By Scott Gilfoid: Tyson Fury believes he’s bigger, stronger, and tougher than Anthony Joshua, and he sees everything in his favor when they meet in June for their heavyweight unification fight.
Fury’s recent knockout of Deontay Wilder earlier last year seems to have given him the belief that he’s KO artist of the first order.
That was a fight in which Wilder was hit in the back of the head by a right-hand from Fury in round three, from which never seemed to recover.
Interestingly, Fury hasn’t put things in perspective to see the larger picture of what happened that night.
Few boxing fans would agree with Fury’s claim of being a bigger and stronger fighter than Joshua (24-1, 22 KOs) because of the facts to back up that claim.
Joshua not only appears to hit harder, but his 88% KO rate is far superior to Fury’s 67.74% KO percentage.
Fury boasts about being stronger than Joshua
“Just like I did with Wilder. They said I was going to box and move, and what did I do? Straight at him, bombs all the way through until he got stopped,” said Fury to Gareth A Davies.
“No, because like I said, I’ve got a bigger heart, tougher, mentally stronger, a bigger man completely, punch harder. Everything is in my favor,” said Fury when asked if he might be making a mistake to go straight after Joshua rather than boxing him.
“When I take it to him, they can’t deal with me. It’s like wrestling with a T-Rex. They can’t win. I’m indestructible, unbeatable. I can’t be beat. If I’m injury-free and active, there’s no losing. I can’t lose,” said Fury.
What Gilfoid is wondering is why on earth did Fury throw in the bit about the requirement on him needing to be “active” for him to be unbeaten.
Fury already knows that he’ll have been out of the ring for a year and a half by the time he faces Joshua in June if Fury sees that as a limiting factor, he needs to speak up now and tell his promoter Bob Arum that he wants a tune-up.
But if Fury takes a tune-up, he won’t have the excuse of being inactive to pull out of his back pocket in case he gets beat by Joshua.
By repeatedly mentioning the problems with inactivity, Fury is priming the pump by implanting in the eyes of boxing fans a believable excuse in case he’s blown out of the water by AJ. What Fury is doing is pretty clever, actually, and so, so sneaky.
Inactivity worries Fury
“So inactivity kills the cat, no doubt about it,” Fury said. “When one man has been active and in camps, and one man has been on the couch, it’s no good. You lose your timing; you lose your distance, you lose it all.
“It’s all got to be gained back in camps and in fighting. I’ve always known because I’m a boxing historian. I’ve always known about the inactivity.
“When Gerry Cooney fought Larry Holmes, he was out of the ring for 18 months, and the timing wasn’t there. He was the same fighter that he should have been.
“When one man has been inactive, and one man has been in the ring, it’s an uphill battle, isn’t it? Activity is the one.
“If one man is an active fighter and is fighting regular, even if he’s been losing, and the champion has got off the chair after two or three years out of the ring, the journeyman will beat him.
“Because one man is match-fit, and the other man hasn’t had a fight in three years. Recently, we saw Juan Pablo Hernandez, a former IBF cruiserweight champion.
“He came back after a long layoff and fought journeyman Kevin Johnson and got knocked out,” Fury said.
There it is. Fury is talking nonstop about inactivity, hinting how things can go wrong for any fighter if they’re not active. In case fans didn’t get the hint, Fury devoted a solid five minutes on the subjective, giving an oral dissertation.