Who is the Lineal World Heavyweight Champ: Fury or Usyk?

Read my first post here FFS...

 

Fury is the Champ.
The lineal champ has always been the man who beat the man all the way back to John L Sullivan. Occasionally in heavyweight history people have retired and walked away from the sport meaning a match between to leading contenders it used to restart the lineage - Tunney, Marciano & Lewis for example. Others like Jeffries, Louis & Ali have retired but returned. These fighters retained the lineage & entered their matches against Johnson, Charles & Frazier respectively as the lineal champ.
Fury fits into this category. As long as he is about, fighting & unbeaten he is the lineal champ regardless of what you, the ring magazine or any other boxing organisation thinks. Often the lineal champ might not be the best active champion ( George Forman’s second championship run is a great example of this) but it is what is it.

 

if fury doesn't fight the number one challenger, what does that mean to the lineal championship?

 

I think claiming Jeffries was still the lineal champion when he fought Johnson is a stretch.

 

Fury forfeited the lineal when he didn't honor the rematch clause with Wlad. He threw his prime away to avoid that fight.

 

Fury is hands down.. I understand Fury hurt a lot of peoples feelings, but that doesn’t make Usyk lineal champ

 

On Dec 23rd they will both be in the ring and Fury will be introduced as the undefeated WBC and lineal heavyweight champion of the world and Usyk will be introduced as the, undefeated, unified WBO, WBA and ibf champ. Then one man walks out with it all, lineal undisputed, undeniably the best HW of this era. Can't wait!

 

Plainly the forum cares and it will be debated and debated and debated.

 

At this point, does it matter? One word... Undisputed.

 

December 23rd is for all the marbles. Bring it on!

 

Who cares to be honest.. the chain has been broken that many times anyway.. its nonsense .. like p4p.. it's just a talking point & a label but means nothing really..

 

I'm a big proponent of lineage and Fury is Lineal Champ. Saying that he swerved a rematch with Klitschko or that he avoided an offer from Usyk has no bearing on the matter because guys don't get stripped at the negotiating table, they get stripped by an opponent in the ring, by Father Time, or via retirement. And of course he said he "retired", though not even the WBC had the audacity to believe him. Granted that, both need to fight so we don't need to debate things like this.

 

Fury announced his retirement and then followed that up with a phone call with Ring where he confirmed that retirement. That ends his lineal title reign. Usyk then became the new lineal champion when he beat AJ the second time. Words count.

 

It's still Fury, but he won't be lineal for long.