Tony Bellew Has Created The Biggest Fight In British Boxing
Having secured the biggest fight of his career against David Haye (set for March 4th, 2017), Tony Bellew’s accomplishments and antics have positioned him at the forefront of British boxing.
In a year filled with shocks and surprises, the announcement that Tony Bellew would move up to Heavyweight to challenge former 2 division titleholder David Haye next March at the O2 Arena in London shouldn’t be one of them.
Bellew wanted this. Despite defiantly reiterating that he isn’t in this game for fame and adulation, he has stoked the flames for a big money fight with the man he calls the “B*tch from Bermondsey” for what feels like years, but in reality was less than 10 months.
A major Hollywood movie, one cruiserweight title, a BJ Flores, a Mark De Mori, a Dave TV, and an Arnold Gjerjaj later, this unexpected collision of two different extremes of British boxing became inevitable.
This reality really started to unravel when Bellew lived out his fairy tale this past May when he brutally knocked out the dangerous cruiserweight contender Ilunga Makabu inside three rounds to win the vacant WBC belt in front of thousands at the 32 year old’s beloved Goodison Park stadium. Nobody saw Bellew overcoming the stacked odds against him, but he had done it.
In that moment it became clear that there was next to nothing the “Bomber” could do in his career to match what he had just done. Rising from the despair of two title fight losses at light-heavyweight, a period of uncertainty while waiting to get a cruiserweight title shot, and then weeks of negotiations to get his opportunity at his dream location. It all culminated in a movie-style happy ending for the antagonist of the latest Rocky installment, Creed.
The achievement also will be hard to match or eclipse for Bellew as he now finds himself submerged amongst the land mines of a division which is as high risk and low reward as any in the sport of boxing. He is only one wrong step away from disaster at 200 lbs, whether it’s against fellow champions Dennis Lebedev and Olexsandr Usyk or against other top contenders in Marco Huck, Yunier Dorcitos, Murat Gassiev or Bellew’s mandatory challenger, Latvia’s Mairis Breidis.
So by the time Bellew’s first defence came in October and when, in his words he had “bounced BJ Flores’s head on the canvas four times”, Bellew made his intentions clear. He wanted David Haye.
Fortunately for Bellew, the boxing gods appeared to be working in his favor as David Haye has presently become a temporary afterthought in the hectic heavyweight title picture. Unlikely to achieve his objective of getting another world title shot until next summer, Haye’s schedule opened up to entertain this impromptu spring spectacle. Money spinning domestic grudge matches have been as synonymous with Haye’s career as anything else and with the distinct likelihood that Bellew would fall quickly just like Harrison, Chisora, and Maccarinelli did (or even quicker), he would be a fool to pass this up.
Thus after an extensive negotiation period, compromises were made, and the fight was signed for the spring.
The contrived nature of this “rivalry” is amusing. Bellew’s rhetoric when the topic of David Haye is raised swings radically from disdain and childish insults to borderline admiration for one of the most talented British fighters of the past decade. This is the type of resolute honesty entwined with laughable delusion which makes Bellew such a polarising figure. One that, for better or worse, people will pay to watch.
Haye has been there and seen it all before. His modus operandi will be to self-promote the matchup heavily on social media, provoke his foe and extensively reiterate how people constantly stop him on the street asking him when he is going to “shut that b*****d Bellew up”
At the end of it all, Bellew and Haye are just two smart businessmen. Cynics will ridicule the matchup’s competitiveness on paper (and rightly so) but no one can deny its profitability, and that, as we have seen countless times this year, is the only thing that matters. This matchup is the product of an era of big British events supported with fans lining the pockets of protagonists, irrespective of betting odds, weight classes, and pre-fight hyperbole. And for both these combatants, it is time for them to get a piece of the pie.