When Tyson Fury speaks, the media listens. The media also listens when he doesn’t.
Fury generated lots of talk on social media for not talking in the immediate aftermath Saturday of Anthony Joshua’s victory over Andy Ruiz Jr. in a heavyweight rematch. Silence from Fury is surprising. It’s a little bit like man biting dog. It just doesn’t happen. It’s a good bet to think it probably won’t last long either.
But U.K. fans have grown accustomed to hearing from Fury – always and immediately – on just about anything. Yet while there was plenty of reaction from Deontay Wilder, there were only crickets from Fury during the first few hours after Joshua carefully and cleverly boxed his way to a unanimous decision over Ruiz, who stopped him in a huge upset last June.
It could be that the multi-tasking Fury was just too busy. There’s a looming rematch with Wilder in February. There’s wrestling, mixed-martial arts, singing, a book tour and who-knows-what-all. Still U.K. fans wanted to know. Where was Fury?
In a review of social media reactions by the Express, a U.K. newspaper, there was this among many from one Joshua fan:
“Ahhhhh That feeling when you wake up in the morning to the realisation of who the real Dossers are!!!!!”
The social media attack also targeted Wilder, who didn’t take long to respond. But Fury was mute, at least for a while, which in the Twitter age is way too long.
Meanwhile, Fury trainer Ben Davison did respond.
He said Ruiz’s weight was a critical factor. Ruiz showed up about 15 pounds heavier than he was in his stunning stoppage of Joshua on June 1.
“I think the weight killed him,’’ Davison told iFL TV. “I think that he knew he needed to close the gap. Except, if he thought Joshua was going to close the gap for him, which was his (Joshua’s) mistake in the first fight.
“He’s not got the quickest of feet anyway. So, to put that extra weight on was going to slow his feet down even more. That was a big, big hindrance for him.”
Davison went on to talk about Joshua’s tactics. He praised Joshua in what was also a backhanded compliment.
“It was like a poor man’s Tyson Fury, wasn’t it?’’ Davison said. “That’s not in a nasty way, because, you know, obviously he can’t do it to the level of Tyson. But it was the tactics and he did well. It was a 50-50 fight and he came out with the win, so it was a good performance.”
Davison then tried to backtrack on what he said about Joshua, saying that Fury’s U.K. rival was smart to maintain distance with footwork and always knowing where he was in the ring.
“It looked a big ring,’’ Davison said. “But listen, I’m not going to say, ‘Oh this, oh that.’ It’s better for British boxing that Joshua won, because that means there’s big shows in the U.K.’’