On the 13th of January, Tyson Fury announced his retirement from professional Boxing. This was not the first time he has done this – in fact it is the fifth. The earliest of these was a full eleven years ago, before he had even made his mark in the heavyweight division.
This most recent retirement is the first since 2013 where he has not been a champion, so one might think there is more weight to it than previous efforts, but the prospect of a British superfight with Anthony Joshua later in the year leads many into thinking that this is also not the most sincere.
Fury has never been one to ignore money waving in front of his nose, and the amount will likely be larger if he is nominally tempted out of retirement by it too. This has been a strategy with his past retirements, and it is entirely possible it is in this instance too.
This is a strange time in the careers of both Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua. Had they fought when they held the Heavyweight belts, it would have been a bona fide superfight. It still probably is, but ultimately the heavyweight division has moved on. Daniel Dubois pummeled Anthony Joshua totally at Wembley last year, and Oleksandr Usyk has conquered the entire division.
Last year’s two fights between Fury and Usyk reduced Fury’s aura of invincibility, which he has cultivated for years, to nothing, and for all of Fury’s claiming to be an all-time great, it is the Ukrainian who will unquestionably go down as the best of this era, and as an all-timer. Fury’s behaviour did not help either. His bombastic claims in the lead up to both fights, especially the first, were made to look deeply silly by the superior boxing skills of Usyk, who definitively won both fights.
Fury will never be able to make those claims again and expect people to take him seriously, and the persona he has crafted lacks credibility in this new environment. Similarly, Joshua has been beaten around many a ring, and has not held a world title since losing to Usyk in 2021. Which begs the question, who actually wants to see this fight?
It seems more like a tribute to the past of the heavyweight division than a genuinely interesting clash for the future of it. However, should the inevitably huge sums of money tempt the relevant parties into a deal, we will probably be seeing it whether we like it or not. And Fury will have to add to his list of fake retirements.
Photo Credits: “Tyson Fury at Place Bell, Laval Q, Canada – Dec 16 2017 (cropped)” by Mike DiDomizio is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.