Top Rank boss Bob Arum reports Dillian Whyte wanted $10 million for his mandatory title shot against WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury and he’s NOT going to get it. Arum says Fury (31-0-1, 22 KOs) is moving on, and Whyte will be the “LOSER.”
Whyte (28-2, 19 KOs) wanted a King’s ransom in asking for a massive purse for his mandatory title shot against Fury, and Arum says the $10 million was just the starting point.
Fury will now use his Ring Magazine heavyweight title for his next defense rather than his WBC title, but the fans won’t likely care. He’s seen as the champion, and it doesn’t matter what title he holds. He could go back to calling himself the ‘Lineal champion,’ which would be good enough for the fans.
Whyte would have wanted more than that for the fight, so he washed his hands of him and will have Fury face former IBF/WBA/WBO champion Andy Ruiz Jr. or Robert Helenius next.
Arum will negotiate with those two and decide soon which of the two lucky contenders will get the fight with Fury. If Ruiz (34-2, 22 KOs) gets the bout, Fury will battle him in the United States.
Should the dangerous puncher Helenius (31-3, 20 KOs) get selected, Fury will face him in the UK in Manchester.
Ruiz would be the ideal candidate to get the fight due to his high profile in the U.S and his past knockout victory over Anthony Joshua in their first fight in June 2019.
Dillian Whyte wanted $10 million for Fury fight
“I’m afraid they’re [Team Whyte] looking at this as their last hurrah, and they want to grab as much money as they can. Well, that makes it a tough negotiation,” said Bob Arum to iFL TV.
“Yeah, they want 10 million dollars,” said Arum. “We want to guarantee him five million or five and a half million dollars against the percentage.
“They said, ‘You got to start at eight numbers, you got to start at $10 million,’ and that’s probably not enough for them. So, they’re just being greedy, and that’s one thing that’s bad about boxing,” said Arum.
It looks like Whyte is out of luck, but maybe he’ll get lucky and be elevated to the WBC champion status if the World Boxing Council strips Fury.
I doubt they will, though, because they would be losing a massively popular champion in Fury, and the sanctioning feels he brings in are very tasty.
What was going through Whyte’s mind in asking for ten million clams? I mean, there are just no words.
Fury to defend his Ring Magazine title
“So, Tyson will just have to fight for the Ring Magazine title.
He’ll [Fury] go on to fight them with or without the WBC title. So the loser will be without any question, Dillian Whyte,” said Arum.
After Fury defends against Ruiz or Helenius, he’ll face the Joshua vs. Oleksandr Usyk 2 rematch winner. In other words, Fury WON’T return to defend his WBC title against Whyte.
If the WBC wants to strip Fury of his title, he won’t lose any sleep over it. He wants to take on the Joshua-Usyk II winner regardless. But the WBC will probably allow Fury to bypass Whyte in favor of facing the winner of the Joshua vs. Usyk 2 rematch.