Tyson Furys Career: In Depth Breakdown

He could have fought any of them. The fighter tells the promotor what to do. He never unified, like every other great champion, and he never fought a #1 contender. That is a problem. It certainly was until the 90s when his reign was whitewashed.

 

Fury has a single great win against Wlad. He won the fight but it was very close, and Wlad looked terrible. Whether that was because if Fury's boxing, or all the mind games, ring surface amd other factors is somewhat conjecture, but it certainly wasn't a good version of Wlad. Fury then avoided the rematch to such an extent that he left boxing for years.

Then he fought Wilder three times, who has been proven not to be as good as previously touted.

He lost twice convincingly to Usyk, whose historical HW ranking seems to be sky-rocketing, which is a lot to do with his defeat of Fury.

Fury ducked AJ and that us a red flag given the amount of money available for that fight. He could fight AJ in the future but it would be well past the time this fight mattered, particularly if AJ fights Jake Paul.

I will assume the fight against Ngannou was a blip caused by the fact Fury did not prepare.

IMHO, Fury is a below average HW champion whose single great win was tainted by all the shenanigans and the subsequent avoidance of the rematch. He kept his clean record fighting easier opponents. His trilogy against Wilder, where he was knocked down 3 times, including an 11 count, was spectacular, but not great boxing. Money and Usyk's persistence forced him into the first fight, which he was saved from a KO and clearly lost. He went for the rematch because it was the only way he could salvage his reputation, which he once again lost.

 

Wlad rematch? AJ?

 

(A) Your subjective opinion
(B) How can you win a belt if you never have the opportunity to fight for one. Plenty of these guys beat better fighters than Stiverne and Martin who Wilder and Joshua won their belts off.

Joyce win over Parker is probably better than anything Wilder ever did despite not holding a belt

You want other examples
Seldon held a belt, Ike and Tua did not
Page held a belt, Ruddock did not
Liakhovich held a belt, Povetkin did not

You want to keep arguing this?

 

How many HW's post-2004 have a better career record than Fury?

Usyk, certainly.

One can argue Wlad on sheer quantity, despite his 5 losses.

Fury's record is unambigously better than the rest in my eyes, despite the inherent subjectivity of these rankings.


Vitali's losses were worse (losses to two fighters rather than one, both inside the distance, Byrd not an elite HW, let Wlad avenge against Byrd for him) and his best wins were also inferior (Wlad + Wilder > Sanders + Chisora). Kevin rounds out Vitali's top 10 wins.

Joshua has an inferior top win (older, already dethroned Wlad in Britain, life and death), his B-wins (Whyte, Parker, 284 lbs Ruiz) are no better than Fury's and Joshua has 4 losses, including to Ruiz and Dubois (whom Joshua hasn't rematched, despite the one-sided loss).

I don't think anyone else warrants a mention. Povetkin is said to have a strong resume but his best win is Whyte and Hammer rounds out his top 10, while he lost to Wlad and Joshua. Whyte is at most Fury's 4th best win, after Wlad and Wilder x2.


If Fury's HW record is the 2nd or 3rd best of the last 21+ years then it's very good at minimum. Especially prior to Chisora 3 he'd had an epic career (dethroning Wlad to end the Klitschko era, historic comeback, classic trilogy with Wilder, 32-0-1 after destroying Whyte).

 

Responding to your subjective and very little agreed on opinion.

They never had the opportunity to fight for one because other people put themselves in better position to do so.

Look, Kabayel is a good fighter, but has not proved himself to be anything special. Hrgovic is an oaf.

I like Parker and would still like to see him get a shot, but we have seen his limitations time and again.

 

'very good' isn't an option in the poll.

Ludicrously, there is no option offered between 'average' and 'great'.

The agenda with the poll is unambiguous.

 

Even his ranking system is low IQ. "Good but overrated" is lower than "average". Isn't good by definition better than average?

 

Yeah, it's a absolute sham of a poll.

 

He's had a solid career with very high peaks. multiple classic fights and demolished one of the hardest hitting humans to ever lace up a pair of boxing gloves in his fast-twitch prime. he also beat a still very in-shape and still very good Wladimir Klitschko in very decisive fashion.

Aside from that his resume is really only alright as his resume lacks different styles and depth. Whyte Chisora eh...Otto Wallin? eh

I don't hold it against him losing to Usyk as Usyk is just better. however, I will hold it against him how he fought in the second fight due to all that size and SPARTAN and then fought a very cowardly fight trying to niggle and BOX his way through it with USYK? laugh my hairy bum off.

 

Having read your thoughts, I am interested to know what you voted in the poll?

 

The poll options are flawed as his career has neither been great or average overall. his career has either been good or very good depending on the lens. if I had to pick? A.

 

Those who want to say that Fury's career is average or below average are just plain dishonest. There are so many one-hit wonder titlists, that Fury's career is well above average even for a heavyweight champ. But I think we can all agree that it in no way qualifies him to be remembered as major champion. He's in that Norton/Bowe/Walcott/Baer/Schmeling group where he made a significant impact, without dominating an era. As for just where he sits in that group, and how great his career is...

My own criteria for a champ are top ten victories. Fury's, as I see it is as follows:

1. WladKlit
Fury unseated a major champ here, but one who was 40 years old and visibly in decline. And some cite that he was on PEDs, although the findings were 16 months prior, and he tested clean leading up. Finally, most consider it a stinker of a fight, although I personally do not agree, as I like scientific boxing, and thought his fans gave it a fun atmosphere. I think he gets some good credit for this, though its hardly the greatest win in heavyweight history.

2. Wilder II
I was one of the first and loudest to maintain that Wilder is a fraud, BUT, he's a hard-punching one with that straight right, he was an undefeated titlist with 10 defenses against various hand-picked opponents, and, there was the history of that first match in which was exciting, slightly controversial, and which established some of Fury's greatness with the "rise from the dead." Though most felt Fury won the first, Wilder had his vocal supporters who thought it was a long count, so the second was a fight people wanted. Fury did what he said he was going to do, here, and put on Wilder, in the words of our Serge, a "shellacking of Biblical proportions." Brilliant performance against a limited but dangerous opponent.

3. Wilder III
The trilogy fight everyone wanted...a knockdown, drag-out brawl after which Fury stood victorious. Again, only contextualized by the fact that Wilder is a limited fighter who never had to improve over the years.

4. Chisora 1
People will rank the Chisora fights as they like...I say he gets the most credit for being the guy who took the zero. These were never great fights, as Fury just has a lot of natural advantages over Del Boy, but considering that Chisora is going to end with a fun, well-regarded legacy of his own as the best fringe contender to ever do it and a guy who stayed in contention for 15 years or so, this is a good win.

5. Dillian Whyte
The one good title defense he managed. Though Whyte was already off his best winning streak and a bit controversial due to PEDs busts, there is no doubt that he earned this shot with a very good run, and a revenge victory over Povetkin. Solid defense...the kind of which Fury should have had more.

6. Chisora II
Here's were we start going south. Fury's first win over Chisora was good enough so that there was no reason for a second fight. What is more, whereas he is a good enough opponent so that one win over him looks good on the resume, two does not, much less three...but we'll get to that next.

7. Chisora III
Just shameful. Had he managed a couple of good defenses after this, you could rationalize it that he was giving a man who had become his friend a good payday, but next up he lost to Ngannou (yes he did), and then lost to a man he derided as "middleweight." Still, it's his seventh best win.

8. Cunningham
A cruiswerweight champ who never made it as a heavy. But, in all fairness, a lot of people felt he beat Glazkov and Adamek (in their heavyweight fight) and he sure gave Fury all kinds of fits, knocking him down and forcing him to use dirty tactics. I like Cunningham, and thinks its a solid win, but this is as high as I can rate it, and most would rate it lower.

9. Wallin
Surprisingly tough fight for an opponent that was an alphabet soup creation at the time, with no significant wins. Wallin went on to become a solid fringe contender, with wins over Breazele and Gassiev, but blew it by losing to a 40year-old Chisora. Can't rate him any higher than this.

10. Kingpin Johnson
Johnson's name has become so synonymous with "journeyman" that people forget he has had a good career, contender for a title, albeit in the worst era ever, and managing some good wins against Seldon, Pianeta, Sosnowski, Leapai, Haumono, and former cruiserweight champion Yoan Pablo Hernandez. But it's a pretty poor win for a supposedly great champ to be hanging his hat on.

Other good wins...Christian Hammer, Pianeta, Martin Rogan, McDermott II

On the balance, a very good carrier, but less than great.

 

Read your post. How did you vote in the poll?

As you will have seen, there isn't a 'very good' option in the poll. You would have had to choose between 'average' and 'great'.

 

I forgot how I voted because, as I described, I don't understand the descriptions, and, as you described, there isn't enough delineation. He's well above average even for a titlist. He's below average to poor compared to other champions who dominated an era.

I agree, the options are not very good.