Fury-Wlad 2 face to face - was fury playing mind games or was he genuine?

I was rewatching this the other day, do you think fury’s playing with Wlad’s head here or do you think his mental distress was genuine? It borders on disturbing around the 11 minute mark.

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Tyson Fury's brain is a bag of cats.

 

Seems to be the case with a lot of people who have bipolar disorder, iirc Fury was actually diagnosed with that before fighting Wlad?

 

He's not that good an actor.
Also he calls out to Paris to confirm that he's mentally disturbed and she does.
After this creepy face-off Fury went back to camp where Helenius said he was just letting him punch him in the head and then was headbutting the ring posts.
I'd say he definitely went properly AWOL for a few years there.
But luckily he recovered and now advocates for mental healthisms.

 

He was diagnosed with something called bi-winning.

 

I've watched that video so many times before as Fury's behaviour absolutely fascinates me, in a sad kinda way. I can relate to him so much in that moment, his body language, his mood, and things he says. Normally, Fury spends most of his time in front of the cameras putting on an act and just talking bull****. But I truly believe that face off is one of the rare times Fury is completely genuine. You can tell he just can't be arsed to play his usual pantomime villain act. He's completely broken, and is only there because he has to be. This is the man he truly is behind closed doors. The usual Tyson Fury would never even entertain the idea of being beaten, but here he is talking about the possibility of losing, and he doesn't even care. He even admits his flaws, i.e. not being the biggest puncher. The Fury of later years would never admit that... I seem to remember him making a silly claim that because he knocked Wilder out, he should now be considered the biggest puncher. Can't help but feel like he was crying out for help here, like he just wanted someone to talk to, and listen. But rather than a psychologist, it was his biggest rival sitting across the table, and a bloke to the side of him just laughing everything off, who didn't quite know how to take what he was hearing. Wlad's change in tone is so noticeable too, as he sees what is happening in front of him. He starts off in fight mode, expecting Fury to be his usual combative self, and then he slowly realises. By the end, you feel like Wlad is almost sympathising with him, and even starts returning compliments. I understand why people find it hard to believe anything Fury says, he's like the boy who cried wolf, and I'm not his biggest fan. But I know a broken man when I see one. This was him at his realest.

 

Not even Fury could answer that

 

He knew wladimir didnt fight well in their fight and he was going to get beaten in the rematch.

 

Fury ducking that rematch was bizarre especially for someone who was so confident he would win again. This is the same Fury who wouldn’t fight Glass Jawed David Price when both were undefeated and moving up the ranks.

 

That's pretty much my read, too.

I think he knew he'd reached the peak, knew the rematch would bring it all crashing down (because he couldn't have been any better and it seemed obvious Wlad potentially could be significantly better) and I think he just couldn't face the prospect of it all.

Perhaps with hindsight it's more obvious, especially after his pathetic inability to accept his clear losses to Usyk showed just how incapable he was of owning any kind of failure, but all the same.

 

Unless he wasn't, and it was all show... Especially if he thought it was very likely he'd lose - then it all makes sense.

 

Wlad made a fool on himself again here talking rubbish and a highly depressed Fury destroyed him saying nonsense like he lost on purpose. Grow up mate you ruled in a weak era and the moment a talented big man came along you got schooled. Lucky Fury isn't a puncher or he would have chinned him but even then he got wobbled late in that fight because he was tired from walking around after Fury.

 

I don’t really know why Fury would think he’d lose, Wlad was old and Fury was prime and it was easy the first time around ?

 

Fury himself acknowledged he needed to be perfect to win, and that he pretty much was.

In other words, he couldn't have been any better.

Wlad, on the other hand, had question marks around his performance (rightly or wrongly!) so at best for Fury it'd be the same again, but there was a real possibility that Wlad would've come in and done better - and Wlad being so keen to run it again might well have made Fury believe it was going to be harder, if not unwinnable.

I don't really think it's fair to say it was easy the first time around, either - it was a stinker of a fight, and Fury did enough, but he absolutely had to be at his best.

Seems entirely plausible that he thought there was a good chance he'd lose - especially with Fury's ability to get his own head messed up.

 

Glad you mentioned this people have short memories he avoided price like the plague