Ryan Garcia is picking Tyson Fury to defeat Oleksandr Usyk by a close decision in their heavyweight undisputed championship fight on Saturday.
Garcia thinks Fury (34-0-1, 24 KOs) is just “too good” for IBF/WBA/WBO champion Usyk (21-0, 14 KOs), and will edge him in their headliner in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. The event will be shown on DAZN PPV and ESPN PPV at the Kingdom Arena.
Ryan feels that Fury is the best heavyweight of all time, which is a big compliment, considering his resume is too thin to put him in the same league as past greats.
Garcia is eye-balling it, feeling that Fury is better than the past top heavyweights. Obviously, it’s difficult to imagine him beating some of the top fighters from the past when they were in the prime of their careers, but Fury is certainly among the best.
This Saturday, WBC champion Fury and Usyk will meet in the main event with the winner, if there is one, who will be the first undisputed heavyweight champion since 1999.
A Close Fight, but Fury is Too Good
“Usyk vs. Fury, everyone is excited for it. I’m excited for it,” said Ryan Garcia to DAZN Boxing about this Saturday’s heavyweight undisputed clash in Riyadh. “Everyone is talking about it. The whole boxing world is talking about it.”
As of last week, there wasn’t a huge amount of buzz for the Fury-Usyk fight, but the interest has increased dramatically this week for fans in the U.S.
In the UK, the fans have been talking up the fight for over a month, as Fury is a star over there, but not so much in the U.S. His fighting style, which involves a lot of grappling and roughhouse tactics, isn’t an appealing one for Americans.
Also, Fury’s performance against novice Francis Ngannou last October hurt his popularity among casual boxing fans who saw him laboring to a controversial ten-round split decision.
“It’s going to be a 12-round decision. It’s going to be a very close fight, and I think Fury is just too good and I love Fury. Fury has got that energy in him, he looks great. Usyk is a hell of a fighter, but nah.
Fury: The Greatest Heavyweight of All Time?
“Fury is the man. I think he’s the best heavyweight of all time. I love Muhammad Ali, but I think Tyson Fury is the best heavyweight fighter of all time,” said Garcia.
It’s a bit much picking Fury above Muhammad Ali, but that’s Ryan’s pick. I think you could make an argument for Fury as the best ever if he’d been fighting high-level opposition throughout his career, but he hasn’t done that.
Fury has only fought one good heavyweight, Wladimir Klitschko, and the rest middle-of-the-road types with limited ability. Ryan sounds a little bit like a fanboy picking Fury as the best ever, but there are a lot of others like him.
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