By Tim Royner: Tyson Fury return to the ring is being talked about taking place in three months from now on June 9th on the Terry Flanagan vs. Maurice Hooker card, according to ESPN. Fury’s opponent is still unknown.
It’s not likely to be anyone remotely talented for the 29-year-old Fury (25-0, 18 KOs), because he’s been out of the ring for 2 ½ years, and he’s lost a lot of weight. The dramatic weight loss that Fury has undergone might leave a little depleted when he does fight on June 9. It’s important that Fury not fight anyone too good for a while.
This is exciting news about Fury being close to returning to the ring. His boxing fans are going to be pleased at seeing him back inside the squared circle. Fury needs to stay active once he resumes his career, because he’s not going to go far if he wins a fight and then eats his way back to 350 lbs. in celebrating his win. That’s kind of what happened with Fury after his victory over Wladimir Klitschko in 2015. Fury got caught up in celebrating, and he just let things get out of control. Fury has to keep fighting on a frequent basis for him not to fall back into the same trap as he’s just climbed out of.
In recent video of Fury working out, his arms and midsection still look flabby. He’s not toned at all. He looks like he’s still carrying around a good 25-30 lbs. of excess flab. With Fury weighing in the 260s now, he looks he might have to get down into the 230s for him to in the kind of shape he was in during his prime. Fury weighed 247 lbs. for his last fight against Wladimir Klitschko on November 28, 2015. Fury has lost a lot of muscle through inactivity and the rigors of dropping so much weight with his dieting and aerobic activity. With Fury’s incredible weight loss, it’s likely left him very weak. He’s going to be vulnerable for a while until he gets to his right weight and he’s able to start eating more calories and putting on muscle. The emphasis for Fury is to take off the fat, and unfortunately when you drop as much weight as he has, a lot of muscle goes with it.
Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn said this week that he couldn’t sign Fury due to their different expectations. Hearn says Fury wants to fight three low level fighters in his first three fights of his comeback, and he couldn’t have those fights shown to the public.
A lot of boxing fans are tired of waiting for Fury to resume his career. They want to see him back already. They’re not interested in hearing him talk anymore. They want to see action from him in the way of scheduled fights.
Flanagan and Hook will be fighting for the vacant WBO light welterweight belt.
Fury shocked the boxing world this week in saying that he plans on capturing a heavyweight world title and defending it successfully 26 times to break the great Joe Louis’ record. The fans think Fury is completely deluded at this point. Fury said that would defend his heavyweight title three times per year. It would take him 10 years to break Louis’ record. Few boxing fans believe Fury capable of winning a heavyweight world title at this point. Fury had the perfect situation in facing past his best 40-year-old Wladimir Klitschko in 2015. The current champions Anthony Joshua, Deontay Wilder and Joseph Parker are still in the prime of their careers, and they don’t have problems pulling the trigger on their punches. The main reason Fury was able to beat Wladimir is because the Ukrainian wasn’t throwing punches because he was afraid of missing and getting countered.