By Sean Jones: Tyson Fury’s promoter Bob Arum was “terribly disappointed” by the arbitrator’s ruling in favor of Deontay Wilder in their civil arbitration case over the rematch clause.
The arbitrator, retired judge Daniel Weinstein, ruled that WBC heavyweight champion Fury must face Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KOs) by September 15th.
For now, that ruling places the August 14th fight between Anthony Joshua and Fury (30-0-1, 21 KOs) in jeopardy.
Arum still believes the Joshua-Fury fight can go ahead for August 14th without a hitch. He wants Wilder to step aside with the idea that he would be allowed to face the winner of the Joshua vs. Fury fight in November or December.
For Wilder to agree to the deal that Arum wants him to accept, he would likely need to be paid a massive step aside fee. It’s unknown how much money Arum and Fury would be thinking of giving Wilder to get him to agree to step aside. You would have to believe it would be over $10 million, perhaps more than $20 million.
With the $155 million site fee paid by the Saudis to stage the Joshua vs. Fury fight in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on August 14th, there’s plenty of money to pay Wilder a step aside fee from that bundle of dough.
With that said, if Arum believes he can get Wilder to agree to a mere pittance with the promise that he can fight the Joshua vs. Fury winner in November or December, that probably won’t fly.
Wilder already saw for himself firsthand that having a contract with Fury doesn’t necessarily mean that he will abide by it.
After Wilder’s experience with Fury, why would he agree to a deal offered by his promoter Arum to step aside with the promise that he can fight the winner? As the saying goes, ‘Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me.’
It doesn’t make sense for Wilder to step aside to fight the winner of the Joshua vs. Fury fighting November or December when he can fight Fury right now. The money is right there within Wilder’s grasp to fight Fury by September 15th.
Why would he want to wait until November or December to fight. Another thing that Arum is failing to grasp is the ring rust issue.
Wilder hasn’t fought since February of last year in his seventh-round knockout loss to Fury. It doesn’t benefit Wilder if he has to wait for an additional three to four months to fight the Joshua vs. Fury fight winner.
Fury is the one that stopped Wilder last year in February, which makes it important for him to fight him, not Joshua next. Arum doesn’t see it the way Wilder obviously is. When you get beat by someone, it doesn’t help you if you end fighting someone else.
Bob Arum calls the arbitrators ruling on Fury-Wilder a “preposterous decision.” Says the plan is to move ahead with Fury-Joshua in August and try to sell Wilder on facing the winner in November/December.
— Chris Mannix (@SIChrisMannix) May 17, 2021
If Fury chooses to ignore the arbitrator’s ruling, he could be sued if he fails to face Wilder next by September 15th. How much Wilder would get from suing Fury is unknown, but you’ve got to imagine it would be a huge amount of money.
It’s believed that it won’t help Fury if he tries to circumvent the arbitrator’s ruling by vacating his WBC heavyweight title to fight Joshua.
Fury will still need to fight Wilder as part of the rematch, even if he vacates the WBC belt to swerve him. Besides, Joshua wants Fury’s WBC title to be on the line for their fight, and it wouldn’t make him happy seeing him vacate it.
“Breaking: an arbitrator has ruled that @Tyson_Fury and @BronzeBomber must face each other in a rematch by September 15, 2021. MORE TK,” said Mark Kriegel of ESPN.
Last Sunday, Fury posted on his social media site that the Joshua fight was “100% on.” But unfortunately, it looks like Fury spoke too soon.