By Scott Gilfoid: Trainer Peter Fury says former heavyweight champion Tyson Fury (25-0, 18 KOs) will be returning to the ring. Unfortunately, Peter doesn’t say precisely WHEN the 28-year-old Fury will be returning. Peter can definitely say that the 6’9” Fury is coming back, which would be technically true, but it might be a long, long time from now before he gets back into the ring.
Boxing great Muhammad Ali lost 3 years of his career from March 1967 to October 1970. Ali had failed to be inducted into the U.S armed forces. The good news for Fury is he probably won’t be out of the ring for as long as the great Ali. Fury is still young at 28. Ali was out of action from age 25 to close to 29. He obviously lost some of his best years in boing. Fury hasn’t fought in 2 years since his win over Wladimir Klitschko in 2015.
If Fury doesn’t fight until 2018, then his time out of the ring will equal that of Ali. I’m not saying that Fury is great like Ali. He’s a decent heavy that uses his height and reach to get the better of his opposition. Fury probably should have lost to Klitschko if the Ukrainian heavyweight had the sense enough to let his hands go. Never the less, Fury won the fight, and he now has Wladimir’s scalp as part of his resume.
He’s got all kinds of hoops he has to jump through before he can return to the ring. Last December, Peter said that Fury would be returning to the ring around springtime in 2017 and would be targeting World Boxing Council heavyweight champion Deontay “Bronze Bomber” Wilder. That hasn’t happened. Fury is still suspended without a boxing license. He needs to get his license back from the British Boxing Board of Control (BBBofC). We heard how Fury was ambitious in wanting to fight on the Billy Joe Saunders vs. Avtandil Khurtsidze card on July 8. That fight is not happening due to the recent arrest of Khurtsidze. But even if it was, there was no news of Fury fighting on the undercard.
He's coming back!! pic.twitter.com/bXxzkbu9D2
— peter fury. (@peterfury) June 9, 2017
There’s no telling how long it’ll take before Fury is back inside the ring. Frankly, I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t see Fury back until 2018.
When Fury does return to the ring, he needs to make sure he doesn’t make the same mistake that Muhammad Ali made in facing good opposition too quickly. When Ali came back in October 1970, he fought a couple of tune-ups against Jerry Quarry and Oscar Bonavena before acing Joe Frazier on March 8, 1071.
Ali needed more than 2 tune-ups, however, for him to shake off the rust of 3 years. Frazier was at the top of his game back in 1971, and Ali clearly wasn’t ready for that kind of a high pressure opponent. If Ali had fought someone like Ken Norton or George Foreman at that time, I think he would have lost to both of them as well, because he wasn’t sharp enough at the time to beat fighters in that class. Ali should have taken at least 3 more tune-up fights before facing Frazier.
Tyson Fury needs to at least fight 4 to 5 tune-up opponents before he faces someone like Anthony Joshua or Deontay Wilder. That’s the only way Fury can be fully prepared for what he’ll be dealing with against those guys. Believe me, Joshua and Wilder will be letting their hands go when they get Fury inside the ring.
They’re not going to fight timidly the way that Wladimir Klitschko did in his fight with Fury, because they know he can’t punch. There’s no threat to either of them in a fight with a light hitter like Fury. When Fury does return to the ring, my guess is he will go straight into a fight against Joshua and will wind up getting smacked around the ring and knocked out cold. Fury will then either retire from boxing or do the thing that he should have done to begin with by taking 4 or 5 tune-up fights.
Besides the inactivity, Fury has to lose a lot of weight that he’s put on. He’s let himself go physically, and packed on a ton of weight that has over 300 pounds. Fury was said to be 365 pounds. That’s only 35 lbs. away from 400 pounds. Personally, I’ve never heard of a fighter that was as heavy as Fury that was able to take the weight off and return to the form that they once had.
Big George Foreman was said to have gained a lot of weight after he retired from boxing in 1977. When Foreman returned to the sport 10 years later in 1987, he weighed in at 267lbs against Steve Zouski. Foreman consistently was in the 250s until he stopped fighting 10 years later following a controversial 12 round majority decision loss to Shannon Briggs in 1997. Foreman in his prime was between 217 and 225 lbs. If Fury comes back and finds himself weighing in the 280s instead of the 250lbs like before, I don’t think he’s going to find much success.
Fury doesn’t possess the punching power that Foreman had going for him. Fury also doesn’t have the great jab that Foreman had. Foreman could jab and punch. Fury is little more than a slapper. Foreman won a gold medal in the 1968 Olympics. Fury never fought in the Olympics. But if he had, I think he’d have been beaten. Fury doesn’t have that kind of talent and pedigree going for him that the likes of Foreman and Ali had going for them. Fury is just a tall guy with mostly a padded record since he turned pro in 2008.
Fury can play it two ways when he resumes his career. He can either look to cash out immediately by facing Anthony Joshua or he can do it the smart way by taking a bunch of tune-ups to give himself a better chance of beating the top guys. I think we’re going to see Fury go for the instant payday against Joshua. I just do not see Fury being dedicated enough to take tune-ups, and to slowly let the fight with Joshua marinate.