With Deontay Wilder having exercised his contractual clause for a third fight with Tyson Fury, the plan is already in place to have the two heavyweights square off once again on July 18 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Bob Arum tells ESPN.
Fury (30-0-1, 21 KO) will be defending the WBC heavyweight title this time around, as Wilder (42-1-1, 41 KO) looks to regain the belt he held from Jan. 2015 until his loss to Fury on Feb. 22 at the same Vegas venue.
Fury and Wilder first met, of course, in Dec. 2018, in a fight that went to a hugely controversial draw, with many feeling Fury deserved the win despite being knocked down twice in the fight. In the rematch, Fury left zero doubt, physically dominating Wilder and dropping the American two times en route to a seventh round stoppage.
The first fight did a reported 325K pay-per-view buys through Showtime PPV, while the much bigger rematch was around 800-850K buys through ESPN+ and FOX Sports PPV.
It might be a struggle to deliver those same rematch numbers for a third fight coming just five months later, and given the fact that the second fight was, in fact, a pretty one-sided beating. But it is still a money fight, and what’s more, it’s in the contracts. If Wilder wanted to do it, it has to be done, save for Fury giving up the belt and just not fighting him, which doesn’t seem like it’ll happen.
