AJ’s résumé has aged like an egg sandwich

"Anyone with half a braincell"

That rules you out then.

I could have mentioned Whyte struggling with Wach and performing poorly against Helenius, Parker struggling badly with Hughie and Fa and Takam struggling with Forrest but I thought it better to keep this post short and sweet. I didn't mention Wilder's KO1 over Scott aging well because Scott came to take a dive, like Martin and Molina. AJ had multiple opponents on the verge of retirement too, so there's less to talk about.

 

Johnson wasn't coming to win against Vitali or Fury either so the fact that AJ destroyed him in 2 while "punchers" Hrgovic and Dubois couldn't do anything with him 3.5 years later makes it an impressive win for AJ, albeit partly at the expense of Pulev and Ruiz, who couldn't wobble him either.

Povetkin wasn't on his best form when AJ beat him and hadn't been for almost 3 years but he did go on to beat Hughie much more clearly than Parker, who barely won if at all, he then had a very close fight with Hunter at 40 (although Hunter has been overrated) and then sparked Whyte in Britain at 41. So AJ's KO7 over a 39 year old Povetkin has aged well, albeit at the expense of Parker and Whyte.

Wlad in Britain is the best win by far but as you say it was a life and death war and Wlad was 41+, 17 months inactive, coming off a schooling at home etc.

 

No, triangle theory is saying "fighter A beat fighter B and fighter B beat fighter C, so fighter A must beat fighter C". Everyone knows that it not the case.

I mainly judge fighters on their performances. If Whyte goes life and death with Parker and Chisora, Parker goes life and death with Hughie and Ruiz, Chisora goes life and death with Kabayel and Parker and Chisora go life and death with Takam, there probably isn't much between them all in terms of levels. Any variation of bouts between these fighters is going to be highly competitive. The only fighter of this 7 man group with a higher level win is Ruiz.

Take a prime Pulev or Povetkin and these fights aren't so competitive, they would win most of them if not all. Hence Pulev schooled Chisora in Britain and Hughie in Bulgaria and Povetkin sparked Takam in Russia, beat Hughie in Britain while 3 years past prime and sparked Whyte in Britain while shot.

 

Floyd's record is a different kettle of fish. My point isn't that AJ's wins are bad per se, just that they've aged poorly. The likes of Whyte and Parker were considered to be far better than "domestic level journeyman Chisora" in the immediate aftermath of AJ's victories over them.

 

The only reason that you don't regard Ruiz as a PBC bum (and PBC themselves didn't rate him that highly) was that he dropped AJ four times and made him quit. Aside from destroy AJ, he's had a close fight with Chisora-level Parker and struggled with washed up versions of Liakhovich, Kevin and Arreola. Losing to Ruiz in the manner that he did was a horrible exposure of AJ's punch resistance, his stamina, his confidence and his courage. All of AJ's fights since have been safety-first performances against light punchers. Ruiz partied and didn't train for the rematch, came in 35 lbs heavier than he was against a mid-late 40's Ray Austin 3.5 years prior and AJ spent the 12 rounds running from that stubby, near-stationary blob. AJ deserves some credit for taking and winning the immediate rematch but it was not an impressive performance, represented a sea-change in his mentality and would have done little to vanquish his demons.

Neither Wilder or AJ had demonstrated much willingness to travel. Wilder had fought in territories/states surrounding America and traveled once to Britain to starch British hypejob Audley. AJ had never traveled as a pro, much less to enemy territory, and lost badly as soon as he did.

There's a reason why AJ fought Martin, 41+, 17 months inactive Wlad and Parker for belts instead of Wilder: all of these were perceived as relatively soft touches (Wlad less so but it was an important fight to legitimise AJ). They wanted to fight AJ for the extra money and status on offer, why fight Wilder for equal or more risk but less reward? Also, this served to narrow the experience deficit between AJ and Wilder while aging the 4 years older Wilder out, hopefully taking the edge of his speed and explosiveness. There was the example of Mayweather-Pacquiao, where a "super-fight" could be left to marinate for several years so that greater rewards could be derived long-term. And ideally, Wilder would slip up, hopefully against AJ's bodyguard Whyte, which would allow Hearn to make undisputed and win either way. Why fight dangerous punchers like Ortiz or Wilder when you can fight the Takam's, Parker's and Pulev's of the world; light punchers and massive underdogs, while still selling out Wembley? Getting the other belts was thought to strengthen their hand at the negotiating table and help them in the PR battle ("Wilder hasn't fought Charles Martin or Joseph Parker in unifications because he's scared of them"). Ignore the fact that Molina and Breazeale were mutual defences with Wilder and two of Wilder's absolute weakest.

If Hearn/AJ really wanted the fight they would have offered 50-50, as Wlad did to Haye. They would have taken out the Matchroom standard one way rematch clause (as per AJ-Ruiz, Whyte-Povetkin and AJ-Usyk) as well. But this was not going to be on the table until Wilder had beaten Fury or Fury had beaten Wilder, either way it would remove a dangerous rival from the equation.

An in-shape Ruiz struggled to beat a 21 months inactive and 5 years older Arreola than the one that Wilder's critics universally derided as "shot" when Wilder schooled him with his left hand and stopped him in 8. By my estimation, 35 year old Arreola was Wilder's 7th best defence. This suggests that the likes of Washington, Szpilka and Duhuapas, all of which are stylistically more difficult for Ruiz than Arreola, would have had a good chance of beating him. Stiverne and Ortiz would have probably schooled/smashed Ruiz and would have had a good shot on AJ too.

 

It wasn't just Wilder holding out for 50%: Fury and Whyte were too. The risk of Hearn/AJ not offering 50-50 for an undisputed megafight was that they would get beaten and lose all of the belts to a massive underdog, which is exactly what happened. AJ got the belts back but within two fights, he'd lost them all again. Getting battered can damage you physically and also mentally, which is what has clearly happened to AJ. In retrospect AJ should have offered 50-50 to Wilder for a two fight deal, one in Britain and one in America. The risk of not doing so turned out to be the most humiliating defeat ever within two fights and they missed out on a good crack at the ultimate reward. But they feared Wilder was too dangerous at the time; better to wait for him to get older and for AJ to gain experience before risking everything. Wilder also could not be lowballed and treated like he was Martin or Parker: he was a longer-reigning champ than AJ, had more defences than AJ and wasn't gifted his title due to the man who won them being stripped.

You need to look up the facts: Wilder has fought in 4 nations as a pro, AJ in 3. AJ has been the A-side in every fight going back to the amateurs and before (gifted wins over the Cuban and Italian in London) Wilder at least had minimal A-side advantage against Fury in the trilogy fight, if any. Both AJ and Wilder were reluctant to travel and AJ showed on the first and only time he travelled to enemy territory that he couldn't handle the pressure.

Whether AJ's opposition was good or not it has proven, for the most part, of being Chisora-level or below. This was not the narrative at the time: Chisora was regarded as a "domestic level journeyman" when Fury schooled and battered him. Whyte, Takam and Parker were all big favourites, not expected to win by A-side SD or get KO'd. The pro-AJ narrative is so absurd at this point that Stiverne schooling and destroying prime Arreola x2 was not impressive, Wilder schooling and stopping Arreola with his left hand was only proof that Arreola was "shot" but 5 years + 3 fights later and after 21 months of inactivity coming off a punishing loss, a fit Ruiz has a war over 12 rounds with the best Arreola ever!