Tyson Fury: Final curtain for the 'Gypsy King'?
LONDON, United Kingdom — Tyson Fury has, not for the first time, announced his retirement from the boxing ring. But is this really the end of the road for the "Gypsy King"?
The towering 36-year-old British heavyweight called it a day on Monday, just weeks after his second straight defeat by Ukraine's Oleksandr Usyk in Saudi Arabia.
"Hi everybody, I'm going to make this short and sweet," he said in a post on social media, apparently filmed inside a vehicle.
"I'd like to announce my retirement from boxing, it has been a blast, I've loved every single minute of it."
Fury enjoyed two stints as the heavyweight world champion and retires with a record of 34 wins, two defeats and one draw.
That is if he stays retired.
Fury has previously announced his exit on a number of occasions, most recently in April 2022.
But they all turned out to be short-term absences from the ring and many pundits are skeptical that this really is the end.
Fury's promoter, Frank Warren, told the BBC Fury had become a "world star".
"If you look at some of the fights he's had, he's not been in one fight that hasn't been exciting," he said.
Fury's retirement appears to mean he will not take on another former world champion, Anthony Joshua, in a long-anticipated all-British showdown.
Joshua said at the weekend a fight with Fury "has to happen this year".
On Monday, Joshua's promoter, Matchroom's Eddie Hearn, said he doubted that Fury was really gone for good.
The two-time heavyweight world champion, who stands 6-foot-9, was born three months' premature in Manchester in 1988, weighing just one pound.
He was named after American boxing great Mike Tyson, while his "Gypsy King" nickname comes from his Irish Traveller roots.
Fury turned professional in 2008 before becoming the British and Commonwealth champion with victory over Derek Chisora three years later.
In 2014, he beat Chisora again, this time for the European and WBO international heavyweight titles.
Fury became a global name in November 2015 when he defied the odds to end Wladimir Klitschko's decade-long heavyweight reign with a unanimous decision to take the WBA, IBF and WBO belts.
But his joy proved to be short-lived.
He ended up spending