With the big fights we had over the weekend, we're going to jump the gun and update the monthly Top 100 a bit early to reflect the results. Tyson Fury is of course the big news, capturing the SportsRatings Heavyweight belt yet again.
Fury first captured the belt on November 28, 2015 when he beat Wladimir Klitschko. He held it as the rematch loomed but ultimately never came and Fury went inactive on November 29, 2016—making then-#4 Deontay Wilder the interim champ as #2 Klitschko and #3 Alex Povetkin were also inactive.
Fury's comeback bout with Sefer Seferi didn't register as a rated fight, so it wasn't until he beat Francesco Pianeta on August 18, 2018 that he regained the belt. He had remained at the #1 spot all along but the interim belt was held by Wilder, Povetkin, and Anthony Joshua for almost two years. And just one month after Fury regained the title, Joshua beat Povetkin to claim the belt himself!
Fury had a chance to reclaim the belt against Deontay Wilder in December of 2018 but that fight was an infamous draw. Instead, he regained the belt in an unusual manner: when Andy Ruiz Jr upset Joshua on June 1, 2019, Ruiz only jumped to #2, making Fury the belt holder instead! He held it through his wins over Tom Schwarz (non-rated) and Otto Wallin, but when Joshua beat Ruiz in the rematch in December of 2019 he regained the belt again. That's three times holding the belt for Fury, twice for Joshua at this point.
But it wasn't long before Fury struck again, beating Wilder in their rematch on February 22, 2020 and grabbing the belt for the fourth time. Of course we know what happened next: Fury vs. Joshua was all but a done deal when Wilder invoked the rematch clause, the fight was scheduled, then delayed, and in February of 2021 Fury lost the belt again due to inactivity.
Joshua missed a chance to reclaim it last month vs. Oleksandr Usyk, who jumped to #2 behind Fury, then just last weekend, October 9, 2021, Fury took the belt for the 5th time. In total he lost the belt twice purely for inactivity, and twice being jumped over on rating points by Anthony Joshua.
SportsRatings Heavyweight Boxing Top 10 for fights through October 9, 2021
| -3 yrs |
-1 yr |
-6 mo |
Oct Rank |
Rank | Fighter |
Rating
|
Rated Record | October 1-9 results |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | TYSON FURY | 52.41 | 19-0-1 |  KO 11 #5 DEONTAY WILDER |
| -- | 24 | 24 | 2 | 2 | OLEKSANDR USYK | 35.64 | 3-0-0 | |
| 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | ANTHONY JOSHUA | 33.42 | 17-2-0 | |
| 6 | 9 | 4 | 4 | 4 | DILLIAN WHYTE | 26.35 | 14-2-0 | |
| 38 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 5 | ANDY RUIZ JR | 24.71 | 14-2-0 | |
| -- | 14 | 11 | 11 | 6 | FRANK SANCHEZ | 20.66 | 5-0-0 | UD 10 #9 EFE AJAGBA |
| 4 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 7 | ALEX POVETKIN | 19.59 | 30-3-1 | --last rated win -14 months. |
| 47 | 27 | 8 | 8 | 8 | JOE JOYCE | 18.20 | 8-0-0 | |
| 26 | 13 | 9 | 10 | 9 | JOSEPH PARKER | 17.95 | 18-2-0 | |
| 3 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 10 | DEONTAY WILDER | 17.82 | 18-2-1 | L KO 11 #1 TYSON FURY |
Deontay Wilder drops from #5 to #10. He's been winless for two years now as both rematches played out. Most would argue he did better this time, and really, the third fight was sort of a combination of the first two—Wilder almost knocked Fury out, and Fury bullied Wilder into submission. His career from this point on will be interesting.
The other big winner of the weekend was Frank Sanchez, who won a decision over previously unbeated Efe Ajagba and jumped from #11 to #6. He showed good skill—and experience—in neutralizing Ajagba's size and power advantage to hand him his first loss. It gives confidence that he might be able to handle the size of some of the giants in the top ten, but all of them have a lot more experience than Ajagba. A fight with #9 Joseph Parker or Ruiz might be interesting, or #4 Dillian Whyte—but Whyte deserves a title shot not yet another eliminator.
Where does this leave the heavyweight division? Well, Wilder is out of the picture for a while at least. Fury is in, and with luck will fight the winner of the Joshua-Usyk rematch. Again, Dillian Whyte has been waiting years, so why not Fury-Whyte in the UK?
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