By Charles Brun: Todd Duboef of Top Rank believes Tyson Fury could come out of retirement soon to battle the winner of the Anthony Joshua vs. Oleksandr Usyk 2 fight or face UFC champion Francis Ngannou.
While Fury (32-0-1, 23 KOs) is saying that he’s retired from boxing, he hasn’t vacated his WBC title yet since his last successful defense of the strap on April 23rd against Dillian Whyte, and he made it a point to invite Ngannou into the ring immediately after the fight to talk about them fighting an exhibition.
If the 33-year-old Fury faces Ngannou, it would be a hybrid fight, presumably a mix of boxing and MMA rules. The fans would eat it up, but it wouldn’t count on the 6’9″ Fury’s record. It would be just for entertainment and, of course, for money purposes.
Fury hasn’t said anything to Top Rank about him coming out of retirement to continue his career, and it’s likely that it’ll take something big like a Joshua victory over Usyk to motivate him enough to return. A $100 million+ may be enough loot to drag Fury from France to the ring.
The problem is, Fury has made many millions in a short period and doesn’t seem to be excited at the idea of getting back into the daily grind of sweat & hard work involved with being a professional boxer.
According to Celebrity Net worth, Fury’s net worth is $65 million, which obviously makes it tough for the ‘Gypsy King’ to resume his career and risk having his perfect record marred by the winner of the Joshua vs. Usyk II rematch.
“I think there is obviously a lot brewing about the rematch between AJ and Usyk,” Top DeBoeuf said to Sky Sports. “Obviously that has always been on his and everybody’s target, but he hasn’t determined what he [Fury] wants to do.
“Maybe the winner, when that fight happens, can pull him out, or maybe something else can be motivational like [Francis] Ngannou,” Duboef said about Fury.
Fury has been arguably knocked out a couple of times in the last four years by Deontay Wilder and lucked out with the referees not stopping the fights. In Fury’s first fight with Wilder in 2018, he was knocked unconscious in the 12th round.
Normally, referees stop the fight when a fighter is in the condition Fury was in, but it didn’t happen. A lot of fans felt that Fury was given a break due to his popularity.
In Fury’s last fight against Wilder in October, some fans believed ‘The Gyspy King’ was given a long count in the fourth round when he appeared to be down for 11 seconds.
The Fury-Wilder III fight reminded this writer of the infamous September 1927 ‘Long Count’ fight between Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunney.
“We saw Francis Ngannou get in the ring and it was kind of bizarre that the guy was retiring but the MMA heavyweight champion was getting in the ring to talk smack – which one are we doing here?” said Duboef.
