Fury-Whyte: the objective facts

Fury’s 9 best opponents: Wlad: UD Wilder 2: TKO7 Wilder 1: SD Wilder 3: KO11 Wallin: UD Cunningham: KO7 Chisora 2: RET10 Chisora 1: UD Hammer: RET8 Whyte’s 9 best opponents: AJ: gets KO’d in 7 Parker: UD Chisora 1: SD Chisora 2: KO11 Rivas: UD Povetkin 1: gets KO’d in 5 Wach: UD Helenius: UD Allen: UD Whyte has an 11% KO ratio and 0 KO’s inside the first 31 minutes and 55 seconds: he rarely manages to make his power count against far lower level opposition than Fury, who is a huge 1/6 (85.7%) favourite. Whyte scored KD’s against headbutt-concussed Parker, shopworn Chisora and two against shot 41 year old Povetkin but he was knocked down four times (AJ, Parker, Rivas, Povetkin 1) in the process. Whyte will be 34 to Fury’s 33.66 with no activity advantage: Fury will have fought once in 26 months (last time 6.5 months prior) for 10 full rounds against Wilder, whereas Whyte will have fought twice in 28.5 months (last time 13 months prior) for 4 and 3 full rounds against shot Povetkin and Whyte very likely carries more wear and tear from sparring wars. Whyte has exhibited cowardice in his dealings on many occasions (most recently by calling for a shot Povetkin trilogy, calling out Jermaine “10 rounds with Pavel Sour” Franklin, 40.5 year old injury prone Arreola, backing out of the Wallin fight and being willing to step aside for less money for Fury to fight Usyk) and his confidence will be lower than usual, just one fight removed from his 2nd brutal KO loss (one-punched by an old, shot Russian former contender). To make matters even worse for Whyte, he will have just under 3 months to prepare for Fury, will only receive 18% of the split (if he doesn’t win, which he’s not likely to) and Fury is the A-side. Fury and Whyte both know that Whyte can’t outbox Fury so Whyte’s gameplan is more predictable. Fury and Whyte were sparring partners years ago, which favours Fury due to his higher boxing IQ and in reducing the unknown/random element of a new opponent (in a similar vein, Fury has performed better in rematches than Whyte). The fact that Povetkin KO’d Whyte faster than AJ may be a restraining factor for Fury’s aggression, as is the fact that Fury got knocked down twice in his last fight and Whyte, Whyte’s trainer and promoter are clearly worried about Fury using his movement and boxing on the outside, which they hope he’s no longer able to do effectively. It’s likely though that Whyte’s reputation for having a glass chin and Sugar Hill’s influence will make Fury want to go for the KO at some stage. Whyte isn’t anywhere near as easy to underestimate as a fighter like pre-AJ Ruiz because Whyte is very antagonistic, is from a nation that is prominent in heavyweight boxing, has some height, arm length, KO power, decent names on his record and isn’t morbidly obese. Fury may be more motivated than usual in a UK homecoming against a “domestic rival”, he understands that a loss to Povetkin’s grandson would be an absolute disgrace which would also delay or prevent the Fury-Usyk/AJ undisputed fight and it will be the highest level and highest profile fight of Whyte’s career by a wide margin (where he will be the B-side and underdog for only the second time in his 30 fight pro career) increasing pressure on Whyte, while it won’t even be in the top 4 for Fury. Another motivating factor for Fury is the fact that Whyte is AJ’s 3rd best win, so if Fury schools and batters Whyte he again exposes Matchroom’s hype of their top two heavyweights and further undermines AJ’s reputation, as well as Hearn’s position. If Fury fights Whyte as he did Chisora in the rematch (who in terms of anthropometrics and level is very similar to Whyte, as proven by their 23 very close and competitive rounds together, giving Fury a considerable experience advantage stylistically) Whyte will be little more than a heavy bag on legs, which is why Whyte has been protected from movers and southpaws for his entire career (Whyte’s fastest opponent was Joseph Parker, who is not especially nimble or fleet of foot and Whyte struggled badly). Whyte also hasn’t looked his best against longer opponents (AJ, Helenius, Wach) and Fury is longer than all of them. To be fair to Whyte, it was a wonderful, accurate headbutt that he flattened Parker with. It's a great weapon for him, and I'm surprised he hasn't used it again since. Maybe he's been holding it back for Fury? Nash out.

Parker and Rivas has never been stopped and knocking out Wilder twice doesn’t mean much it just means he probably should have been stopped 3 times instead of 2 ,he almost was in the last one in the first fight wobbled badly . Parker ,Wach and Chisora are not easy opponents to stop . Helenius on record has a win over Chisora not sure why that’s relevant either . A.J also defeated Klitschko who is better then Wilder you are reaching using other opponents. Your reply is very incoherent. For a start, you say that Parker and Rivas have never been stopped (true) but then say that stopping Wilder "doesn't mean much", even though Wilder had never been stopped either. Taking Fury and Whyte out of the equation, Wilder has still fought more dangerous opposition than Parker and vastly more dangerous opposition than Rivas, so the fact that Wilder had never been stopped proved a lot about his toughness/heart/defence etc. A post-Whyte Dave Allen got stopped by Ortiz in 7, Yoka in 10 and David Price after 10 A pre-Whyte Helenius got KO'd by Duhaupas in 6 and a post-Whyte Helenius got KO'd by Washington in 8 A pre-Whyte Wach got stopped by Bakole in 8 and a post-Whyte Wach got dropped and stopped by Makhmudov in 6 Short bridgerweight Rivas has fought one other opponent of note in his career: relatively light puncher Jennings, so we don't know how tough he is Chisora is a tough fighter but far less shopworn versions were dropped multiple times and stopped by Haye in 5 and retired by Fury in 10 Parker is a tough fighter but he has since been dropped inside the first 10 seconds of a fight by Chisora If Whyte was a prolific puncher with his aggressive style, he would be stopping at least half of these guys. AJ defeated a 17 month older, 17 month inactive, schooled in his last fight, winless in 2 years, away from home Wlad in a life and death war. AJ went on to get battered and quit against a short light punching fat pig Ruiz and get schooled at home by light punching cruiserweight Usyk. He will probably lose the rematch to Usyk as well. So considering all of these things, AJ can't definitively be rated above Wilder at this point.