By Charles Brun: Deontay Wilder wasn’t in the mode to gracious following his loss to Tyson Fury last Saturday night in Las Vegas, Nevada. Deontay says Fury (31-0-1, 22 KOs) came to “rough” him up, and that’s precisely what he did.
As a result, the winner of the fight, Fury, didn’t prove that he was the better fighter of the two. The only thing Tyson proved was that he could get away with clinching and mauling the 6’7″ Deontay.
Wilder’s trainer Malik Scott wasn’t happy after the fight, talking about a “passive referee” allowing the mauling tactics from Fury.
With Fury being able to get away with his holding & leaning last Saturday, it put Deontay in a position where he couldn’t win because it wasn’t boxing. The fight immediately morphed into a boxer [Deontay] fighting wrestler/boxer/MMA fighter [Fury], and Wilder wouldn’t win that type of fight.
There aren’t too many fighters that can beat someone who is using wrestling and headlocks, leaning tactics to wear down and stymie their opponents’ offense.
Without the referee policing this type of activity, it puts the other fighter in a position to deal with it.
Fury GAMED the system
Wilder isn’t happy about it because he could have won if the referee penalized or disqualified Fury for his grappling. At times, it wasn’t fighting on Fury’s part.
It was more Greco-Roman wrestling from the stand-up position, and there was nothing Wilder could do but wait to see if the referee Russell Mora would do his job by policing Fury’s tactics. Wilder didn’t have a 277-lb body to get in the mud with Fury and see who the better grappler was, and he shouldn’t have had to.
The referee should have addressed Fury’s negative tactics right away, but instead, he was allowed to continue to use them until he succeeded in wearing Deontay down.
Had the referee Mora taken charge right off the bat by penalizing Fury for his mauling, Wilder would have had an even playing field and a great chance to come out of the contest as the winner.
Wilder told the straight truth in why he had lost to WBC heavyweight champion Fury by an eleventh round knockout by saying that the 6’9″ Gypsy King had bulked up to 277 lbs to lean on him with all his weight to tire him out.
“I did my best, but it wasn’t good enough,” said Deontay moments after his loss to Fury. “He didn’t come in at 277 to be a ballet dancer. He came to lean on me, try to rough me up, and he succeeded.”
When a referee chooses to give warnings without penalizing a fighter, it leaves the other fighter in a vulnerable, stultified position where they’re left out on their own, neglected, and forced to deal with the roundhouse tactics.
Wilder couldn’t do much to stop Fury from his holding & leaning without the help of the referee because there was no way he could escape the bear-like Tyson to keep from getting grabbed/mauled after every turn.
Deontay unhappy with Fury
“He was able to implement a few of the things in the early rounds,” said Wilder’s new trainer Malik Scott to ESNEWS. “After tonight, I’m going to consider him [Fury] a great fighter.
“He’s [Wilder] good,” said Scott about how Deontay is feeling after the fight. “He has a busted lip, and he broke his hand. His finger or knuckle is broken.
“Fury, I’m assuming, will get the Usyk shot now, which will be good.
“I want Deontay to get some good rest after this. I’m going to make sure he gets it.
“Deontay looks at Fury as a man that he had serious issues with concerning allegations that were out and certain things he actually seen with his own eyes,” said Malik in addressing why Wilder didn’t shake Tyson’s hand after the fight.
“He [Wilder] still felt the way he felt,” said Scott on Deontay, still feeling bitter after the fight towards Fury due to his belief that he had cheated in their battle last year in 2020,” said Scott.
You can’t expect Wilder to forget all that happened in the second fight and be happy about Fury’s tactics last Saturday to get the victory.
This was a slash & burn approach to winning a fight, and Fury was willing to do anything to get the victory. As Wilder said, Fury “succeeded.”
Malik: Fury will “MAUL” Oleksandr Usyk
“With Deontay, I believe with his style; he’d do a whole lot better against Usyk than AJ’s style did. Ten times better.
“Tyson Fury and Usyk is a very good fight,” said Scott. “I can say this. If Tyson Fury is fighting Deontay Wilder and Deontay is 238 and the hardest puncher in the history of the sport, and he’s willing to come and lean on Deontay to wear him down, what do you think he’s going to do to Usyk?
“He’s [Fury] going to go right to him [Usyk] and want to lean on him and maul,” said Malik in talking about what Tyson will likely do when or if he faces Oleksandr next year.
“What SugarHill has helped him with, he didn’t make him a one-punch knockout artist. That’s impossible. What they did to, to Tyson Fury’s credit, they put the weight on to make you tired. It’s an accumulation; they wear you down [by leaning/holding/mauling].
“That’s even in there,” said Malik when told that Fury uses ‘chocking’ during his fights with his headlocks that he’s added to his game since last year’s fight with Deontay.
“This is the noble art. If you’re able to get away with something and you have a passive referee that is allowing.
“He said, ‘run it back to me. Where did I go wrong,'” said Scott about what Wilder told to him after the fight in wanting feedback on why he lost to Fury. “Of course, I’m going to tell him everything we did wrong and everything we did right.
“We’ll come up with another plan, the next plan. Life goes on; we got to move on.
“We almost beat him. This was a hell of an experience,” said Scott.
It’s fair to say that Oleksandr Usyk won’t beat Fury if he can get away with mauling him as he did with Deontay last night.
If anything, Fury might take his mauling into overdrive by adding even more against Usyk because he might need to slow down the talented Ukrainian enough to win.
It’s still too early to say whether Fury will meet up with Usyk or Anthony Joshua for the undisputed championship next year.
Joshua (24-2, 22 KOs) and Usyk (19-0, 13 KOs) still need to meet in their rematch next March to decide which of the two will face Fury.
