Tyson Fury: “Deontay Wilder was given a gift decision”

By Scott Gilfoid: Tyson Fury (27-0-1, 19 KOs) doesn’t believe in taking the high road following his fight with WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (40-0-1, 39 KOs) last Saturday night. Fury is bellyaching about the 12 round split draw that the judges scored the fight, and he thinks that the American Wilder was given a “gift decision” because he was fighting in the U.S, which is where he’s from. Unfortunately for Fury, the judges had little choice but to score the fight as a draw after he was knocked down twice in the later rounds, and almost knocked out cold in round 12 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, California.

When the challenger can’t stay on his feet against the champion, then they don’t get the decision. That’s the way it is in boxing. Fury doesn’t quite understand the dynamics of the sport. The judges more give more weight to knockdowns than for fighters that dance around the ring, mugging for the media, and looking to make their opponents miss all night long. That’s called safety first fighting.

“The world knows who the real WBC champion is. Wilder’s had a gift decision in his home country,” Fury said. ”He must be thanking his lucky stars that he’s still got the green and gold belt because that belt belongs to me, Tyson Fury a.k.a. the Gypsy King.”

The way that Fury is talking, he sounds like he has a sense of entitlement about the outcome of the Wilder fight. Fury didn’t do enough to rate the win in the eyes of the judges. It doesn’t matter that Fury believes he should have won or that some of the boxing public thinks he won. This isn’t mob rule. The judges are the ones that are the decider in picking the winners and losers in fights, not the fighters themselves. Fury shouldn’t be so arrogant, and accept that the judges couldn’t decide on a winner last night. Fury getting knocked down twice in the fight in hitting the deck in the 9th and 12th wrecked his chances of being crowned the new WBC champion. What’s noticeable is Fury is coming across a little like a poor sport. What a pity. It was thought that Fury, 30, would take the high road after his fight with Wilder last night, and show some class in admitting that he failed to measure up to the ideal of what a challenger should be doing when challenging arguably the #1 heavyweight world champion in the division in Deontay. When you’re taking on the king in his castle, you need to go above and beyond the norm to get the decision. You can’t expect to go into the king’s castle, get knocked down twice and expect to knock him off his throne. It sounds like Fury wants special treatment from the judges or he’s used to special treatment. When that didn’t happen, he got upset and is now grumbling about it.

Wilder says he’s open to giving Fury a rematch, but he’s not sure if it’s going to be in his next fight or not. Wilder’s management will need to decide if it’s the right move to throw a bone to Fury by giving him a rematch in his next fight in early 2019 or make the fight down the line in late 2019 or 2020. As the WBC heavyweight champion Wilder has a lot of options and responsibilities that come with being the belt holder. It would be in Wilder’s best interest to fight someone that he doesn’t need to chase around the ring for 12 rounds. Fury is an interesting opponent as far as promoting the fight with his gift with gab, but he essentially has a negative style of fighting. He’s not someone that is going to stand and fight for 12 rounds. Fury is there to make you miss with your shots, and then tap you with counters before drifting away. It’s pure spoiling for the most part. It’s a boring style to watch, and it’s got to be frustrating for any fighter that has to go against that style. Fury is like modern day Jimmy Young in terms of his style of fighting. He’s all about making his opponents miss, but there’s not much in the way of offense from him. Wilder would be better off going in another direction towards the likes of one of the following fighters:

– Anthony Joshua

– Jarrell ‘Big Baby’ Miller

– Dominic Breazeale

– Adam Kownacki

– Kubrat Pulev

– Dillian Whyte

– Joseph Parker

– Joe ‘Juggernaut’ Joyce

– Luis ‘King Kong’ Ortiz

Wilder can give Fury a rematch in the future, but it has to be under his terms, as he’s still the world champion. Fury didn’t do enough to take the champion’s WBC title, so he’s going to need to get back in line and wait for his chance for a second fight.

Fury’s promoter Frank Warren is reportedly going to be writing to the World Boxing Council to try and get an immediate rematch for Tyson against Wilder, according to BT Sport Facebook. It might not be a good idea on Fury’s part to fight Wilder again so soon. Wilder clearly figured out Fury’s style in the last four rounds of the fight, and a rematch would be different than the first fight. Wilder has taken criticism from boxing fans that only remember the first eight rounds of the fight. The fans aren’t focusing on what happened in rounds 9, 10, 11 and 12, with Fury taking a shellacking from Wilder, getting dropped twice and almost knocked out.

“I don’t know if it will be my next fight,” Wilder said to BT Sport Box Office. “I would love for it to be my next fight. Why not? Let’s get right back into it and give the fans what they want to see. I think it was a great fight. We need to do it again.”

So there it is. Wilder, 6’7″, isn’t sure whether he’ll give Fury a rematch next, but he is interested in fighting him again. Wilder might leave it up to the boxing fans to decide whether he should fight Fury again. If Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn saw the Wilder-Fury fight, he might now be licking his chops at the thought of putting together the Anthony Joshua vs. Deontay fight finally. The way that Wilder struggled at times against Fury in the first eight rounds might have planted some ideas into Hearn’s head, making him think Joshua can beat him. Hearn might like the idea now of making the Joshua-Wilder fight, especially if the Wilder-Fury fight brings in a lot of PPV buys. Joshua isn’t the only interesting fight out there for Wilder. He can face Breazeale, Joyce or Ortiz. Those are great fights for him. Obviously, Whyte and Miller would be off limits to Wilder, due to Hearn saving those guys as future opponents for Joshua.

“Whatever makes sense. I think we could do it again in America. It doesn’t matter to me,” Wilder said.

Wilder saying that the rematch with Fury would take place potentially in the U.S might not be music to his and his promoters’ ears. Since Fury is complaining about Wilder getting a gift decision, he’s probably not going to want to have to come back to America to fight him a second time there. What choice does Fury have though? If he says no, he’ll need to go back to fighting the likes of Sefer Seferi and Francesco Pianeta. Wilder is the champion. He decides who and where he fights.