I think Lewis and to a lesser extent Klitschko changed the division a bit as they were big men with speed and power. The division got heavier and heavier as a result, but Usyk shows talented smaller men can still do it. It will only take the next man with size and speed to dominate that though.
Fun decade though with Leonard, Duran, Hagler and Hearns?
He's been a bit unlucky that through his rise in the heavy division he lacks that signature fight to help build his legendry status.
Let's not forget that episode all emerged from an extended masterclass in legendary ducking by Fury (from Klitchko for the rematch).
If that’s the metric, give me a Joshua fight to watch any day of the week.
Getting out-jabbed by someone with a 7 inch reach, 6 inch height disadvantage is quite significant. It suggests Uysk is comfortably a better boxer.
He is far and away the better boxer. The only reason the fights were close was the size difference. What was it, 4 stone?
It was this time. I’m not sure why he decided to carry that extra weight into the second fight because he couldn’t get close enough to Uysk to use it and it definitely felt like he tired quicker.
3 rounds? Can't see that, at all. Fury is not a big puncher. Would be shocked at that, tbh.
There was loads of conversation about him being an all-time great, you only have to go back a couple of years in this thread. It always struck me as a bizarre level of fanboyism….because he’s not even a particularly likeable character to warrant that kind of bizarre opinion
Cruisers definitely weren’t supposed to be able to come up and handle heavies and there was acknowledgment of Usyk’s abilities for years, even in this thread before he made the step up, but the 40, 50, 60lb gap in weight was perceived as way too much of a gap to bridge, by boxers and fans alike.
Fury undoubtedly has a skill level above many heavyweights. But he’s lacking in so many other areas. One is power, he really doesn’t carry much. Dedication is another. And I don’t believe he has the mental toughness and bravery many credit him for. Saturday was crying out for him to get on the front foot and be as offensive and aggressive as possible, instead he was timid and fell into the trap of trying to outbox the better boxer. Not taking anything away from Usyk of course
Joshua and Fury basically told him to stay where he is because he’s under sized for the division. The issue is that the size discrepancy has gotten so huge in the 00’s through to the ‘20’s that it became a kind of consensus. That notion of these massively scary HW’s because they’re huge is dead now though. It tells us they’d have been obliterated in the ’70’s, ‘90’s and would have a tough time in the ‘60’s and ‘80’s.
Imagine if it were Joshua v Fury at Wrestlemania
If it was made it’ll be popular as hell. Purely because they genuinely don’t like each other so the shit-talking in the build up will be real. The Usyk fights for both of them have been devoid of that kind of hype…..the social media war between AJ and Fury would have the fight at fever pitch by the time it happened
This is exactly it. If he had the win-at-all-costs attitude he’d have said “feck the risk, I’m going to go out and hurt him”. Which to be fair is exactly what he said beforehand….he just didn’t do it in the ring. It was, in the most part, a conservative bordering on cowardly performance
That’s not really fair. As I said to @The Hilton Fury felt Usyk’s power and knew that he could - and was - hurt him. Fury is a technical boxer, not a war machine and he’d get blasted for abandoning his principles if he went in and got bombed out for being reckless, especially early in the fight.
Then he chose the wrong tactic, as Usyk was always going to outbox him.
It would also have most likely got him knocked out, which is why he didn’t do it enough.
I think it's more about the engine than focus. He couldn't capitalise because he didn't have gas in the tank to do so. Usyk's engine is unmatched by heavyweights and he knows that as long as he keeps the pace up and pressures them relentlessly, they can't keep up.
Yeah but not better boxers; that's the first time he's experienced superior boxing and if you have a whole body of work predicated on being outright better at something than those you face, it's got to be a shock to the system.
