...and at the same time it is almost certainly going to make a ton of money for all of the people involved. I haven't really been a fan of boxing for a long time, that ship set sail a long time ago when Mike Tyson was fading fast. I really looked forward to matches in the 80's and 90's and it may have always been this way but these days it just seems like it is all about the money and not really about whether or not the matches are actually going to be any good. We may have Conor McGregor, Jake Paul, and even a little bit of Mike Tyson to blame for this, but this whole mis-matching of opponents in my mind is just kind of dumb.
I haven't been paying much attention to it but I don't think that really anyone is buying that these two are actually interested in hurting one another. They are laughing all the way to the bank for one thing and I believe that most fans of combat sports are very aware of this.
In my mind there is only one way that this could possibly go if it wasn't some sort of fix, which it almost certainly will be. Francin Ngannou would get absolutely worked in a boxing ring. This is something that people truly need to understand. While there is some element of boxing in MMA it is nowhere near the technical level of expertise that exists in true boxing. Any time that MMA fighters try to step in a boxing ring with someone who is experienced unless something crazy happens, the boxer is going to destroy the MMA fighter. Ngannou wouldn't even need to fight someone very good in the world of boxing and he would still lose, but he is shooting for one of the best heavyweight boxers of all time as a first-time opponent? I think that is all the information that we need to know that Fury is going to pull a "Mayweather" like in his fight vs. Logan Paul. He is going to take it easy on Francis so that the crowd doesn't get treated to an early KO.
That's not what boxing or any combat sport should be about in my mind. When we saw Conor McGregor go after Mayweather it was mostly just a TON of promotional work leading into the fight, then it was a fight that even though they acted like they hated one another, that Floyd intentionally dragged out as long as he did. I believe that Fury is going to do exactly the same thing.
One professional sports writer summed up this upcoming fight between Fury and Ngannou perfectly when he said that it is like "taking a Tiger Woods in his prime and having him golf against a Roger Federer in his prime or vice versa."
I think the major reason why it is always MMA fighters entering boxing and not the other way around is because the boxers are very aware of the fact that the would get absolutely destroyed in MMA, embarrassed even. MMA fighters will normally suffer the same fate as we have seen in the past few years, but they don't seem to mind because boxing carries a much larger payday with it than MMA fights ever could. No MMA fight has ever generated $30 million for a single fighter in a single fight but that is basically the norm in boxing "superfights."
I will not be watching this fight and I certainly wouldn't pay what is bound to be an insane pay-per-view buy in price to do so either. The fight is taking place in Saudi Arabia, so it wouldn't surprise me if there isn't even much in the way of celebrity attendees... well, at least not ones that we are going to recognize.
I don't think this fight will be over quickly and I believe this will be by design in a pre-determined fashion mostly on the part of Tyson Fury. I only hope that it will be evident so that the two of them can be exposed and perhaps we can stop having these silly fights that are just stealing money from fans. This doesn't advance either sport very much. It makes boxers look greedy and it makes MMA fighters look weak.