Tyson Fury is talking about three more fights, including the Deontay Wilder rematch Feb. 22, before leaving boxing and moving on to pro wrestling, or singing, or stand-up comedy, or all of the above.
Whomever he fights and whatever the undisputed multitasker does next, it looks as if Oleksandr Usyk is not a possibility. Usyk is just another Fury punch line.
Fury, the U.K.’s lineal heavyweight champion, continues to dump trash talk all over Usyk, saying he would never fight the Ukrainian.
“Usyk isn’t on the list,’’ Fury told iFL TV during a break from his Las Vegas training camp for the Wilder rematch at the MGM Grand on Fox/ESPN+ pay-per-view. “He’s a no-name. He doesn’t make any money. Why would I want to fight him for?
“He’s a small cruiserweight, a foreigner who doesn’t speak good English, and no one is really interested anyway. I want the big fights that people are interested in, and that ain’t one of them.’’
Ain’t exactly the King’s English, but there was no mistaking what Fury thinks of Usyk, who he has called “some cruiserweight bum.’’
Fury also said he wants to keep the heavyweight belts in the West, meaning the U.K. and United States. Fury, remember, traces his lineal claim back to his Nov. 2015 decision over another Ukrainian, Wladimir Klitschko, then the undisputed heavyweight champion.
After Wilder, Fury says he wants to fight Anthony Joshua and Dillian Whyte. He was asked whether would consider Usyk if he beat Joshua.
“Still, it wouldn’t be a big fight,’’ Fury said. “It’s still a foreigner in a westernized world. The belts are back in the West, and they’re going to stay there.
“For whatever it sounds like, the heavyweight championships should be from Britain or America [and] nowhere else.’’
Sounds like a heavyweight Cold War.