Source - Tyson Fury and Billy Joe Saunders each delivered big news during a press conference in London on Monday.
Fury, the reigning lineal heavyweight champion, and Frank Warren's Queensberry Promotions announced that they signed a multi-year co-promotional deal with Top Rank/ESPN, while Billy Joe Saunders announced that he's moving up to super middleweight for a world title opportunity.
“I’m delighted that Frank and Queensberry Promotions have teamed up with Top Rank to promote my fights in America," Fury said in a press release statement sent to Sporting News by Top Rank. "With ESPN and BT Sport behind me, the biggest sports platforms in the world are now linked up with the best heavyweight in the world!”
What this means for a highly-anticipated rematch between Fury and Deontay Wilder remains to be seen, considering that Wilder is a Premier Boxing Champions fighter and PBC and Top Rank have a rather frigid relationship with each other.
His friend and fellow British boxer, Saunders, announced that he's moving up from middleweight to super middleweight to fight for the vacant WBO super middleweight world title against Shefat Isufi at The SSE Arena in Wembley, England on Saturday, April 13.
Last year wasn’t the best for the undefeated Saunders. Two injuries forced him out of title defenses against Martin Murray and then his October fight against Demetrius Andrade in Boston was scrapped after Saunders failed a VADA anti-doping test. He then decided to vacate his WBO belt.
Big time news in the gypsy world yesterday. The Gypsy King himself announced a massive five fight deal with ESPN and Top Rank worth a cool £80 million. Convert that bad boy over to US dollars and you've got yourself a cool $104,377,380 to take to the bank. Not too shabby for five nights of extra hard labor. And while this is good news for Tyson Fury, it's more than likely very bad news for a rematch with Wilder.
Top Rank's head honcho Bob Arum and PBC's main man Al Haymon do not like each other. Al Haymon basically does not do business with Bob Arum. Deontay Wilder is promoted by Al Haymon. These are all facts and they all mean very bad things for this rematch. Everyone is going to say they'll do what's best for the fighters on paper but the fact of the matter is that Al Haymon and Bob Arum will never sign off on a deal that doesn't include one of them very clearly getting the upper hand.
As for the other Traveller in the announcement, Billy Joe Saunders, I'm surprised by the move. He just lost his middleweight belt, so I can't imagine this is a permanent move. I definitely see him returning to the weight so I'm assuming this is just to A.) keep him in shape for his next fight at middleweight and B.) give him an easy shot at a belt so he becomes a more desirable opponent.
The fact of the matter is that no one is going to want to fight Billy Joe unless he has something they want. He's too slick and too dangerous to risk it if it isn't for a belt, so the only way he can get those big fights is if he has some hardware to offer up.
He had a rough year and brought most of his trouble onto himself by doing a ton of dumb shit. I'm not denying that he made himself look like a real arsehole, but all in all I'm a fan of the guy and I love watching him fight. As far as the PED suspension, I personally never believed he took anything intentionally and I don't think the Massachusetts state commission really did either. I think they basically decided to suspend him as additional punishment for the video scandal and I don't completely blame them for feeling that way.
Fortunately for Billy Joe, he seems to realize that he acted like a total cunt and now seems dead set on getting his shit together and being very active in 2019. He's only got a few prime years left - something he himself is extremely aware of - so if he wants to make a real move, the time is now. If he can get a few game opponents and put on a clinic like he did against Lemieux, we'll be cooking with gas. Roll the clip!
I fucking love
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