Tim Tszyu's defeat to Sebastian Fundora shows he is no longer at a boxing crossroads

Australia Broadcast Center

3 days ago

This isn't how it was meant to end for Tim Tszyu.
His return to Las Vegas for the rematch against Sebastian Fundora, the site of his lowest ebb as a professional boxer, where he lost his long-sought world title, was supposed to be a return to triumph.
Vengeance, redemption, and glory were the words being used in the lead-up.
Instead, he heads home in defeat, heartbreak, and pain.
Some fans may find the bloodied image of Tszyu refusing to back down almost a year-and-a-half ago hard to reconcile with the footage of the referee waving the fight away as Tszyu sat, immobile, on his stool at the end of the seventh round against the same opponent.
Fans who watched the fight may find it even more baffling, given Tszyu had just fought his best round of the bout, clearly hurting Fundora with a monster overhand right.
Every boxing fan in the world knows the immortal utterance of Panamanian legend Roberto Durán when he sat himself down in the eighth round of his rematch against Sugar Ray Leonard.
"No más," Durán was reported to say — no more — before plonking himself in his corner.
The accusation of quitting is the most heinous that can be levelled at a boxer — in Panama, there was disgust over how Durán quit.
The Tszyu camp was at great pains to say that staying down was not Tim's decision.
He never uttered the words himself, although his post-fight admission that he "just couldn't do it" tells its own story.
Sometimes a look means more than two short words ever will.
The vacancy behind the eyes, the blankness and heaviness weighing down on a set of shoulders that already carry such a burden imposed by a family history that is nigh-on impossible to match.
If a corner's job sometimes is to save a boxer from themselves, then those closest to Tszyu are the only ones who know the truth.
In Tszyu's case, that corner is his family. Saving him from potentially irreversible harm has to come first.
Tszyu went to the hospital after the bout, raising questions about the long-term impacts the sport has on its practitioners. Never forget, a spectacle that battles humanity's primal instincts of self-preservation has real impacts on real people.
And now, the question must be reasonably asked: does his corner prioritise his long-term health by asking him about retirement?
Pre-fight, Tszyu had said how the bloody defeat to Fundora in March 2024 had changed him.
"A big fear of mine was how I was gonna react to my first loss," Tszyu said in his dressing room at the MGM Grand.
"Now I've had that, it's made me a different person, and now I've got this new level of hunger."
The fact that Tszyu is different is now, sadly, without doubt.
The seeds of this change came from the bloodbath of the T-Mobile Arena last year.
But far more damaging was the savage beating at the hands of Bakhram Murtazaliev the following October.
Back-to-back world title fights. Back-to-back defeats.
And yet, the seeds of this fall were planted even earlier.
Arguably, Tszyu's first foray into the United States delivered a warning that he simply refused to heed.
Terrell Gausha provided a stern test of Tszyu's abilities offensively, while exposing his glaring deficiencies defensively.
Tszyu was knocked down, for the first time in his career, in the very first round, as Gausha gratefully accepted the large, static target of Tszyu's head as a punch magnet.
"In the first three rounds, everything's flash, everything's quick," Tszyu explained ringside after that fight in 2022.
"You sorta blink and you're down and you think, f***, how did that happen?"
Perhaps Tszyu wasn't given enough time to learn from that experience. Winning covers a multitude of sins.
Tszyu's next opponents, Tony Harrison, Carlos Ocampo, and Brian Mendoza — all fighting in Australia — were bossed around the ring by a dominant fighter.
The first time they met, even Fundora was awed by Tszyu's domineering presence in the ring, the stoic, terminator-style marching down of his rivals — a horrific vista in Fundora's case, amplified by Tszyu's wide eyes staring through a grotesque veil of streaming blood.
But the four knockdowns against Murtazaliev were the straws that broke Tszyu's spirit.
Cowed by the horror of that previous, bloody mess, one of the most fearless fighters around realised he was no longer the indestructible force of nature he believed himself to be.
Murtazaliev simply confirmed it.
No lateral movement. No stalking intensity. Playing the bogeyman doesn't scare the true dangers of this world.
In the rematch, Fundora played his cards perfectly.
The giant American used his extreme reach advantage to beat Tszyu to the punch.
Working behind a jab that Tszyu was powerless to evade, that static head absorbed telling blows.
Tszyu also failed to adapt to Fundora's southpaw stance, his only lateral movement going to the right, straight into that jab and leaving him vulnerable to the left hook.
It was a glaring tactical error that has been exposed in three of his last four fights. So, where next can he go?
"He's not finished at the top level," former world champion Shawn Porter was at pains to say on Main Event.
"He can still get it done against elite guys; it's gonna happen back in Australia for a little while.
"I don't believe Tim Tszyu is done on the world stage, primarily because he still fought very hard, very courageously, and we're now at the stage in the sport where it's about what you can bring to the stands, not what your status is."
Never has a backhanded compliment stung more.
A man who has taken pains to distance himself from his world champion father's achievements and stand on his own two feet, reduced to using his name to draw a crowd.
Nevertheless, Tszyu is now most definitely at a crossroads.
For many, there is only one sensible direction the newly-married 30-year-old should travel.
No más. No more. Save yourself from the savagery of this brutal profession.
Because while the other roads are still available — just look at how 46-year-old Manny Pacquiao performed in his 73rd career fight — there is too much doubt down those paths.