something major or did something historic.
Fury also did something major and historic in Germany. I blame PPV as the major achievements in boxthing are hidden away from the general public being viewed by a very small % age of the population
Not sure when wiggo won it but he was a beast the year he won tdf and Olympic gold. But froome is probably the greatest British cyclist of all time.
He was nominated in 2015 and finished 4th, ahead of Hamilton, Froome, Farah, Armitstead and Peaty. He didn't do as badly as some are making out. In 2018 though his major achievement was officially a draw. While within boxing it was seen as a huge result to come back from where he had been, I don't think it's any kind of conspiracy that he wasn't on there instead of people that were. Agree that PPV doesn't help when a lot of the competition are more visible on terrestrial TV.
That's how I read it. Certainly wasn't the case though. He didn't make it in 2018, but it's not like he was blackballed or anything. There were enough justifiable reasons why others got nominated instead, even if many of us felt he could have been in there.
If this is 2018 then you have to consider what the other nominees did. Tour de France winner, F1 world champion, World Cup golden boot, 100 - 200 - 4x100 European champion plus world leading times in all three and two British records, first British competitor ever to defend winter Olympic gold and all time record fast bowler in cricket history. Fury’s two wins that year were Seferi and Pianeta.