World Boxing News realized an astonishing fact about Tyson Fury just days after naming the current world heavyweight champion as Editor’s choice Fighter of the Year for 2020.
‘The Gypsy King’ – a two-time heavyweight title-holder, once unified. A two-time lineal ruler has never actually made a defense of any bonafide world championship in his career.
It’s quite an astonishing occurrence that Fury has never put a world title belt on the line against a challenger during his career.
We all know what happened in 2015 to stop the 32-year-old as his career imploded on the back of defeating Wladimir Klitschko in Dusseldorf.
Speaking to Mike Tyson about it on a HotBoxin’ Podcast appearance in the run-up to his rematch with Deontay Wilder, Fury explained why his mindset changed after pulling off the shock victory.
Achieving his lifelong dream was complete, but Fury was far from happy.
KLITSCHKO
“I suppose I suffered from depression and anxiety my whole life. From being a little boy to being a man,” revealed Fury. “But, I always had a goal of becoming heavyweight champion of the world.
“It always brought me back out of the darkness to achieve that goal, and nothing else mattered. I had a lot of tragedy in my life, and a lot of stuff happen.
“All that maybe could have put me off track of becoming heavyweight champ, but I always side-tracked all of that and concentrated on the job in hand.
“When they said ‘right, you’re going to fight Klitschko for the world championship,’ I was like, ‘Hmm. When I win, I’m not going to have a goal anymore’.
“So I almost knew going into the fight that I was going to come down that it was going to be a disaster.
“I was very depressed, going into the fight, going into training camps. I knew I was going to beat this guy. But I remember saying to my dad and brothers, ‘Win, lose or draw, I probably won’t fight again after this.’
“They were like ‘You’ve boxed all your life to get to this position, and you’re just going to walk away?’ I was like, ‘You know what? I’m not feeling it anymore’.
“But I look back on it and I was very ill going into that fight. I wasn’t well-minded.”
TYSON FURY DARK PLACE
Fury dropped the four titles he won from Klitschko one-by-one and sank deeper into a dark place he may never have recovered from.
But a meeting with Ben Davison changed all that, and Fury was put on the road back.
Eventually, the whole scenario culminated in an exceptional performance against Deontay Wilder in February. All Fury now has to do is put the strap up for grabs to end one of the most startling sports facts.
The vast majority of the boxing community hopes that it will be against British rival Anthony Joshua. What a way that would be for Tyson Fury to break his title duck.
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