Yes, Tim Tszyu is past his best, but he can win a world title at 160

SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA - JULY 26: Errol Spence Jr of The United States and Tim Tszyu of Australia compete during the Middleweight bout between Errol Spence Jr and Tim Tszyuat Afterpay Arena on July 26, 2026 in Sydney, Australia. (Photo by Brendon Thorne/Getty Images) | Getty Images

Tim Tszyu is obviously coming off of a big win last night over Errol Spence Jr , and he says he’ll be staying at 160 lbs going forward, rather than trying to return to 154.

Tszyu (28-3, 18 KO) has been dabbling with this idea for a year now, after his second loss to Sebastian Fundora. He wasn’t doing full 160 fights, but he has weighed in at 156¼, 157¼, and now 159 for his last three, albeit the Spence fight was the only one with a full, 160 lb contract weight, and that was negotiated late by request from Spence, as the original agreement was 158.

Tszyu’s 31, has won three straight, is a former titleholder at 154, and middleweight is still fairly weak. For titlists at the moment we have Carlos Adames (WBC), Erislandy Lara (WBA), and Denzel Bentley (WBO). The IBF title will finally be decided between Aaron McKenna and Etinosa Oliha on August 8.

I don’t think anyone should take the Spence fight as evidence that Tszyu is still in his peak days. He’s not. If anything, it was evidence that he’s definitely past his best. This wasn’t the Anthony Velazquez or Denis Nurja fights, where you got the sense that Tszyu was trying to work some adjustments out in-ring, and he won those fights 20-0 in combined rounds anyway.

He had a vulnerable, washed, undersized, and rusty opponent in front of him last night, but it was also a legitimate star with some name value, some amount of commercial “rub” to give to Tszyu. If he was going to really take it to somebody, that was the time. But I got the sense watching him that he was either having trouble pulling the trigger at various points, or part of his stylistic tweaks in the last eight, nine months have seen him get away from his old, more aggressive approach.

There’s sense in that. Tszyu’s at a point in his career where fighting like a mad dog will quite likely get him knocked out by good opponents. But when fighters have to make changes as they age, you have various outcomes. Great fighters can usually make it work. But guys who were pretty good, and leaned on a particular attribute or the like, have a tendency to lose the one thing that they were great at, that set them apart and hid some of their flaws.

I think Tszyu is at that point. He can win 10 rounds over a Velazquez or Nurja, he can beat a washed-up Spence, but everything from here is going to require some fairly careful selection.

The good news is that 160 is very vulnerable, even among the titleholders, and Tszyu has a window where he might be able to become a two-division champion.

Who should Tszyu avoid, and who should he target?

Carlos Adames (25-1-1, 18 KO) is the fight to avoid. He’s not flawless and I wouldn’t really call him a great fighter, as compared to those I would call great, but he is very good and I think presents the absolute worst matchup for Tszyu, or at least the one Tszyu is least likely to win, and by a lot.

But what about Erislandy Lara ? The 43-year-old Cuban southpaw can still be tricky, or at least we think. Realistically, Lara’s run as the WBA’s middleweight champion has been one of the most incredible grifts you’ll ever see, to the point you can only respect that Lara has held this belt for five years now without once facing a legitimate, serious contender.

Look at this list of opponents: Thomas “Cornflake” LaManna, Gary “Spike” O’Sullivan, Michael Zerafa, an overweight and badly faded Danny Garcia, and Johan Gonzalez — not one person who belonged in a serious top 10 at the time of the fight.

(I know BoxRec has long ranked Zerafa highly, and me and that computer do not agree.)

Lara could be bad news for Tszyu, because the Cuban is such a skilled boxer. He’s not as slick or good as he used to be, but today’s Tszyu doesn’t seem to have the aggression that might have better taken advantage of Lara’s decline, either.

But could Tszyu beat an aged Lara? Yeah. Tszyu’s a lot better, even in 2026, than anyone Lara has fought since Brian Castano in 2019.

(Lara’s last two fights at 154 in 2019-20 were against Ramon “One of Canelo’s Brothers” Alvarez and Greg Vendetti. The Lara Grift Years deserve their own Hall of Fame exhibit someday. That man has made a pretty good amount of money with relatively minuscule risk for six years and counting.)

Denzel Bentley (22-3-1, 18 KO) is the best bet of the current titlists. Recently elevated from interim status after Janibek Alimkhanuly decided to vacate — after the WBO played cowardly and refused to strip him, as the IBF did, for failing a drug test — Bentley is 31 and on a decent run of form for sure, and he’s a good fighter who could beat Tszyu.

But Tszyu can beat Bentley, too. No disrespect to the man, but Nathan Heaney beat Bentley. The 2026 version of Tszyu is better than the 2023 version of Heaney, even on that one great night.

As for the IBF situation, Aaron McKenna and Etinosa Oliha have to settle the vacancy first in a couple of weeks, and the we could assess from there. McKenna (20-0, 10 KO) looks a good fighter, but I can’t ignore that he’s 27 and has felt stalled in his progress for years. Italy’s Oliha (22-0, 10 KO) is 28, has been very good at sort of the European level, but even then he hasn’t really faced Europe’s top middleweights.

We’ll know more about both of them soon, but that could be another opening for Tszyu to take a reasonable, winnable crack.

As much as Tszyu has seen better days, so has the middleweight division. I don’t think Tim has a long reign at 160 in him, unless he can pull a Lara, but could he win a belt? Yeah, I think he can. You can look at this one division or look up and down all of the weight classes in boxing — true greatness is not actually a requirement to win a world title, and it never has been.

Indexed and credited by AIPROPX. Originating outlet: Yahoo Sports. Open at source →