WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman says heavyweight champion Tyson Fury is a “victim” of being the “greatest fighter today” and that’s why he can’t get a compelling fight for the summer against one of the fighters in the division.
Some would argue that it’s the fans that are the victims of Fury’s success because he’s no longer fighting quality opposition.
Sulaiman says it’s “greed” on the part of the contenders for Fury (33-0-1, 24 KOs) is unable to get an interesting opponent for his September fight.
Some would say that Fury has burned his bridges by fouling up his negotiations with Oleksandr Usyk and Anthony Joshua, and those guys no longer trust him. They see him as an intractable person to try and negotiate with.
If Fury was willing to fight for less money, he could easily get one of the top contenders to fight him in September, but he doesn’t want to fight for chicken feed.
Of course, Matchroom Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn has a different explanation for why Fury can’t get a fight. Fury wants too much money, and he’s not willing to be paid less than his high demands for him to fight a lesser guy.
Hearn says Fury won’t take a risky fight because he doesn’t want to lose out on the massive payday he’ll get fighting Oleksandr Usyk in December in Saudi Arabia. Unfortunately for Fury, he’s not going to get a boatload of dough fighting another Derek Chisora-level journeyman.
“Well, he’s a victim of being the greatest fighter of today, and it’s very unfortunate that money is ruling out every other fighter. They don’t want to fight him,” said WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman to talkSPORT Boxing about Tyson Fury not being able to get an opponent for his summer tune-up fight.
“They want to abuse a monetary status and simply, it’s not fair. Tyson Fury has been willing to fight any of them. We see he has been waiting. We left a lot of flexibility to try to do Fury against Usyk, which was looking very good for March.
“We have had the flexibility to do Fury against Joshua. We ordered Wilder against Ruiz as a final elimination for the [WBC] mandatory spot, and it is just tragic to see with the division that has so many great fights that can be made but are not
happening.
“So I’m a little bit disappointed. I feel very much for Tyson Fury. It’s not his fault. It’s not anyone’s fault but just the greed and the selling out putting out of price for the containers,” said Sulaiman.
