It was less than one full day before Tyson Fury’s “It’s official” video was seemingly null and voided in an arbitration case half a world away.
The planned and announced August 14 heavyweight unification clash in Saudi Arabia between Fury and Anthony Joshua was put in serious peril on Monday when arbitrator, retired judge Daniel Weinstein, ruled that Fury was, indeed, obligated to face former champ Deontay Wilder for a third time, by September 15.
The long-running dispute between Team Wilder and Team Fury was over a rematch clause attached to the fighters’ February, 2020 bout. Despite Wilder dropping his WBC title to the Irishman in a one-sided beating, he opted to exercise his rematch option shortly after the loss. What ensued was a series of postponements and false starts due to injury and the ongoing Covid-19 crisis.
By October, Fury co-promoter Bob Arum insisted that the rematch clause was expired and he moved on to negotiating the unification with Joshua.
And, this past weekend, after many starts and stops and threats to walk away, it appeared that the all-Brit blockbuster was finally signed and sealed.
It wasn’t exactly a secret that this Wilder-Fury issue was ongoing and that arbitration was simmering even as Joshua promoter Eddie Hearn was supposedly finalizing details for Fury-Joshua, hammering down a Saudi site fee reportedly in the neighborhood of $150 million.
“This negotiation’s been going on for three or four months now,” Hearn commented in a video interview, “and we were always assured that this wouldn’t be a problem. It was a very strange decision from the arbitrator, to say the least...I think he [Arum] was in complete and utter shock and I’ve never really heard him speechless...he was almost shell shocked, I think.”
The prevailing wisdom in boxing circles is that Wilder will be offered a sizable step-aside payout to let Fury-Joshua play through-- something which Fury’s other co-promoter, Frank Warren, seemed to accept. Arum, however, has gone on record as saying that Wilder will not be paid off and that he may just opt to have Fury face Wilder before worrying about Joshua.
“We’re not paying Wilder to step aside,” Arum told ESPN. “It’s better to get rid of him and go about our business. We can make the Fury-Joshua fight for November or December.”
Hearn, meanwhile, is already talking about a plan B, which may involve Joshua’s WBO mandatory opponent Oleksandr Usyk, and he’s giving Fury’s side until the end of this week to figure out what they want to do about Wilder.
“We know what we wanna do, we wanna win the undisputed champion, we wanna fight Tyson Fury,” Hearn said, “but if his hands are tied, we have to look elsewhere...The one that springs to mind immediately is the... mandatory, Oleksandr Usyk. They’ve been quite patient, and I think really, if Team Fury don’t get themselves together, don’t get their act together, by the end of this week, we will have no alternative but to look for an alternative fight.”
Looking deep into things, it may be hard for Wilder and an American arbitration ruling to stifle the business maneuverings of two British citizens, fighting under three-quarters British promotional contract, looking to fight in Saudi Arabia with three of the four presiding sanctioning bodies based outside the US. That sure looks like a rough road to travel en route to a kibosh of a bout just three months away.
On the other hand, as Arum said, it may be best for Team Fury to get the third Wilder fight out of the way and revisit the Joshua unification later in the year or possibly next year. There is a certain wisdom in waiting out Covid restrictions and then, possibly, putting together a true blockbuster at Wembley Stadium in London-- especially when, according to some insiders, a Wilder step-aside payout could be pushed as high as $20 million.
Arum said that he’s already reserved Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, July 24, for Fury-Wilder III. Hearn also seems to be making quick plans to move forward, away from the Fury fight.
The jaded boxing cynic in this writer wonders whether all this Fury-Joshua stuff is falling apart TOO quick, too easily. We’ve certainly seen promoters fight more tenaciously for far less than the supposed $150 million Saudi haul being dumped on this event.
Could it be that this Fury-Joshua “done deal” was not actually so “done” after all? The path to where we’re at now did seem a bit odd-- on, off, on, off...and then suddenly REALLY on, just a day or so before the Wilder-Fury arbitration ruling, which most people in the know seemed to feel Wilder might win.
Whatever the case, we may not get Fury-Joshua right now. But Fury-Wilder III is not all that bad and Joshua steamrolling Usyk will be okay as well. Then, we can pick up and revisit Fury-Joshua at a time when we can have a real live crowd in the UK and not some stale, joyless Saudi audience full of the rich and privileged killing the excitement of what is, legitimately, the biggest heavyweight clash since Lennox-Lewis-Mike Tyson.