Few sights in combat sports scream “freak-show spectacle” like an Eddie Hall fight. Luckily for fans, the former World’s Strongest Man still has a handful left in the tank, starting with his June boxing match against Tommy Fury.
Hall is set to return to action under the Misfits Boxing banner June 13 in Manchester, England, competing for the first time since his MMA win over Mariusz Pudzianowski in KSW last April. Hall, 38, hasn’t boxed since 2022, when he lost a unanimous decision against “The Mountain,” Hafþór Björnsson.
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Hall appeared on Tuesday’s edition of “The Ariel Helwani Show” to share more details of the upcoming openweight match. Rounds and time are still to be decided, said Hall, but he expects the match to consist of six two-minute rounds, with each man wearing 12-ounce gloves. As for the weight difference between him and Fury, Hall can’t see his opponent adding much mass in the coming months.
“I’m just under 350 pounds. If I come in at like 335, that will probably be my lowest. Probably 340,” Hall told Uncrowned.
“Honestly, if [Fury] comes in at 210, I’d be surprised. I think 205, 210 max.”
The origin of the match is almost as wacky as the pairing itself. Hall recalled running into Fury’s father — John Fury — at a Premier League game. A match with the youngest Fury wasn’t on Hall’s radar; instead, he wanted the big, bad brother, former heavyweight champion Tyson Fury — but not for a boxing match.
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Hall admitted he was wise to how that encounter would go. So he proposed an MMA fight against the former WBC world champ Fury, before things turned sour.
“It was Tommy’s dad, to be frank. Me and Tommy’s dad had a few words, and I basically said, ‘Look, I’ll f***ing slap any of you f***ers all over the place.’ Then I had a contract to fight Tommy,” Hall said. “So I guess he’s put his youngest son as sacrifice to defend the Fury name as of now, and it might move up the ranks after that. We’ll see.”
Although Hall knows his place in combat sports as a “Goliath” type of figure in most of his matchups, he wants to test himself to the best of his abilities while he still can. That would entail a fight with an elite opponent.
Ideally, Hall wants to try and become an MMA champion — even if that means attempting to get through someone of former UFC heavyweight king Francis Ngannou’s caliber.
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“There’s people like Francis Ngannou, who are just the biggest, scariest bastards on the planet. Just a big, big fight like that,” Hall said.
“I’d train my bollocks off for it, and that would be the last one for me. Win, draw or lose. I just want to go up against the biggest, baddest person I can get up against, and see if I can grab a title, because imagine winning World’s Strongest Man, then coming into the fight world and grabbing a European title or a world title off Francis or something? It would just be insane.”
Like Michael Chandler famously once said, Hall isn’t here for a long time, but a good time.
The strongman’s time in combat sports is limited, so he intends to make the best of it.
“I feel like I’ve got two years left in me. I feel like by the time I’m 40, I’m looking toward being done,” Hall said. “So, probably 18 months left in me.”
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