Ngannou might have doomed Usyk

He doesn't get credit for Wlad in some circles because he ducked the rematch, which would have shown if Wlad just had an off night (like Fury had many times) or Tyson was actually that good.

 

Dropping body fat is never a bad thing unless it's too quick and drastic. Being 280 lbs with around 30% body fat like Fury was against Ngannou is not healthy. He looks a good bit lighter now but it's not like he's drained. Just at a healthier weight which is better for athletic performance. He also has several months to get used to the lighter weight and build up his strength in the meantime.

 

Fury was quite trim for the fight against southpaw Wallin, and we all saw how that went. Ultimately a big influence in the outcome of the fight is how have the years of abuse and the wild weight fluctuations have affected Furys body, which will not be obvious just by looking at his physique.

 

The BBOBC took away his licence. Then he had a compound nervous breakdown and went into exile for 3 years.

 

My point being really is I think he can be much better than he was against Ngannou. However you, and another poster, raise two very valid points/concerns. Is it possible for Fury to get in that shape again, and even if he can will that style work against Usyk (I think it might).

It’s impossible to say how much he has left, and there is no doubt the third Wilder fight took something from him (and Deontay too). However, I would hardly call either guy shot too pieces, these are the 70s where guys went through war after war. I think Fury has still got a decent amount in the tank and should Usyk beat him he would deserve all the credit.

The whole ‘he lost because he was shot’ point is way overused and I’ve seen the Fury fanboys already preparing it in advance.

 

We really don’t know and the third Wilder fight definitely took something from him. However I would hardly call him shot as we saw in the Whyte fight where he crushed a still solid contender. You are also right, even a fit, pressure fighting Fury may not have the tools to beat Usyk, and the style could be all wrong for him. We ultimately do not know, and won’t know until/if the fight happens.

I will also say Usyk is levels above Wilder in terms of ability and pretty much everything minus reach and power. This is going to be the hardest test of Fury’s career.

 

Father time has beat the crap out of both Fury & Usyk

Their age will show
Their failing bodies will show
Their inactivity will show

But most importantly above all else what will show is their fighting spirit.

Then we all wake up and realize this life is for us to live & love to the best of our ability - as Usyk & Fury have. We must send them both into retirement remembered as the true spartans of this era.

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The Fury fans will like it, his haters will dislike it:

I personally respected Fury very much in 2015 when he defeated Wlad on Wlad's home turf in Germany, using the unfair K2 rules, basically Wlad gets away with everything (just look the Povetkin fight).

I was also very impressed how he smased Wilder to bits in the second fight, since nobody thought he was able to do it.

In 2022 and 2023 my dislike towards him became bigger and bigger, it even became so far that I almost "hated" him, and I hoped more and more Usyk would school him. Even in the Ngannou fight I scored that fight 96-93 for Ngannou.

But in the past 2-3 months I realized something:

If someone says he was at 100% in the Ngannou fight lies to himself!

This Fury would have been outclassed and KOed by Wlad 2015 but also Wilder 2018-2021.

Fury got the same problems like R. Balboa in Rocky 3. The money and the fame got him. And he wasnt just a full-time boxer anymore, but a full-time boxer + part-time actor (Netflix show) and/or part-time singer and wrestler.

You can disagree or agree, its up to you, but we had more such examples in combat sport:

1) Manny Pacquiao vs Juan Manuel Marquez 4:
Even Roach said before the fight he is afraid Manny can lose. Simply because he wasnt just a full-time boxer anymore, but a part-time politican and singer. The result was devastating.

2) Ronda Rousey vs Holly Holm (MMA):
Yes I know how much boxing fans hate Ronda and love Holly, but with Ronda was a similar thing. After her big success, she tried to become a Hollywood actress too, being a part-time actress working with Stallone in "The Expendables 3", etc..
She became overconfident and had the wrong gameplan, her trainer was so deluded telling her fighting just with her hands (boxing) against a foromer pro boxer Holly, and she payed the price.
The same Holly was choked out brutally in her next fight against Miesha Tate, and the same Tate lost to Rousey before.

3) Lennox Lewis vs Hasim Rahman 1:
Same thing with the acting stuff. Lennox wasnt a just a full-time boxer anymore, but a part-time actor too. He was in Vegas filming "Ocean's 11" with Clooney, J. Roberts, B. Bitt and all the crem de la creme in Hollywood. And he got KOed by Rahman. In the rematch Lewis proved what was going on.

4) Hongman Choi vs Siala-Mou "Might Mo" Siliga 1 (K-1):
After having much success in K-1, Choi became a part-time singer and recorded a song. His preparation for Mo was basically none, and he payed the price, getting KOed. Like Lennox, in the rematch against Mo he proved what was his mistake. Even if it was close, but he took all heavy shots from Mo without going down, beating him by points.

And so on. Of course some people will dispute one of these things, especially that Rousey-Holm thing, but it's a fact Rousey was a part-time actress when she fought Holm. Same what Lennox was when he fought Rahman 1.

5) Tyson Luke Fury:
What I wrote above, Netflix show etc.. There were too many other things except boxing for him in the past years. He became a bit lazy, and since Covid pandemic he never was close to his best shape again.

But should he really reach the level of Wilder 2 or exspecially Wlad again, means being sharp and moving that quick, there is nothing what Usyk can do.

If two guys have almost the same speed, but the one is so much bigger with longer reach etc., the little guy cant win, at least not in Queensburry rules. In a street fight Usyk could hit him with an uppercut in the balls, yes, but this doesnt work in boxing.

Usyk would never come close to him. It would be a boring fight of course, but for Fury effective.

Watch how fast Fury was against Wlad.

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And then tell me this was like he moved against Ngannou, or that AJ or any of Usyks heavyweight opponents were that fast. Nobody was. And especially not with this distance control and defense.

So if Fury really comes back to this level...and for some reasons I think maybe this was the reason he needs more time to go down in weight to maximum 255 lbs or something, better would be 250, and when you see new clips when he trains his legs, it seems he plans to reach that Wlad shape again.

I dont know if he can reach this form again, I doubt it very much. But if he can turn the time back and move like when he was at the age of 27, I dont see any scenario in which Usyk can win. He wont reach him and cant land shots on that 2015 Wlad version of Fury.

 

Roberto Duran, James Toney, Muhammad Ali, Lennox Lewis, Mike Tyson, etc., etc.

 

Definitely... And for obvious reasons, he needs to be.

I don't think that style would work on Usyk, but if he's going to fight that way he needs to be at least as fit as he was in that second Wilder fight - and I don't think he can be.

If nothing else...
In that style, he had levels AND styles advantage over Wilder.
Against Usyk that style might be effective, but it won't nullify Usyk completely like it can to Wilder - and Fury won't have a levels advantage with Usyk.

Couldn't agree more that it's hard to tell what Fury's got left... He's not been in very many wars, but he's put his body through a lot all the same.

That's the dumb thing about the third Wilder fight - he took a lot more punishment than he needed to because he refused to train properly.

Usyk would definitely deserve credit - it'd put to bed any doubt he's the best of the era having beaten the second and third best guys (whichever order you prefer to put them in)... The fact he's aging himself would counteract the fact Fury might not have a huge amount left either.

Sometimes it's true... But it works much better when one guy is clearly far closer to the end of his career than the other - it's not applicable here.

Not that it's difficult to have levels on Wilder in skill and ring IQ, of course.

You're absolutely right this is Fury's biggest test - he doesn't have a youth, fitness and motivation advantage like he did against Wlad, he's not facing a guy who's coming off a bad loss like Whyte and he's not fighting a fringe contender (at best) level cancrusher like Wilder who's never fought anyone his level before.

 

There is very little chance that Fury, who has never been knocked out, will be knocked out by Usyk.
Fury has also never been defeated. Usyk has a better chance of beating Fury than knocking him out.

 

John McDermott clearly defeated him. Though Fury avenged it, to his credit.

 

Yeah and before all of that he ducked the rematch twice.

 

Kiltschko pulled out against Chisora twice. Duck or no?

 

He'll be so motivated he'll be sparring a snapping turtle a week before the fight for literally no reason and it will snap on his hand and then you can't fight like that so we'll have to postpone it, of course. Maybe early to mid 2025. Uh oh! Big fights need tuneups...Fury shows up to tuneup unmotivated and has a fight so controversial with whatever rando dude's name will be...that it demands a rematch before an Usyk fight. Then a teaser for an Ngannou MMA fight with special rules, where they're in the MMA arena but they have to stand up the whole time and not kick.