Tyson Fury's top 4 fantasy fights in WWE & MMA
The 'Gypsy King' Tyson Fury revently announced tongue-in-cheek he would make his MMA debut, after making his WWE bow on Nov. 2. We've rounded up some fantasy Fury fights we'd love to see in either the cage or the wrestling ring.
READ MORE: Tyson Fury claims he will train with Conor McGregor ahead of potential MMA switch (VIDEO)
Former heavyweight boxing king Fury will make his foray into WWE against Braun Strowman at WWE Crown Jewel in Saudi Arabia on November 2, which has been a much-ridiculed move in between fights as talks boil down for a February 2020 showdown with WBC champion Deontay Wilder.
Also on rt.com 'I've seen better acting in porno movies!' Tyson Fury's WWE crossover lambasted by fans (VIDEO)Many were quick to condemn the one-time unified world heavyweight champion competing in a scripted wrestling contest versus a man whose greatest achievements are a few 1st place finishes in strongman events.
But it could make sense. Fury is set to pocket an estimated $15 million for his sports entertainment bow debut his eye is healing from a horror gash suffered in his 12-round decision win over Swede Otto Wallin in his last fight, where he suffered an eye injury which also needs time to heal before a date with the hardest puncher in the division.
Sceptics say that he may receive or even fake an injury that could rule him out of a lucrative rematch and much-anticipated match with Wilder, and force him to again sit on the periphery of the heavyweight scene.
As if that wasn’t enough, the 250 lbs 6ft 9in Fury announced he could also make his MMA debut before the year is out, being trained by Conor McGregor, to which The Notorious agreed in principle. In response, RT Sport have put together some mouth-watering fantasy fights in wrestling and MMA involving the Gypsy King.
Mike Tyson
The age-old fantasy fight usually pits a current elite heavyweight against a former champion from a bygone era. However, it’s rare that two champs decades apart mirror each other in name and achievements in the sport.
Born in 1988, Tyson Fury was named after then-heavyweight ruler Mike Tyson, on account of his fighting spirit as an infant. Fury has gone some way to emulating his namesake by holding the same championship Tyson won aged 20, becoming the youngest holder of the heavyweight title.
Fury has now followed Tyson into the WWE. ‘Iron Mike’ was in full and electrifying ‘Baddest Man on the Planet’ mode when he made his WWE bow at WrestleMania XIV in 1998, serving as special enforcer and flattening ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin with a push when the latter flipped him the bird, later teaming with D-Generation X and sparking Shawn Michaels out cold.
Any boxing fans would love to see the raw ferocity of Tyson versus the slick boxing brain of Fury, but a WWE match up would be pure box office.
Chael Sonnen
If there was one opponent that could tempt ‘The Bad Guy’ out of apparently blissful retirement, it could be Fury himself. Former UFC favorite and ‘All-American Gangster’ Sonnen has already had his say on Fury’s reported move to MMA by saying that although he doesn’t believe the Manchester man’s words, he wouldn't doubt them.
“No there is no part of me that believes he’s going to do that. But my days of challenging crazy statements by Tyson Fury that he then goes out and does are long behind me,” Sonnen said on his eponymously named podcast.
His reasoning? “Tyson Fury is another animal...the fine line of ‘genius’ and ‘insanity - he's on 'genius' but it's a fine line!” Sonnen went onto say that Fury possesses the work ethic to make it in mixed martial arts, despite only having, albeit very significant, boxing experience.
Sonnen’s resume is a who’s who of box office names in MMA and Fury’s would perhaps be the most well-known of those and a welcome addition to that list alongside the likes of Quinton Jackson, Wanderlei Silva and fellow Brit Michael Bisping.
Stipe Miocic
There’s nothing like a straight ‘best v best’ matchup and Tyson Fury and Stipe Miocic would be a clash of perhaps the best heavyweight in boxing pitted against the widely-recognized greatest mixed martial arts heavyweight ever.
Miocic snatched the title back from highly respected Daniel Cormier in their rematch in August, that made him a two-time champion and catapulted him back into the big time within the promotion after almost becoming a forgotten man.
It’s a scrap of two genuine working class men; Fury comes from gyspy stock, the son of Irish immigrants and the descendent of a long line of bare-knuckle travelling fighters; Miocic also is the son of immigrants, from Croatia, and had a blue-collar upbringing in Ohio, where he still moonlights as a firefighter.
A title for lineal salt-of-the-earth champion would draw in the crowds - as if it needed any more promotion - for Tyson’s mma debut.
Conor McGregor
If there was one fight in pugilistic heaven that could be made it would be 'The Gypsy King' versus 'The Notorious' himself. The two snappiest of dressers, the trashiest of trash talkers, the motor-mouths of the world of sport would be a fight for the ages.
The onus would be on Fury for this one; Conor already made the move into the squared circle, and now it’s Fury’s turn to purportedly swap gloves and climb into the cage. However, if this was ever likely, it would probably happen under the bright lights of WWE.
Size-difference has rarely ever influenced a dream match in WWE and a Fury-McGregor double-header would be akin to Floyd Mayweather Jr’s scuffle with The Big Show in a no holds barred clash at WrestleMania 24 in 2008.
Earlier, the self-proclaimed ‘TBE’ broke the 7 ft 2 in Show’s nose at WWE No Way Out in a seemingly unscripted row, but a repeat of such David and Goliath antics would be out of the question this time around, but would perhaps be the single most talked-about punch landed in the internet era.
We know this one is about as unlikely as a Christmas card from Khabib to Conor but it’s worth thinking about - even if for those outfits and press conference soundbites.
