By Barry Holbrook: Tyson Fury made the wrong choice in choosing to fight Derek Chisora in a trilogy match instead of Joe Joyce, says Eddie Hearn.
As Hearn points out, the first two Fury vs. Chisora fights were “fairly one-sided,” which makes it “unusual” that there would be the third match between them.
Obviously, Chisora (33-12, 23 KOs) was picked out because he’s well-known in the UK, and it’s a good business-level fight to lure UK boxing fans to purchase the fight despite it being a dreadful match on paper.
Joyce (15-0, 14 KOs) might have been viewed as too dangerous for Fury because of his power, punch output, and the steady pressure that he puts on his opponent.
It’s reasonable to assume that the last thing that Team Fury wanted was a fighter that would knock major chips off of him, adding to the wear from his three fights with Deontay Wilder.
“It’s difficult because Delboy is my friend, so I don’t want to criticize the fight,” said Eddie Hearn to the DAZN Boxing Show about the Tyson Fury vs. Derek Chisora contest on December 3rd.
“The UK public are very disappointed because they wanted Fury against AJ. Anything else was going to be a disappointment. I think the problem is the first two [Fury vs. Chisora fights] were fairly one-sided. It’s very unusual to get a trilogy in that respect.
“But Del has improved, and he’s earned his shot, I think, by hanging around, and he got a good win against [Kubrat] Pulev. I think people would have preferred an in-house fight with Joe Joyce.
“Probably in terms of who Fury was looking at, he definitely earned it,” said Hearn about Chisora being an upgrade over who Fury had previously been looking at fighting in Manuel Charr. “Until he saw the backlash of Manuel Charr, who he was definitely looking at as his dance partner.
“We were told [by Fury] that we had to sign four weeks ago because Fury wanted to make his decision in terms of who he was fighting. Nearly four weeks after, he finally made his decision [to fight Chisora].
“I don’t know why we weren’t allowed that time, but Chisora had already signed the contract four or five days ago. We were told that we had to sign the contract nearly a month ago,” said Hearn.