Former UFC champion Demetrious Johnson argues Oleksandr Usyk should learn from Floyd Mayweather and retire from the sport as undisputed king.
Oleksandr Usyk reigns supreme as the undisputed king of the heavyweight division, but as attention turns towards an immediate rematch with Tyson Fury, not everyone is convinced that Usyk shouldn’t just retire from the sport on top – including one of the best UFC fighters to have ever stepped foot in the octagon.
Demetrious Johnson argues Usyk should retire or face AJ next
Breaking down the Ring of Fire main event via his official YouTube channel, former UFC flyweight champion Demetrious Johnson celebrated the outstanding performance of Oleksandr Usyk.
Yet despite the obvious likelihood of a rematch with Fury happening later in the year, Johnson argued that Usyk should avoid a second clash and instead consider either retirement from the sport of boxing, or bow out with a trilogy fight against Anthony Joshua.
“The hardest thing is that they said there’s an automatic rematch [clause] in their contract for these gentlemen, so there’s no brainer that you’re going to have Tyson Fury vs Usyk 2.”
“Now I would like to see Usyk fight Anthony Joshua because he’s beat Anthony Joshua twice and Joshua just knocked out Francis Ngannou so I would love to see that…. [But] If Usyk decided not to defend the belt [and] decided to retire, I would be completely happy with that.”
The consensus greatest flyweight in UFC history claimed that he’d actually like to see the undefeated Ukrainian champion taking lessons from Floyd ‘Money’ Mayweather on how to navigate the final portions of his own legendary career:
“I think this is the point of time where if he was Floyd Mayweather 50-0 [who] left the sport on top as champion, I think this would be a monumental moment for Usyk to do that exact same thing.”
“Leave while you’re on top while you’re the best in the world, don’t give anybody the opportunity to take away what you’ve done in being undefeated in your whole entire career and capturing your ultimate dream and goal, which is to be the undisputed heavyweight king of the world.”
The former pound-for-pound best mixed martial artist in the world added that given such a tremendous if not incredibly hard-fought victory over Fury, there simply isn’t anything left for Usyk to fight, or risk his legacy, for:
“This gentleman has won every single thing [possible]; he’s won Olympic gold medals, he’s won the Golden Glove, he’s won absolutely everything you could have done. He’s undefeated, he just beat the Gypsy King Tyson Fury, there’s nothing left he can prove.”
Following the judges’ scorecards being announced, Fury himself called for the rematch to happen in October.
Usyk to be stripped of championship title belt next month
Whilst Usyk is now the first undisputed heavyweight champion of the world since Lennox Lewis all the way back in 2000, ‘The Cat’ is not going to be undisputed champion for very long, in fact, less than a month.
This is because, in just a few weeks’ time, Usyk will be stripped of the IBF heavyweight title as overdue mandatory challenger Filip Hrgovic takes on Daniel Dubois on June 1.
According to reports, both Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk’s contracts for their super-fights include clauses that they would vacate the IBF belt no matter who won in Riyadh, as Hrgovic was made mandatory almost 18 months ago.
Whilst Usyk was himself looking forward to the rematch with Fury at the post-fight press conference, he noted that at this point in time, he’s also looking forward to some well-deserved time away from the sport:
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“I don’t think about boxing now, please, my camp started in September 2023, I worked for nine months.”
“I missed Happy New Year, I missed my son’s birthday, I missed my other son’s birthday, I missed my daughter’s birthday and then the birth of my daughter.”
“I also missed family holidays. I was only focused on this fight, now I’m happy and I want to go back home.”
Oleksandr Usyk improved his career record to 22-0 with the victory over Tyson Fury.