You may not know this, but Tyson Fury — arguably the most entertaining heavyweight of the past decade — comes out of retirement (again) to fight on Saturday. It’s a Netflix fight against 36 year-old Arslanbek Makhmudov, previously best known for fighting a bear.
The Fury/Makhmudov match is barely registering on Kalshi, as it’s racked up just $110,000 so far (Fury is 79% to win as of this writing). Maybe the coming days will bring it some attention, as Fury’s a press conference master and Makhmudov’s stunt could get a second boost of virality as the fight nears.
In addition to the actual fight, there are newly released “what will the announcers say?” and “what will Fury say at the press conference?” markets. There isn’t really anything interesting in there yet in terms of phrases or value; expect things to possibly change in the next few days as people buy and sell positions. But it doesn’t look like Prediction Markets are going to be the answer for boxing’s floundering buzziness in pop culture — at least not for anything that doesn’t include Jake Paul (Paul/Joshua produced an eye-popping $74 million market on Kalshi).
And this may not be just a boxing issue. UFC 327 is also this Saturday, and the main event — Jiri Prochazka vs. Carlos Ulberg — is sitting at just over $200k. So maybe the markets just don’t attract non-Paul fight fans?
One advantage the markets hold over regular sports betting — where Fury ranges from a -450 to -750 favorite — is in the organic trading nature of the platforms. If momentum starts to shift, if someone gets cut, if Fury looks overmatched, those % numbers are going to change as people buy and sell live during the fight. And given that boxing matches take place over a much longer period of time than UFC ones do, there’s more opportunity to trade and raise the market.
Still, with so little Tyson Fury buzz at the moment, and “Fury retirement fatigue” a real thing, and the walk-ins set to take place in what is essentially the afternoon on a Saturday in America, and an unknown older-ish opponent, and Tyson Fury being so far removed from the Jake Paul universe… will anyone even be watching to trade live? Does anyone know Fury’s tendencies enough to buy and sell a mentions market for his press conference? He says a lot of wild stuff — he said “sausage” a million times before his fight with Usyk but was remarkably reserved before his second fight with Wilder — even after Wilder called him a cokehead and announced Fury had previously wanted to kill himself. With a bunch of boring terms so far in the market, it probably won’t go over $35k.
And this isn’t meant to knock Fury, who has earned almost $150 million in his career — everyone at the top is just… old. Even Terance Crawford, arguably the best boxer in the world, is 38. We have Moses Itauma destroying everything in his path and his best “next fight” prospect right now is 40 year-old Deontay Wilder.
Fury is one of the most popular boxers of the last decade and here’s where he rates in Google Trends over the last week — with a fight three days away — against Sydney Sweeney, Jake Paul, and Mary Poppins (fury is that blue line that is currently less popular than the green Mary Poppins one):
What does this all mean? That right now, this weekend, prediction markets aren’t swooping in to save boxing. But give fans something like an Itauma fight worth watching, or maybe even a Joshua match this summer — and the markets could help, at the very least, enhance the live, 12-round experience.