By Mark Eisner: Geoge Groves shoots holes through the conspiracy theorists’ claims that Tyson Fury tampered with the gloves that he wore for his rematch with Deontay Wilder on February 22.
There are many fans who now believe that Fury tinkered with his gloves to gain an advantage that he used to knockout WBC heavyweight champion Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KOs) in their rematch at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.
The video that has gone viral on Youtube showing Fury hitting Wilder with left-hand shots shows that his glove is coming off is from the first fight between them in 2018. Groves acknowledges that Fury’s glove has clearly slipped, but he doesn’t view that as something that could give him any kind of an advantage against Wilder.
Groves notes Fury’s glove wasn’t on properly
”You can’t dispute that the glove isn’t on properly. They’ve broken it down frame by frame and the glove isn’t on properly,” said Groves to After The Bell. ”The guy says it’s being done on purpose and that he’s hitting Wilder with a bare fist but the footage is from the first fight so you can’t say that was the difference in the second fight.”
The referee should have spotted that Fury’s glove was coming off during the Wilder fight, and had him fix it. That didn’t happen apparently. It’s unknown why Fury didn’t have his glove fixed during the fight so that his left fist wasn’t down by the lacing area where his wrist would normally be.
You’d have to think that must have been a handicap for Fury to fight with his glove only partially one. He’s a real trooper for sticking it out under those conditions. It’s like a sprinter running with a shoe that’s coming off during a sprint. Fury didn’t say anything and just endured it.
Fury was slapping with his shots in the video, and that couldn’t have helped him much against Wilder. To have any real effect on Wilder, Fury would need to have his hand fully inside the glove. We didn’t see that. He was slapping with the empty portion of the glove hitting Wilder, and it looked very strange.
Why didn’t the referee notice Fury’s glove problem?
Again, it’s surprising that this problem wasn’t spotted by the referee and fixed. If you’re right on top of the action, you should be able to spot when a fighter’s glove is coming off. Fury should have alerted the referee to ask for extra time so that his glove could be fixed. That would be the right thing for Fury to have done.
“The guy says it’s being done on purpose and that he’s hitting Wilder with a bare fist but the footage is from the first fight so you can’t say that was the difference in the second fight,” said Groves. “Fury has that kind of style where he flicks his shots so it is bizarre. For me, it wouldn’t be of benefit because you’re much more likely to do damage to your hands and wrists,” said Groves.
Fury was punching well with his right-hand shots during the rematch, and those are the ones that ultimately led to the fight being stopped in the 7th. Wilder was getting hurt by Fury’s right-hand punches, which had a lot of steam on them. The belief is that Wilder never recovered from the right hand that he ate in the first round from Fury. From that point on, Wilder’s balance was gone, and he was stumbling and bumbling around the ring.
“If you don’t punch properly to start with… he doesn’t actually sit on his shots – he doesn’t throw his right hand like Deontay Wilder – sometimes they are palm-facing and have that slap effect,” said Groves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtALQq_1xTY&feature=emb_logo