Months ago I posted that Fury's career bore a startling resemblance to Ali's career at the point of his title challenge to Liston, and that the fights themselves resembled each other. When you line it up its striking: Ali/Fury: Hated (at the time as Clay) loudmouths who were great at self promotion Both knocked down twice and staggered other times from lesser competition; huge questions about their chin, only to prove it against the hard hitting champs Apart from that, both generally struggled at times with lesser competition leading up to the fight, only fought a few fringe top ten guys before making a huge step up to face the champion Champion was well regarded, fairly taciturn, and extremely hard hitting, making the people who questioned their chins think it would be easy work for the champs Both fairly featherfisted, relying instead on size and speed Along the same lines, both presented a generational change. Both Ali and Fury were taller than the champ, and upon winning became one of the tallest HW champs of all time. Really a striking list of similarities. To be fair, Grant/Lewis was much the same, and I did think the odds were much better that this match would work out more like Grant Lewis than Clay Liston. But I also predicted that the way Fury could win would be by decision, and that if it went to decision I thought Fury would win unless he'd been knocked down a lot. Now the question is whether Fury can have an ATG career like Ali. Wlad is easily a bigger ATG than Liston, so he's gotten off to the right start. People are overestimating what he needs to do at this point to go down as a top 10 ATG. He's got the "career defining" win that eluded Wlad, that made Wlad rely on longevity. Assuming Wlad declines the rematch (I really hope he does, it will only get worse for him at this point), Fury only needs to unify by beating Wilder (making him the first HW to unify this many belts), beat Joshua and a few other obvious contenders and last for a few years. If he beats them, lasts for 3 or 4 years as a unified champ, runs up 6 or 7 title defenses, his resume would stack up well with a lot of top 5-15 ATG heavyweights. I suspect that Fury is too undisciplined to take full advantage of his gifts, and won't become that kind of truly dominant champion, but I'm rooting for him at this point. Congrats on a great career Wlad, Fury will have a tough time equaling it.
I don't think Fury will have a long career at the top. He matched up great against Wlad mostly because he took away his jab and Wlad was too afraid to open up and risk getting nailed back. It was a stinker of epic proportions, and even then he had Fury genuinely hurt at some points. Against durable punchers that are willing to trade I think he'll have a much harder time. Let's see how he deals with Povetkin or Parker. Time will tell.
Maybe, like you said, time will tell. Part of me would love to see Vitali come back to fight him. I think that would be an epic fight for much the reasons you mentioned, even with Vitali older than the hills. But, Vitali is Kiev's mayor, and coming back at this age against top level opposition is too much to reasonably ask for.
I read somewhere that Vitali may be planning to break Foreman's record, hence why he still stays in shape and trains. If Fury manages to successfully rematch Wlad the fight could very well happen by the end of 2016/early 2017.
I believe he has the talent, so it's about discipline and dedication. I doubt those aspects, and think that if he is to reign it won't be an especially long reign, after which he'll contend for a while and probably pack it in pretty early by modern standards. In terms of his gifts, they are obvious and plentiful. He's a good athlete (don't let looks fool you) — not a great athlete, but a good one. More importantly, he has some clearly stellar intangibles regarding heart and desire to win a fight, ability for self promotion and mind games and a natural fighting instinct which leads to adaptability, versatility, which may help him in the future find ways to win when his back is against the wall - at least, that's what I predict. So, he has the tools to forge a great career, but does he have the long term career discipline and dedication? I honestly don't think so, not for a long reign, but that doesn't mean he won't become great overall by his way and through his unique path.
Don't suppose you have a link? Part of me would love to see that. It would be an awesome fight. But, I'm a big Vitali fan, and while the reward would be huge, Fury would rightly be the favorite. That said, if Vitali as a 45 yr old came back and beat Fury, who presumably would have either beaten Wlad in a rematch or have a couple other good wins under his belt, Vitali immediately grabs the best win of his career and establishes himself as a top 5 ATG.
