By Charles Brun: Deontay Wilder says he Tyson Fury is NOT the same fighter he once was after watching him struggle badly to beat obscure Swedish fringe contender Otto Wallin (20-1, 13 KOs) last Saturday night in Las Vegas, Nevada. Cut early in the fight, Fury labored to win a 12 round unanimous decision by the scores 116-112, 117-111 and 118-110. Most people saw the fight as a closer one than the judges’ scores.
Wallin cut Fury bad in the 3rd round after hitting him with a left hand on his right eye. The cut was a bad one, and the only way Fury’s trainer Ben Davison could keep it from bleeding was to put a huge glob of Vaseline on it. Normally the referees order the trainers to remove the Vaseline, but that didn’t happen with Fury’s. He was able to fight with a huge mountain of Vaseline on his injured right eye.
This was the last of two tune-up fights for Fury, 31, to get him ready for his February 22 rematch against WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (41-0-1, 40 KOs). Their fight is signed, and the only thing that can keep it happening on that date is a loss for Wilder against Luis Ortiz or if Fury’s cut eye needs more time to heal. There’s a lot of ifs involved in the Wilder-Fury 2 rematch taking place on the scheduled February 22 date. It won’t be surprising if the rematch takes place in the fall of 2020, because Fury’s cut might need more than five months to heal.
Fury looked gun-shy against Wallin
The one constant that Fury showed against the 28-year-old Wallin was his gun-shy look. It seemed like Fury was afraid to let his hands go for fear of running into something. Moreover, Fury’s punch resistance wasn’t good either. The 6’6″ Wallin, shook Fury to his boots with a left hook in the 12th round that buckled his knees. Instead of going back to that same punch, Wallin started jabbing and throwing right hands after Fury was hurt. Fury had been wipe open to Wallin’s left hook the entire fight due to his habit of leaning to his right.
Fury was there to be knocked out by Wallin if the Swedish heavyweight had the sense to go back to the same left hook punch that he’d hurt him with in the 12th. Wallin wasn’t getting fooled by Fury’s feints, unlike Wilder and Wladimir Klitschko. Wallin was throwing nice shots, but he failed to capitalize on Fury being hurt in the 12th.
Deontay Wilder: Fury is not the same fighter
“Anyone that saw this fight will understand and recognize he’s not the same fighter, but this is what I do to them,” said Deontay to Barbershop Conversations. “I end careers. He’s not the same fighter at all, I took something. He’s done and I can’t wait. He’s not the same fighter at all. Wallin cut him open, and he was trying to execute on him. He was using different tactics to get up in there. At one point he even grabbed the boy’s eye and was trying to pull it out. I was thinking, ‘s—t, there you go’.”
“He [Wallin] was roughing him up, and put him in a headlock with sweat up in the eye. Sometimes he was going with his hair in there. He was doing the right things, but he started slowing down a little bit. In the 12th round, he hit him with a hook, it changed the whole complexion of that fight. He needed to execute on it a little bit more. I thought he was going to come with another hook. He was trying to shake himself back together. He was hurt at that point in time,” said Wilder.
Fury didn’t look like the same fighter that fought Wilder. Wallin was able to land shots on Fury that Wilder couldn’t, and the fight looked to be up for grabs in the 12th.
Deontay Wilder: “I can’t wait” to fight Tyson Fury again
“I f—ed Fury up. When I hit him with that hook and right hand, it was over,” said Wilder in remembering his knockdown of Fury in round 12 last December. “I can’t wait. Bad intention, and bad blood. He’s going to need more than that Gypsy voodoo doll. He’s going to need more than that Gypsy magic when he gets in the ring with me.
I’m all bad intentions, trust me. I can’t wait. As he should,” said Wilder when told that Fury will look to get out of the rematch with him. “We got his number. He’s nothing. As I said, he’s a 6’9″ clown. He come over here. He’s trying to entertain, because he feels that’s the remedy. So ‘I’m going to act like a clown to get the people to laugh with me.’ In this situation, they’re laughing at him,” said Wilder.
Deontay really wants the rematch with Fury. There’s bad blood between the two heavyweights. Last December, Fury fought Wilder to a 12 round draw. Fury did a good job of out-boxing Wilder through most of the contest. In the 9th and 12th, Fury was dropped by big shots by Wilder.
Wilder reacts to Fury being announced as ‘lineal heavyweight champion’ at start of Wallin fight
“I feel like he’s not a champion,” said Wilder in reacting to Fury being announced as the “lineal heavyweight champion” for his fight against Wallin. “I say in my head, ‘he’s not the champion.’ I understand the marketing part of it and the promotion. You can fool the casual fans, but you can’t fool the real ones that understand. The true people in boxing understand that Fury is not a champion. We understand this lineal s—t that he’s talking about really isn’t nothing.
I’ve never seen in the history of boxing where they have a 12 round fight and there’s no belts involved. They go with lineal. It’s all a make up. To make him seem good. It’s all part of promotion. Some of the things he does, it’s funny, and we’re entertained. We’ve got to give him that. At least he tries. I’d rather he be the way he is now rather than someone boring and proper. It’s definitely going to be a short night, and I’m going to make sure of it. It’s going to be a short night, and it’s going to be an interesting night,” said Wilder.
Fury calling himself the “lineal heavyweight champion” is seen by some as a marketing tool.