By William Mackay: If you were to think of a heavyweight that can beat the Klitschko brothers in the future probably not too many boxing fans would pick unbeaten Tyson Fury (15-0, 10 KO’s) as the man to do it. He’s a good fighter, but not someone that you can see beating either of the Klitschkos now or even 10 years from now. He’s just too flawed in a number of departments to be the guy.
Most boxing fans would likely pick David Price or Robert Helenius as fighters that have a small chance of beating the Klitschkos one of these days, but even they are fatally flawed and would likely get dominated by both Klitschko brothers.
Fury’s promoter Mick Hennessy said this about Fury in a pressor at boxrec: “Everyone in boxing must know now that the only man who can beat the Klitschkos is Tyson Fury. Tyson is a modern heavyweight; he’s 6′ ft 9″ but he also has the speed, the heart, the hunger, the chin and the power to beat either one of them.”
Obviously Hennessey’s job to hype his fighter, but there’s little chance that Fury will be the guy that one day beats the Klitschko brothers and dominates the heavyweight division. Fury probably can’t even dominate the UK, let alone at the world stage at this point.
This Saturday night, Fury takes on 32-year-old journeyman Nicolai Firtha (20-8-1, 8 KO’s) in a 12 round bout at the King’s Hall in Belfast, Northern Ireland. What I don’t like about this fight is that it appears that Fury is being moved backwards for an easy payday fight against Firtha instead of being pushed forward to develop him more.
It seemed like it didn’t matter who Fury was going to be pitted against for the fight, it was going to be a weak fighter pretty much no matter what as if he needed to be rewarded for a win over the fat and out of shape Dereck Chisora last July.
What Fury didn’t need was a reward for that fight, because he was stunned a couple of times by an out of shape Chisora. What Fury needs instead of Firtha is someone that can actually give him some rounds and help him improve. Firtha is a journeyman without speed, without power and without much ring movement. He’s basically just a body for Fury to beat a look good.
Fury isn’t going to be the guy to ever beat the Klitschkos if he keeps getting matched against guys like Firtha or whatever soft opponent that’s put in with him after that point. All it will do is make Fury lazy, and lead him to get sloppy by developing bad habits in the ring that will get him destroyed if and when he gets put in with one of the Klitschkos.
Fury is a future fodder opponent for the Klitschkos in my view, and he needs to be matched against Price or Helenius so that he can show that he even deserves to be put in with the Klitschkos. What I don’t want to see if Fury facing 10 Firtha type opponents and then Hennessey deeming that Fury is ready for the Klitschkos. He then goes out and gets blasted apart in four or five rounds, and boxing fans are like “what happened.”
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