By: Sean Crose
“I just mean business,” Deontay Wilder told ESNEWS’ Elie Seckbach immediately after Tuesday’s press conference to kick off the promotion for his third fight with Tyson Fury. “I didn’t come here to fool around.” Appearing far more relaxed than he did at the official media event, Wilder went on to say “it’s all good.” As for what Fury said to him during the tense, over five minute face off after Tuesday’s press conference, Wilder appeared rather nonchalant. “I couldn’t hear nothing,” he said simply. If Wilder was rattled by the thought of facing Fury a third time, he wasn’t letting it show in his talk with Seckbach.
Yet, although he seemed at ease, Wilder still made it clear he felt he was cheated in his second fight against Fury. Like the first bout between the two in 2018, the 2020 rematch was for the WBC heavyweight championship of the world. Unlike the first bout, which ended in a draw, however, the second bout saw Wilder being stopped by Fury in the seventh. Judging from the interview, the former titlist appears firm in a belief that Fury didn’t win fair and square. “I wanna do more than just knock him out,” he said of facing Fury once more.
“I’m so focused right now because I was done wrong,” Wilder claimed. “I was done wrong in front of the world. I’m just a man of what’s right is right and what’s wrong is wrong.” The former titlist indicated that the arbitration which led to the third fight with Fury was something that was legitimate and fair. “We had an honorable judge, Weinstein, and he did the right thing,” Wilder claimed. Seckbach at one point in the interview asserted Wilder wouldn’t take step aside money, despite how much was being offered. “It’s principle,” the Alabama native said. “I’m a man of principle.”
Wilder made it obvious on Tuesday he’s also a man who likes music, as anyone who saw the man sitting through the press conference with headsets on could attest. “It was old school R&B,” he explained, “and I changed to some Gospel stuff.” With the one, and reported only, press conference for the fight behind him, Wilder made it clear he’s eager to simply get back to camp. “It ain’t nothing but train, train, train,” he told Seckbach. He may have lost to Fury the last time they met in the ring, but it appeared in the interview that Wilder kept Fury, a mind game king, from getting inside his head on Tuesday.