Tyson Fury vs. Deontay Wilder II: The Fight Site Staff Predictions
If you were tasked with finding a more dramatic moment in recent boxing history than lineal heavyweight champion Tyson Fury rising from what appeared a highlight-reel knockout in the 12th round of his first fight with Deontay Wilder, my guess is that you’d probably be stumped.
WBC champ Wilder seemed as dumbfounded as the thousands in attendance millions watching at home. The question is can he keep ‘The Gypsy King’ down for ten this time?
We all know who Wilder is: long, spindly, ungainly, an awkward operator with quick hands and devastating power.
We all know who Tyson Fury is: a big man with speed and defensive nous that belies his gargantuan frame, a big mouth and personality making up for what is often a safety-free approach and a style only purists appreciate.
The only question is: what happens this time?
We at The Fight Site are always happy to put our necks on the line and offer up our predictions, and for a fight like this you’re either going to look like a genius or a buffoon. We’re still not scared, so let’s see what our team has to say”
Kyle McLachlan: Whilst I am still amazed at Tyson Fury’s powers of recovery after being heavily dropped in the 12th round by Wilder (I doubt even Larry Holmes would’ve got up from those shots) I have to say I’m not sure that means he can do it again. Surviving a knockout puncher once doesn’t mean that you can suddenly always survive him (see the Morales-Pacquiao trilogy for instance) and Fury’s somewhat underwhelming performance against Otto Wallin gives me pause for thought in picking him to win the rematch.
A few things: Wallin might have been better than advertised. Fury was bossing the first Wilder fight for long stretches, so only needs to be that tiny bit more switched on to avoid losing points when being flattened. Wilder arguably lost every round to an ancient Luis Ortiz in their recent rematch before he landed his patented knockout punch. And Fury was cut early against Wallin, and came through to win. So surely it’s not a huge stretch to pick Fury?
That’s the thing: Wilder does only have to land once. And I can’t see Tyson Fury—as defensively aware and as smart a ring general as he is—going 36 minutes without being clobbered once. And I’m not sure that the herculean effort he put forth to rise from the canvas last time didn’t take the last of his prime out of him.
My actual hope is that Fury bosses his way inside behind the jab and sticks to Wilder’s chest: Fury is an excellent inside fighter and a mauler inside the clinch, and it would also take away the space Wilder needs to gain leverage for his shots. But getting in there consistently without walking onto a heavy punch would be a dangerous tactic in itself.
My prediction: Wilder is too dangerous at all ranges and Fury may already be past his best. Could Fury boss the fight? Yes. Could Fury be bossing the fight for long stretches and get knocked out? Yes. But I predict absolute chaos, and as I’m uncertain moving to a Kronk coaching tree that hasn’t had any success in recent years will benefit Fury in any way, I’m predicting that Deontay Wilder will smash a still cold Tyson Fury in two rounds.
Taylor Higgins: If Fury adopts the same stick-and-move approach he took in the first fight, he won’t be able to survive until the final bell. Wilder began to adjust to Fury’s defensive habits in the final third of their previous encounter, throwing his right hand slightly lower to meet Fury as he attempted to duck under it, and he also had success with the left hook to the body after Fury shoulder rolled the right hand. Whilst Fury is the most defensively sound fighter at heavyweight not named Usyk, there are still patterns for an intelligent puncher like Wilder to exploit and given his late success as a result of adaptations in the first fight, I think the Bronze Bomber will be dangerous early.
I’m largely in agreement with Kyle in that ideally, Fury wants to work on the inside and push the pace there; it’s a range he’s much more proficient at than Wilder, who has very little inside craft, and the American will be less dangerous up close. The risky part is getting there - he’ll be vulnerable to a big shot coming in, but I think it’s a risk he’ll have to take. What’s encouraging is that Fury has talked about being more aggressive and taking the fight to Wilder in the buildup, so hopefully he stays true to his word. He’ll need to impose his physical strength on the inside and focussing on body shots will also be key.
That being said, even if Fury does change his tactics I’m not confident that he can close the distance over 12 without getting clipped; I trust Wilder’s ring IQ enough to believe he’ll find a way to deliver a fight-ending right hand. And if Fury tries to fight on the outside, I think Wilder’s explosiveness will lead to a highlight-reel KO. Fury can win this fight if he performs near-flawlessly and adopts the right approach, but I’m picking Wilder by mid-round KO.
Lukasz Fenrych: Most of the questions about this fight come from the unpredictability of Fury. Wilder might be an underratedly clever fighter but we know what he’s going to be doing- trying to marshall his potent but limited set of skills into landing the right hand with finality. He won’t be particularly bothered about winning rounds so Fury is almost certain to be in nominal control of the fight for as long as it goes, and as much as he has more ways to approach the fight than he’s often given credit for, they’re pretty much all range games, he can’t fight inside.
The worries about Fury are numerous: he’s changed his coach, and announced an intention to fight more rough-and-ready. He’s weighing more. We don’t know if he’s as focused as he was last time, and even if he is he was clocked twice last time so it may not be enough.
Myself, I’m not awfully worried about the change of trainer because I think Fury at this stage more or less coaches himself with just a few refining touches from the coach, and so is unlikely to be worse or more predictable than the first time. In fact, drilling with a different team might mean that the reactions that Wilder eventually worked out the first time will be slightly different and he’ll have to work them out again.
The second big question, as others have asked, is whether Fury can approach the fight more aggressively and still be safe. Again, I don’t think doing so would put him in more danger than just playing pure defence. Wilder is not especially good at timing opponents coming towards him (he’s most effective either they relax thinking they’re out of range, or when he has time to throw his own feints or throawaway shots and draw reactions he can exploit), and Fury doing so would mean that yes, there is one shot in range on the plate for him, but it’s one shot and then he’s inside where he’s in a world he doesn’t know well, without a gameplan we’ve ever seen so far to disengage and catch his opponent while doing so- in other words Fury getting in Wilder’s face consistently would quite probably give Wilder fewer genuine chances for a fight-ending single shot than sitting on the edge of range letting him throw sighters until one lands.
This does depend quite strongly on Fury choosing the right approach to being aggressive- if he thinks he’s just going to stand and bang it out he’s asking for trouble.
The third question, about Fury’s mentality, should for completeness be asked but is from what we’ve seen so far impossible to answer so has to be set aside. I will say that I don’t see any particular reason to believe he’s less on the ball than he was the first time, but we can’t really know till the bell rings.
The final big question I have is about Wilder and it’s this: how will his conditioning hold up, if Fury pushes the pace even a little bit? At the end of the first fight, Wilder was exhausted, and apart from some KO-chasing bursts, he hadn’t forced or been forced into an uncomfortable pace at all. If Fury does end up getting more physical, Wilder’s lack of tools for dealing with that combined with the simple fact that a grind is inherently more tiring than the fight we saw first time (unless Fury makes the mistake of simply hugging a lot), I strongly suspect we’ll see the effectiveness of Wilder drop sharply in the later parts of the fight.
With all that in mind, I’m going to go against what seems to be the grain, take a leap, and go for Fury by KO in the later rounds.
Phillippe Pocholle-Marchetti: The first fight was great and so was the story of the fight. The scorecards were once again an absolute mess and Tyson Fury got robbed of the biggest win in his career (biggest due to where he came back from and how well he performed). It was inspiring to see Tyson coming back to life and I don’t mean only in the 12th round I mean him battling his depression just as well as Wilder destroys his opponent brain cells. Fury outboxed Wilder most of the fight, timing very well Deontay’s biggest weapon : the straight right hand. In order to do so, Fury made sure to slip or duck just after Deontay’s jab. For many rounds, The American could not land a right hand clean on the Gypsy King. However, in the end Deontay made the adjustment and instead of throwing 1-2 in the air all night he started to bait Fury at his own game ( Deontay started to throw that right hand lower so that even when Fury duck under he gets caught but more importantly he followed up that right hand with a nasty left hook). So yes, Fury won and survived in a great fight but I don’t see that rematch playing like this again at all. If I don’t expect a first round KO from the Bomber I think he’s gonna end the show and Fury’s comeback run inside 8 rounds. Even though it happened late, Wilder did crack the defensive code that Fury created (can Tyson create a new defensive strategy ? yes but I find it unlikely that Wilder won’t crack it again) and though he got outboxed, Fury never ever hurt the Champion. This lack of offense and punching power will cost Fury in that fight. So I expect a much more aggressive performance from each man who’ll be eager to show who’s the king in there. And at this game to me the king is from Tuscaloosa, Alabama.
Deontay Wilder by KO inside 8 rounds.
Ollie Raderecht: I’ve really struggled to pick a winner here, and even when I think I’ve finally settled on one fighter, I’ve been easily tempted to switch. Truthfully, it’s a relatively evenly matched fight that could legitimately go either man’s way, evidenced by their first encounter. There’s a very enticing argument to be laid out for both, and I’ve debated with myself which side I’m on. However, I’m not here to fence-sit, so here’s my take on who’s most likely to achieve heavyweight supremacy (keep Usyk’s throne warm) on Saturday night.
Last February, I’d have picked Fury without much doubt in my mind. Now, a year later, after Fury’s underwhelming display against Otto Wallin last September, on top of Wilder’s explosive form, I’m more sceptical than ever about Fury’s ability to win again. When they last went toe-to-toe, Wilder adjusted to Fury’s primary defensive habit — ducking underneath Wilder’s right hand — and twice knocked Tyson down, so I’m with Taylor in that Fury shouldn’t adopt a similar approach. It’s fair to expect Fury to adjust, but to what extent?
Fury’s best bet? To operate inside of Wilder’s preferred punching range, rather than outside. That way he’d be eliminating Wilder’s leverage and forcing a largely inept infighter (Wilder’s never demonstrated any inside craft) to fight on unfamiliar territory against a crafty, heavier opponent. However, crucially, I’m not remotely confident that Fury will successfully implement an in-fighting approach without getting caught clean by Wilder’s right hand. Whilst I’m far more confident in Wilder’s ability to, at some point, land a fight-ending, or at least fight-altering, right hand. After all, I’m not relying on one fighter adopting a drastically different approach, I’m simply relying on a power-puncher who’s never failed to land big… to land big.
Conclusively, there’s too much uncertainty surrounding Fury (cut potentially reopening, unaccustomed trainer, unclear game-plan) to pick him over a fighter whose path to victory couldn’t be any easier to envision. I’m not ruling anything out, including a Fury stoppage, but I’m going with Wilder to win by come-from-behind, mid-late round KO. Ultimately, though, it’s going to come down to fight night, and we’re in for a real treat on Saturday.
Lee Wylie: “Boxers” typically come out on top against “punchers” in rematches, but I sense we’re going to see a different approach from at least one man that could alter the style dynamic. Fury said he wants the KO, and I believe him. How he will go about getting it requires some guesswork, but I suspect he may try to work up close where he can impose his size and dig the lanky, skinny-legged man’s body while taking away punching leverage. Here’s the problem: I don’t believe Tyson will be able to do that without, at some point, getting nailed on the way in by boxing’s biggest puncher.
Tyson is hard to hit cleanly when he stays behind the jab and circles, but when he holds his feet or moves forward, he is easier to find. Conversely, I believe Wilder will be more methodical and less gung-ho this time; less predictable and more dangerous. Rather than actively pursuing his man, don’t be surprised if Wilder sits back and tries to lure Tyson into the right hand, which would not only help disguise the punch but also amplify its impact.
Although he didn’t take one flush on the chin, “The Gypsy King” couldn’t avoid Wilder’s money punch for twelve rounds in their first fight despite boxing almost flawlessly. Fury getting hit good and proper with the right now seems inevitable, given he will likely be sitting down on his punches and presenting “The Bronze Bomber” with a more stationary target. Wilder by KO.