The purse bid scheduled on Tuesday for the mandated rematch between heavyweight world titleholder Deontay Wilder and lineal champion Tyson Fury has been postponed for one week.
The sides have been negotiating the bout, but a purse bid had been scheduled for Tuesday afternoon at WBC headquarters in Mexico City in the event the camps could not make a deal.
However, WBC president Mauricio Sulaiman told ESPN on Monday night that the purse bid has been postponed for seven days.
“We have extended (for) one week the free negotiations, per their request,” Sulaiman said.
Usually, purse bid deadlines are extended when the sides go to the sanctioning body and request a delay because they are getting close to a deal but need a few more days to get it done.
Shelly Finkel, Wilder’s co-manager, said the discussions are going well.
“We’re in strong negotiations and hopefully we will get things done,” he said. “I don’t think we are going to need a purse bid.”
A purse bid is used in the event that the promoters cannot make a deal on a mandatory fight. The promotional rights are put up for auction to all promoters with the highest bidder winning promotional control of the bout and the winning bid establishing the fighter purses. In this case, if Wilder-Fury II goes to a purse bid, Wilder would receive 60 percent of the money and 40 percent would go to Fury.
Wilder and Fury fought to a draw in an entertaining battle on Dec. 1 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles in a classic heavyweight title fight that generated around 325,000 buys for Showtime PPV in the United States. Fury outboxed Wilder for long stretches but Wilder also scored two knockdowns, one in the ninth round and a thunderous one in the 12th round, after which Fury shockingly beat the count and was able to continue.
In the end, the judges scored it 115-111 for Wilder, 114-112 for Fury and 113-113, a split draw that allowed Wilder to retain his belt for the eighth time.
After the fight Wilder (40-0-1, 39 KOs), 33, of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Fury (27-0-1, 19 KOs), 30, of England, both forcefully said they wanted an immediate rematch, and a week after the fight, the WBC said it would approve a second fight. Two weeks ago, the WBC formally ordered the rematch and set the parameters for the purse split in the event there was a purse bid.
If the fight is finalized, it is likely to take place in late April or May in New York or Las Vegas, Finkel said.