It’s hard to believe looking at them now, but Shawn Porter once bested Oleksandr Usyk in the amateurs.
Back then, both men were 20-years-old and Usyk was much smaller than he is now. He went on to win gold in the 2012 Olympic games before turning over at cruiserweight and eventually moving up to heavyweight. He dominated both divisions, becoming undisputed at each weight.
Porter is now retired but had a fine career that saw him become a two-time welterweight world champion and take on the likes of Terence Crawford and Errol Spence Jr.
Usyk is currently in camp ahead of his December 21 rematch with Fury who he beat narrowly on points back in May. Speaking to FIghtHub ahead of that, Porter assessed the first fight.
“I think it’s Tyson Fury’s fight to lose. We could see in the first fight he was bigger, stronger, he was sharper on the outside. I think he had a moment where he got complacent and he paid for it by losing the fight, he lost the whole second half of the fight including the knockdown of course.”
He then made his prediction.
“However two things I cannot ignore… The greatness of Usyk and the wars and the mileage on Tyson Fury. That mileage is something we can’t really measure and the greatness of Oleksandr Usyk we can’t measure either.
The first fight we knew was 50-50, it really was, same thing with the second one, but I’m willing to bet that Tyson Fury wins this one.”
Fury has a history of doing in better in rematches as he proved when he stopped Deontay Wilder in the second and third fights of their trilogy following a draw in the first. He will be hoping to repeat that next weekend against Usyk.
