Fury vs Joshua is OFF

Your understanding of odds determination is flawed.

Bookies price markets at a spread where they make money either way, yes. But opening and pre-fight night odds are an accurate predictor for how a fight will play out. Luckily I’ve done the analysis. During times when I've tracked my boxing betting record, I've found that on roughly 80% of occasions the bookies get it right. If they simply priced markets in the way you describe then this result would be vastly different.

Bookies open odds based on a spread taking into account all context around the fight - the smaller bookies take into account other prices - and then they react to small movements by bots on betting exchanges. It’s only at the back end of fight week when the casuals pile in that you get silly movements in odds which is where matched and trade bettors make their living.

All betting odds are is an implied probability of an outcome occurring, in a boxing context, with 80% accuracy.

In other words, bookies odds are the closest thing we have to an objective measure of risk.

Any view that Tyson Fury has avoided risk in his career is nonsense.

An undefeated Chisora in London was absolutely a risk to take as a 22-year old that had only been pro 2.5 years. There’s been no claims anywhere in this thread that he's the greatest HW of all time.

Your diatribe here around Usyk’s top class CV is irrelevant. He was mentioned nowhere.

The subject here is Fury and as above, he's taken substantial risk on multiple occasions throughout his career

 

It would be interesting to see if the 12 people that agreed with Cyrion's flawed comment above could offer an alternative to what I've just described with regards to betting odds, and what experience they draw upon to make that judgement

 

Got banned and made an alt. Nice.

It really doesn't matter what bookies do or don't. Being an underdog doesn't prove you took on a bunch of tough challenges in your career. It depends on subjective expectation without knowing what the outcome will be. Lots of people (dumb ones) thought Wilder was the greatest thing since sliced bread. He knocks everyone out! He's a killer! He's the hardest puncher in the history of the HW division! Well, so what? He's an F tier boxer and never beat any top tier fighters in his entire career. If Fury was an underdog against him what does that prove? Nothing besides the fact that lots of casuals are idiots.

As far as Delboy goes, styles make fights. We all know this. Delboy is a stubby little brawler who needs a step ladder to hit a guy Fury's size in the chin. That's why he never had any success whatsoever against Fury. It's why Fury was fine fighting him THREE FUGGIN' TIMES. Because he knew it was always going to be an easy night's work.

Again, having a handful of semi-difficult fights over your career doesn't mean ****. The point is that Fury has dodged as much adversity in his career as he possibly could have. Have fun making yet another alt when this one gets banned, you goof.

 

Two pussies. This is why I don't rate Usyk's wins over those two tosspots like his fans do. Neither near top-10 material, H2H or whatever. They're really not. And I won't waste any more words over those two clops.

 

Being an underdog in every fight isn't the key to building a great CV, but it's a key indicator of taking risk. Which is ultimately what this discussion is about. You can't make the leap between Fury's natural aversion to risk causing him to avoid AJ in 2026. The reason is because the evidence from betting markets at the time of each fight disproves it, and you fail to understand the weight of that evidence.

That's the beauty of betting odds. They take into account the context of the fight at the time. You again missed out context this time for Wilder I where Fury was in poor condition and had been back for just 6 months after a 2.5 year drug & alcohol binge which greatly increased the risk of defeat. Just like you missed out the context for the 2011 Chisora fight. Betting odds usually reveal the true context at the time.

That fight was far from an easy night's work. At the time Fury was not the long range boxer he eventually became and was a green brawler that was 22 and only pro for 2.5 years.

It's good that we have some progress here from your original comment:

We've gone from Fury avoiding the best competition throughout his career to now you admitting he has actually taken a bit of risk but that he's dodged as much of it as possible. If you understood the link between betting odds and risk this comment would fall apart too

 

Yeah, no.

Nowhere did I ever claim that Fury avoided ALL legitimate competition.

Fury, for all his many flaws, is no idiot. He knew he needed a belt to be relevant in the division and make the most money possible. So he did decide to take on Wlad. Old Wlad. In an absolute stinker of a fight where both guys should have been forced to return their purses and the fans reimbursed for having to watch that shite. But he did do that. While clearly on PEDs, but I digress.

Of course, what did he do immediately after? Ducks a rematch and then disappears to avoid a drug ban. Makes up a bunch of nonsense about mental health to rehabilitate his image. Then comes back to fight the likes of Seferi and Pianeta. Needs a belt again though! Did he go after AJ for AJ's three belts? Nah. He went after the guy who was getting title defenses against guys ranked somewhere in the hundreds. Who does he fight after his draw with Wilder? Did he go after other guys in the Top 10? Nah. He picked two absolute melts in Schwartz and Wallin. Then after his Wilder adventures what does he do? Is he banging the door down to fight Usyk, become Undisputed, and prove his greatness. Nah. He takes a mandatory against already shot Whyte and then fights Delboy for a THIRD time. Then he fights an MMA guy who was a complete boxing novice. All while claiming Usyk is a nobody, he wants half a billion dollars to fight him, that Usyk should have to take a 70/30 split, etc. and so forth. He ran from Usyk for two damn years. That's totally the actions of a guy who is looking to take on all the best competition, right?

I think we must also look at Fury's early career, too. This dude had TWENTY FOUR FIGHTS before taking on Wlad for the title. Now, that number would be no big deal if this was boxing from past decades when guys were fighting much more often. If this was Mike Tyson crushing multiple dudes a month, ok. But it isn't. This is Fury being essentially just a domestic level fighter where it took him NINE FREAKING YEARS before he ginned up enough confidence *cough*Nandralone*cough* to fight Wlad for the straps.

For comparison here are some of Fury's peers and how long it took them before taking their first title fight:

Usyk - Less than 3

AJ - Less than 3

Dubois - 6 years, but clearly would have gotten there sooner had Joe Joyce not obliterated his eye

Wilder - 6

Joe Parker - 4

Andy Ruiz - 7

Wlad - 3

This giant gypsy ******* was too chicken**** to actually get out there, fight the best, and move his career forward. It took him damn near a decade to finally get away from ducking the likes of David "Glass Jaw" Price and go try and win a title. This is not the resume of a man who believes in himself and is willing to go out there and prove it. It's the resume of a guy who likes easy fights and avoiding the most risk possible. A couple of fights here and there where he basically got backed into a corner because he needed a belt and his career would have just been over otherwise doesn't mean he took on all comers and wanted to fight the best. But hey, you go ahead and keep making inane arguments about how betting odds prove Fury was the Muhammad Ali of the past decade or w/e.