By: Sean Crose
“Demetrius Andrade has a rather unlikely fan: WBC and lineal heavyweight champion of the world, Tyson Fury. “I’ll tell you someone we should mention, but he never gets a mention,” Marca quotes Fury as saying. “He’s the bogeyman in every division, the one who needs a shot at something: Boo Boo Andrade.” As far as Fury is concerned, former WBO middleweight and WBA junior middleweight world titlist Andrade is being flat out avoided. “The man is a two-weight world champion,” Fury stated, “and he’ll rip the ears off anyone who has the cojones to get in the ring with him.” Andrade has recently moved up to super middleweight in the hope of finally landing a major fight. His last bout was a unanimous decision win over Demond Nicholson in early January.
“Give the man a chance to do something,” Fury added. “He needs his shot.” In truth, Andrade has been maddeningly easy for big names to overlook. For starters, the Rhode Islander’s 32-0 record doesn’t include an overabundance of knockouts. He doesn’t appear to possess a great deal of fight ending power. Plus, unlike a fighter such as Floyd Mayweather, he isn’t enough of a showman to draw in fans, regardless. Therefore, charges of Andrade being boring keep him from being popular – which makes it easy for other top names to avoid him. Or wait him out. Andrade is now 34 years old, after all.
“You’ve got Caleb Plant, you’ve got David Benavidez, you’ve got Charlo,” said Fury. “Get them all in. Give him a chance. He’s 33 or 34 years old, and he hasn’t boxed against someone very heavy.” Fury then laid out his opinion on Andrade for the world to see. “Really, he’s a very good boxer,” he continued. “It’s the other names that don’t want to fight him. He’s the most avoided man in all of boxing today, and they do it because they’re afraid of him.” Although it’s impossible to fairly accuse any professional boxer of cowardice, it’s easy to suspect that popular potential foes for Andrade might have a vested interest in keeping away from him.
The truth is that, at this point in his career, Andrade could use someone along the lines of Fury to put pressure on fighters who might be making it a point to keep from fighting him. No one, after all, wants to look like they’re ducking, even if it involves a potential opponent who isn’t seen as being particularly fan friendly.
