A good comeback story is popular with most people, but coming back and reclaiming your “crown” so to speak is the truest test for anyone, especially for the “Gypsy King” Tyson Fury.
A few weeks , Fury, the lineal heavyweight champion defeated WBC Heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KO) via a seventh round TKO and is now the reigning WBC Heavyweight, Ring Magazine and Lineal Heavyweight champion.
The fight was a rematch from their December 2018 bout, when the fight was scored as a draw without a clear winner.
With Fury holding three belts, a good question to ask is where does Fury place on the boxing totem pole, pound for pound?
For Fury, his biggest competition includes Wilder and fellow Englishman boxer, Anthony Joshua (23-1, 21 KO) who could be Fury next bout, via Eddie Hearns who is Joshua’s fight promoter. A bout between Fury and Joshua, who holds the WBA, WBO, IBF, and IBO heavyweight titles would determine the number one heavyweight boxer in the world.
In the middleweight division, the fighter with the most belts is Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (53-1-2, 36 KO). Alvarez holds the WBC, WBA, WBO and lineal middleweight titles and won the majority of them after defeating fellow middleweight Gennady Golovkin (40-1-1, 35 KO) in September 2018.
In the welterweight division, names that come to mind are Terence “Bud” Crawford (36-0, 27 KO),who holds the WBO welterweight belt, and Errol Spence, Jr. (26-0, 21 KO) who holds the IBF and WBC welterweight belts.
Crawford has held multiple championship belts in three weight classes and was considered ESPN’s second best pound for pound boxer in the world, before his last fight with Egidijus Kavaliauskas. A bout between Crawford and Spence, Jr. is still expected, per worldboxingnews.net, but nothing is guaranteed at the moment. This fight would boost the rankings of the winner due to the amount of belts at stake.
All of the boxers mentioned have multiple belts and reign supreme in their division. With Fury holding the lineal title as well as two other belts, not only do skills have to be put into the debate, but wins and level of competition as well. For a while Fury was considered to be the third best heavyweight behind Joshua and Wilder because of the lack of competition in Fury’s previous fights.
In the heavyweight division, many would say the top three attractions are Fury, Wilder and Joshua, since all fighters are either undefeated or have one loss on their resume. The only boxer to not have faced one of the three is Joshua, and more rankings in debates will be released in the boxing field if and when Joshua fights Fury and Wilder.
Fury has not been as consistent as other champion fighters. Fury has never lost a fight in his career, but his career was on hiatus due to personal issues, drug abuse and excessive weight gain.
One of the titles held by Fury is lineal, which means he never lost the belts in a bout, because of his hiatus and he is still in the process of trying to claim all the title belts in the heavyweight division.
With the title belts and having claim to being the first boxer to defeat Wilder,
Fury has a strong case to consider himself to be near the top of boxing.
Fury’s nearly three year absence slowed down his career , but he is still regarded as one of the best boxers in the world, not just for his wins, but his journey and comeback as well.
