If last night’s fight card in Miami, Florida was not surreal enough (it was), the things one of last night’s performers said after winning an easy fight that has been described as a veritable sparring session was nothing short of crazy. David Haye, fresh off his easy win over buddy Joe Fournier, actually called out heavyweight champion Tyson Fury – the man Haye was all set to fight (twice) in 2013 before injury forced him out of the fight.
Haye stunned/insulted/jaw-dropped many fans by calling out Fury. Was he serious? Is Haye serious? After all, fighters can be prone to say all manner of things when they are still feeling the adrenaline rush of a ring victory (even as easy and as straightforward a win as the one 40-year-old Haye picked up last night). But Haye spoke with IFL TV after his win, and he repeated the call-out of Fury, insisting he is indeed “deadly serious.”
“I am deadly serious,” Haye said. “I know Joe Fournier and Tyson Fury are two completely different physical specimens, but I know how to beat Tyson Fury, I really do. I understand why he’s so effective when no one else can see it and no one else has implemented what they need to do to beat him. I’m good enough still to do it. I would have done it in 2013, he knows it. I see that fight, in 2013, as Mayweather versus Canelo. He’s a lot better now than he was then, but the confidence he’s got from the wins he’s had would actually work in my favour.”
Haye has always been a great talker but does he actually, really, truly believe what he’s saying here? Fury has yet to respond to what Haye has had to say (and might not actually respond at all) but is there any chance this fight could happen, now, some eight years or so after it should have happened? In today’s crazy boxing world, nothing can be ruled out. And that’s the scary thing. And the insulting thing.
There was a time when a fighter had to EARN a shot at the richest prize in sports.