Just as we were beginning to think that Tyson Fury was gone, what with the WBC heavyweight champion being uncharacteristically quiet during the fight between him and rival heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk in negotiations, Fury finally showed up. Having said he turned up his nose at a 60/40 split the 60 prior to going to the winner this was shown to Fury by Aleksandr Krasyuk this week after Fury previously said no chance of a 50-50 split Tyson had Now he set his own conditions.
Speaking in a short video he uploaded to social media, Fury offered WBA/IBF/WBO heavyweight champion Usyk a split of 30 percent of the prize money. However, Tyson is Tyson, there’s a catch — with Fury saying that for every day that “USC keeps messing around,” he’ll “cut one percent out of 30 percent.”
“I see all this talk about boxing fights, they want 50 percent, Usyk, Tyson is greedy,” Fury began. “But from where I stand – Usyk, you and your team are worth 30 percent. You either take it or you leave it. And if you don’t want to, go fight Daniel Dubois in the Copperbox.” [arena in London] And you get a few million dollars. If you want to win some real money, come and fight the gypsy king. But I will say, for every day that you slow down and mess around, I’ll take one percent off 30 percent. And if you don’t take it, DuBois fought for two million. No problem. But how on earth can you offer me a deal? impossible. Tik Tok, Tik Tok, Pussies.”
Anger sure likes to play hard ball when “negotiating” a fight, right? negotiation? Putting silly terms more like. Kind of like when he released Anthony Joshua with a totally unrealistic deadline, Fury sure knows he’s making ridiculous demands here. Okay, Fury is the biggest name and draw, but 30 percent for the holder of the three belts in a fight that would contest four belts?
And how long does Usyk have to accept that 30% offer, before Fury, with his threat of a daily 1% discount – presumably starting today – brings the amount to zero? Maybe Usyk will call Fury a bluff, if Tyson is really bluffing here, and accept 30 percent. But what then? Will Fury add some more stipulations before the fight is actually signed? With anger we just don’t know. However, this latest episode of Fury forces a lot of fans to believe that Fury is making ridiculous demands that he knows will never be met, and that’s in order to get out of a fight he really doesn’t want anyway.
Is this the way you feel about Fury, or am I being too harsh on the WBC Heavyweight Champion?
Bottom line: all we want for fans is the best against the best in the biggest fights possible.
