In a combat sports world where every member appears to be trying to create a legacy, new Heavyweight boxing champion Tyson Fury might not be around for much longer (if he’s to be believed).
In an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live, the Brit spoke freely about the potential of his leaving the sport, and how defeating former champion Wladimir Klitschko may have cemented his journey into the sunset.
I’m struggling to get motivated for more stuff,” Fury said. “I already won 12 belts already and [have gone] undefeated 25-0… All that I would be boxing for is money and I always thought to myself I never want to let sport become about money.”
“If I keep boxing on and on and on, it’s clearly not about winning belts, because to add another one to a collection wouldn’t really mean that much. I’m not the type of person who wants to beat another person’s record or cement a legacy or whatever they want to call it. Now I’ve accomplished the dream, it’s about how much motivation I have to keep going on.
“I have a young family that I want to spend a lot of time with. There is life after boxing, and I don’t know what I’m going to do at the moment.”
It was speculated that Fury would be meeting Klitschko in a rematch for the WBA and WBO titles that he took from the champion. Fury also won the IBF title in that bout, but was eventually stripped of that belt for not agreeing to a bout with the IBF’s mandatory contender.
Yet Fury was hesitant to accept the idea of a second Klitschko bout.
“I haven’t even cemented that I’m going to fight in a rematch,” Fury said. “There’s all this speculation about the rematch but it’s even if I want to go ahead and fight again.”
Such words will no doubt be worrying for the former champion Klitschko, who tweeted his dismay shortly after their bout in Dusseldorf, Germany.
“I still don’t believe I actually lost. Man, I’m suffering” the champion said just two days after his loss.
For Fury, it’s merely a question of nothing being able to live up to his win over the Ukrainian.
“What do you do?” Fury said. “Where do you go from here? Take a rematch? Fight a couple of guys?”
“If I win another 50 fights, or lose my next one, it’s not going to mean as much as 28th November Dusseldorf, 2015. I believe I’ll be frozen in 2015 for the next forty years, or forever how long I live for. Nothings going to out do that achievement for me.”
It’s possible that Fury’s words should be taken with a grain of salt. The controversial boxer has said his fair share of outrageous statements over the past year, even receiving a warning by the British Boxing Board of Control, who informed him that he was to avoid making “controversial non-boxing comments” last week.
Yet Fury’s comments seem to have struck a chord with some members of the boxing community.
Former Heavyweight champion of the world and boxing legend Evander Holyfield spoke to the BBC and made it clear he hopes the latest holder of the title wasn’t really ready to leave.
“You work so hard to become champion,” Holyfield said. “You just gonna give it up like that? I hope not. I hope he changes his mind, because that’s not too good for the game of boxing.
“What Tyson Fury has done, he shook up the game. You know, nobody could beat Klitschko. After [Fury] proved that he didn’t look like he could beat him[…]but he beat him on points. He told us that he was gonna come back and beat [Klitschko] again, so he can’t just back out now. He gotta stay in it.”
As usual with Tyson Fury, everything is uncertain. No one knows what to take seriously, and what to dismiss as just talk. Whether he stays in the game or leaves undefeated, Fury will do so on his own terms and to the beat of his own drums. Just as in his victory over Klitschko, something which he predicted that few else did, we’ll be the last to know what he’s capable of.
“Yeah, I could walk away,” Fury said. “I could sail away into the sunset unbeaten with all the belts and live a normal life. It’s what I decide to do, and I haven’t decided yet.”
