Eyebrows are being raised here and across the boxing world over the generational fortune Tyson Fury will bank on Saturday night’s fight against Oleksandr Usyk that will determine who enters ring legend as the first undisputed heavyweight champion of the world of the era of the four belts.
Eyes are turning green with envy not only in the fighting fraternity, but among millions across the planet, as it is revealed that Gypsy King is guaranteed £81.5million for his bid to join Lennox Lewis as the sole heavyweight holder of all available world titles.
Obscene is among the derogatory terms used when Fury’s promoters predict that once the pay-per-view counting houses declare their returns, his purse will rise to well north of £100million.
Today, 21,000 kilometers from the shifting sands of Saudi Arabia, it is Joe Louis Day, in the Nevada desert.
The memory of the Brown Bomber is served on the Las Vegas Strip with glasses raised, presentations to the Louis family, sepia film screenings of his finest performances in the ring and eulogies delivered by boxing luminaries American.
Tyson Fury set to bank more than £100m after his fight with Oleksandr Usyk on Saturday
Fury’s huge earnings stand in stark contrast to what boxing legends like Joe Louis (pictured) earned during his time at the top of the sport.
The gap between the financial situation of Louis and Fury (right, pictured with his partner Paris) marks the expected end of the era when the most heroic fighters found themselves falling into disarray.
Could the timing be more exquisite? No, but perhaps not in the way many would like to think. Louis, who remains alongside Muhammad Ali as one of the two greatest heavyweights, had to turn to charity to end his years in even modest comfort after collapsing almost penniless on a sidewalk from New York.
The bitter and resentful will seize on this coincidence of dates as a straw with which to beat Fury. An excuse to express their anger against a man whose extravagant showmanship they detest and who tolerate no tolerance for his extraordinary triumph over the difficulties of his bipolar condition.
From a more rational perspective, the gigantic gap between Louis’s financial situation and Fury’s marks the final, welcome and long-awaited end to the era when even the most heroic of fighters found themselves on the skids. .
Joseph Louis Barrow was born in 1914 in LaFayette, Alabama. Twelve years later, to escape growing threats from the Ku Klux Klan, the family of eight children moved from the Deep South to Detroit. Hence this statue of a giant fist that stands in downtown Motor City.
The instinct to fight your way out of poverty led Louis (left) to the longest reign as world champion in any weight class.
Fury, meanwhile, is expected to have a bank guarantee of a minimum of £81.5 million during Saturday’s fight.
His fight against Oleksandr Usyk (pictured) will determine who becomes the first undisputed heavyweight champion of the four-belt era.
The raw instinct to fight his way out of poverty led Louis to the longest reign as world champion in any weight class. Twenty-two years, no less. This included 25 consecutive successful world title defenses, also a record. All this as the undisputed holder of the NYSAC, NBA and Ring magazine belts of the time.
For which he was rewarded by having most of his purses stolen – including those given away by massive crowds of New Yorkers at Yankee Stadium and a packed Madison Square Garden – by rapacious, shameless and parasitic managers and promoters. And by the ruthless US Internal Revenue Service which demanded up to 90 percent of his entire income, even before all those greedy deductions.
Joe Louis had 66 wins and three losses during his prestigious boxing career
So much for his voluntary enlistment in the army during World War II and for using his immense popularity in the United States to raise considerable funds for the armed struggle against Hitler’s forces.
When Louis first retired, he received, out of the blue, a tax demand for half a million dollars. Even after donations from friends, the shortage still carried the implicit threat of prison time. The IRS and government pressured him to return on the condition that he forfeit his $100,000 purse for fighting Rocky Marciano.
Nothing to face, at 38 years old, this younger, stronger, more brutal puncher, who remains the only heavyweight world champion to retire undefeated. Marciano, under pressure from his own connections, agreed but said: “This is the last fight I want.” He did his best to limit the inevitable punishment with an early knockout, but Louis, out of professional pride, lasted eight rounds before being beaten to the ropes.
Rocky cried as he went to the big man’s dressing room and said, “I’m sorry, Joe.” To which Louis replied: “What’s the point of crying? Everything is going well. In his case, we have to get rid of the taxman.
The Gypsy King has already showcased his luxury car collection on his social media accounts
Fury himself had a rough start to life and was born prematurely, weighing just 1 pound.
What followed this last fight was sad to see. A grotesque wrestler’s fight. Decreased celebrity appearances. Bankrupt companies. Benefactors intervened. One with a motorized wheelchair in which he was taken to ringside for big fights at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas to collect donations from the big players.
Tyson Luke Fury was born in Wythenshawe in 1988 into a traveling family of Irish descent. Although he would never claim to have endured such hardship as Louis, it was a difficult start to life for a boy weighing only 1 pound at premature birth and not expected to live. Then as a child, he left school at the age of 11 to go work in the family, alongside his father and three brothers, paving the roads.
He learned to fight around campfires. Bare fists. After becoming a 6-foot-9 giant, he defeated Wladimir Klitschko to win his first world titles. Whereupon he remarked: “Becoming heavyweight champion of the world is not as difficult a fight as proving one’s Irish character.”
For all the scandalous antics and turbulence of his career, no one has the right to bash as he embarks on his biggest fight, against Usyk – one of the most important in boxing history over the past 25 years since Lewis claimed the three years. undisputed crown belt of heavyweights.
Joe Louis (right) defeated German foe Max Schmelling (left) in 1936, a fight that dealt the first blow to racism in America.
By helping boxing exploit Saudi wealth, Fury is taking less famous undercard boxers with him into a rewarding new era.
It’s not his fault he makes several times more than Joe Louis. The Gypsy King also can’t be blamed because the Brown Bomber drove a sedan he received as a gift, while Fury’s most visible indulgence in his wealth is a Rolls-Royce or three in his fleet of luxury.
Louis cemented American sentiment against the Nazis by winning his comeback fight against German foe Max Schmeling, which also dealt an early blow to racism in America. Fury broke the glass ceiling above which sharks flew honest fighters. By helping boxing exploit Saudi wealth, he is taking less famous undercard boxers with him into a rewarding new era.
And in the final analysis, the Gypsy King and the Brown Bomber face the same end. Louis died, aged 66, of a heart attack attributed in part to the rigors of combat. Fury is aware that his epic trilogy with powerhouse puncher Deontay Wilder will likely have taken years off him. This could also happen tomorrow night if he and Usyk engage in a punishing battle.
Schmeling, as a champion and not the prey of the IRS, helped pay for Louis’ funeral in Vegas. At least whenever Fury goes to meet his maker – hopefully several years from now – he’ll leave behind a family more than capable of meeting the costs of his departure.
Fury vs. Usyk will air live late this Saturday night on TNT Sports Box Office.
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