By Charles Brun: Bob Arum has told WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury that his trilogy match against Deontay Wilder is being moved to November or December.
According to Chris Mannix of SI, Top Rank promoter Arum will be moving the Fury-Wilder 3 fight from the previously tentatively scheduled month of October to November or December. The match could be moved again, depending on the circumstances with the global crisis.
Don’t be surprised if Fury vs. Wilder 3 is eventually moved to the fall of 2021, given the enormous risks involved in staging this fight in front of a large audience. For the third match to pull in the massive money that the first two Wilder-Fury fights brought in, it’s going to need to take place in front of a large crowd.
A lot of fighters will be affected by the trilogy match between Wilder and Fury being moved repeatedly.
WBC mandatory Dillian Whyte is supposed to be challenging the winner of the Wilder-Fury fight in February of next year. Additionally, Anthony Joshua is counting on facing the winner as well. The way things are looking, those fights won’t happen if the Fury vs. Wilder 3 contest keeps getting pushed back. They were initially supposed to fight in July. Then it was moved to October, and now Nov/Dec.
Fury vs. Wilder 3 can’t take place without fans
One big problem that will keep the Fury vs. Wilder III fight from taking place earlier is the fact that it needs to take place in front of live fans. The recent Wilder-Fury 2 fight on February 22 pulled in a massive live gate of $17 million at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Nevada.
With that kind of money to be made in a third match, Top Rank, Arum, and the fighters aren’t going to give it up and stage the clash without fans behind closed doors. As such, the third fight between former WBC champion Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KOs) and Fury (30-0-1, 21 KOs) will be at the mercy of the government and State Commissions.
Bob Arum told @SInow he informed Tyson Fury that a third fight between Fury and Deontay Wilder would not take place until “November/December” at the earliest. Gate for Fury-Wilder II accounted for $17 million of the total revenue.
— Chris Mannix (@SIChrisMannix) April 28, 2020
Fury, 31, is under contract for the rematch with Wilder, which ties his hands in forcing him to take this fight. The boxing world would like to see Fury face IBF/WBA/WBO champion Anthony Joshua in a unification fight next, but it’s not going to happen.
Wilder won’t be stepping aside to let the Joshua-Fury fight to take place. But even if Wilder did agree to it, the fight won’t take place without fans behind closed doors. Joshua vs. Fury would need to wait until fans are allowed to attend live fighting events.
Top fighters won’t compete behind closed doors
Joshua’s promoter Eddie Hearn of Matchroom Boxing, is interested in staging events behind closed doors, but not with big-name fighters. Unfortunately, that limits the quality of fights that are shown. In each card that Hearn stages, he includes one big name in the main event.
Hearn won’t be able to do that with the events without fans. The top name fighters won’t likely want to take a pay cut to stay active. He has a lot of famous fighters in his Matchroom stable that won’t like the idea of taking risky fights for less money than what they were receiving in the past.
Nevertheless, if the global pandemic lasts three years or more, ALL of the big name fighters will need to agree to fight behind closed doors if they want to get paid and keep their careers alive. For most guys, they’re assuming an effective vaccine will be available by 2021. If not, then those fighters will need to join in with the rest and fight without fans.
