Fury's knock downs and their cumulative effects

Its the old time sparring that damaged those old fighters, they train smarter now and don't take unnecessary damage.

 

The biggest effect here was probably the shots he took against the MMA fighter, which were half a year or so ago.
People underestimate how long the concussive damage on the brain takes to repair. I think Bradley admitted he had effects a long time after that Provodnikov fight.

This is not some kind of excuse for Fury, he was an idiot for taking that fight for this very reason, that it could hurt his 'chin' in the Usyk fight if he got concussed. It looks like that's what happened. And it's fair to consider it a real factor.

It could be seen from a mile away that he could take massive damage 'going to war' with Wilder. And probably he did lose some chin there.

Let's remember the idea of Fury's pressure fighting in the Wilder fights was to end it early. What ACTUALLY happened is that he hadn't even finished Wilder properly by round 7 or whatever in the first rematch and in the second he needed almost the whole fight to do it. This is not better stopping power than the fighter who KO'd Cunningham and Hammer/Chisora on attrition, it just isn't.

Sugar Hill didn't improve Fury's power at all, just got him bashed up and made him easier to hit and easier to hurt.

 

Let’s be serious and not underestimate the punch that rattled Fury. That punch from Usyk would have KO’d any current HW. It was actually amazing that he came back and finished the fight. His recuperative powers are legendary. That being said, of course the cumulative knockdowns from Wilder (what other HW could have survived being put down by Wilder that many times?) and Ngannou would weaken his ability to take a punch, but I don’t think it played a role in the Usyk knockdown as I noted.

 

And at 40, Wlad was still able to take a lot of big shots from Joshua.

Luckily for Fury, he took a lot of time off between fights. So that likely helped him recover a fair bit. That third Wilder fight was a brutal one, but it happened in 2021.

 

Maybe but if you look at the shot he took it was a counter punch, he was caught after throwing and at that stage he was also more tired than he's ever been in a fight. Counter punches are not like other punches, as they say is the punch you don't see or expect that really hurts you which is also why Zhang KO'ed Joyce so easily while every other puncher Joyce faced couldn't put a dent in him, it wasn't that Zhang or Usyk hit harder it's that they caught Joyce and Fury with punches they couldn't see coming. Throw in fatigue into the mix as well and then punch resistance can wane.

 

Wlad got knocked down mostly because he lost his balls & heart, he suffered only a couple legit knock-downs.

 

I didn't think personally he showed great effeçts of those wars in this particular fight ... He actually looked better than I expected. But, yes, a long career experiencing some hard fights cannot be good for you, ultimately.
My view is always that it's better to retire too early than too late. Ali was my hero growing up. Roy Jones was one of my favourites... Both guys who went on far too long. I am also much more forgiving of a fighters losses as they age - as I get older I couldn't do things at 40 that I used to at 30. You feel your body slipping.
I remember Lennox Lewis being roasted at the time because he retired instead of giving Vitali a rematch. But I thought that was a very sensible move - He recognised he was slipping and didn't risk it. We should applaud that kind of recognition, not criticise it.
So, yes, I would like to see BOTH guys retire to enjoy their wealth and families in-tact.

 

That shot he took from Wilder that rippled his whole body must’ve done some serious damage