Do you think Ray Mercer is an underachiever?

Yes.

Less capable men achieved more in that decade.

 

I do .. he seemed to lack the dedication to conditioning and improving to match his skills .. the man was a physical brute, an incredible chin, very solid power and pretty decent skills ..

 

No doubt. He fought up or down to the level of his opposition.

 

Oh yeah. He probably shouldn't have lost to Larry Holmes. He definitely shouldn't have lost to Jesse Ferguson, especially when a big money title shot was on the line. When he finally got his act together and did well vs. Holyfield, he waited a year before fighting again against Lennox Lewis. Against Lewis he did even better. So he waits six months to fight again, against Tim Witherspoon. He gets the decision there, and instead of capitalizing on his win he doesn't fight again for another year plus. What happened? He couldn't get time off from a day job?

 

Not really. He accomplished quite a bit considering how late he started. Boxing apparently came easily to him, which allowed him to be successful but probably stifled him in that he didn't learn a lot and, since it was easy, it got easy to be lazy.

 

Yes he is an underachiever

 

My thoughts exactly. If you were 29-30 years old back in the early 90s with only 15-18 fights, people weren’t expecting you to go too far. I do however agree to some extent that he might have gone a step further if he had been more dedicated but I don’t consider him an underachiever at all.

 

Since his performances & conditioning varied fairly dramatically when at his peak, sure he was an underachiever.
It was just that such was his talent that he was still a top contender.
But his dedication deficit made him lose when he could have won.
Holmes maybe, but he was outsmarted.
Lewis maybe- his less conditioning contributed to losing the crucial final rounds.
When he was trying to throw the fight against "The boogeyman" because he did npot have it that night...
Again if he was sharper & in better conbdition he likely would have prevailed.

 

I don't think so.

Mercer had a particular style and physique and he was always going to struggle against certain types. Frankly he did well to run Lewis close and he did very well to overcome the beatdown Damiani was putting on his ass and KO him. He beat Morrison who, if Tommy had used his sense a bit more, could probably have outboxed him too. Mercer is a Marciano type who was small for the HW division and yet managed to grit and tough his way into victories that on paper he probably shouldn't have won. Huge heart.

 

He did that in spite of his size. I think that you are downplaying what Ray achieved there.

 

Yes he is an underachiever. He was often a better boxer than he showed. But we did see his best.

Mercer had a fine jab, he just did not use it often enough. He was also out of shape too often.

 

I watched Mercer v Lewis again recently, and enjoyed it. Also heard a recent podcast host saying he met Mercer, and he was a really sound guy. Things like this affect my bias. I love a good story. So, I say yes, he is underrated. I think I had him number 51 on my most recent HW list. He might crack my 50 soon.

 

Yes and No actually. He started boxing late and won Olympic without much of an amatuer background and he did it in the toughest of era's. Then again, as folks have pointed out, his pro career was marked by a lot of inconsistency and seemingly bouts were the effort and preparation wasn't there.