Joyce beats Ruiz and Wilder handily. Might even beat Joshua without too much trouble, but that's a more genuine fifty fifty. Seriously, why Ruiz of all people to trouble him? We all just saw what Joyce did to Parker, who beat, or at worst drew, with Ruiz. Joyce would ******* annihilate him. I picked him to annihilate Ortiz as well, back when that fight was still on the cards. Shame it never went ahead.
Wilder's a very easy win for Joyce. We'll see that after the Helenius fight. Wilder's very beatable for a lot of guys worse than Joyce. He just never fought them moving up.
i dont think he would be hard to beat with the right prep and gameplan. this is what i said about last fight. parker proved the overhand right was a gimme. he just failed to roll out after throwing it. stayed in front of joyce to get hit. but he was landing it at will. you have to train to go 12 at a high pace, and train not to get hit. he will give you the openings, just dont give him the range and stationary target he needs to pummel you. easier said than done, but should be perfectly doable for a world level boxer.
Sometimes to help me sleep I think of Joe Joyce out there fighting for justice. It's psychologically draining to get punched at all (and I'm sure with Joyce's huge paws nothing lands that soft) and probably trains you not to fully respond because that's wasting energy on your side. That said, I think there is a mental energy cost in flipping the switch from throwing a light punch to really putting power into one. I'm not that good at reading what fighters will throw but you can see Joyce at times think to himself "OK time for the big one." But hey, one thing to see it coming and another to take it. There are precious few HWs who are really trained for 12 rounds. I don't know if it's just too hard past 240lbs or if they could but say "**** it, we'll win in 8 or not at all" and go have a beer.
Twice now, once vs Takam and the other vs Parker, I've noticed Joyce start a round and immediately throw a four or five punch combo completely at odds with what had gone before at the start of a round. Right at the beginning of round 6 vs Takam - and I swear that combo was fast. He's a thinking fighter with a ring IQ higher than he's given credit for...
He's crafty. The way he set up the hook vs Parker was he would go into the load position for the shot and throw a jab. He primed Parker by doing that repeatedly and he hit him on the temple when he dropped his head/tucked chin/presented forehead expecting a jab. Was very intelligent boxing by Joyce.
I just want to see the chin VS the Bomb. Joyce has that iron curtain chin and Wilder has that deadly power
Joyce is a breath of fresh air because I genuinely don't know how his fights with the Big 4 would go down. It's all very well saying Fury and Usyk would dance rings around him but Joyce will just keep coming, I'm not sure he can be deterred and he can bang... I'm confident Joyce would cream AJ but the other bouts are all up in the air. It's nice to have a contender where their ceiling isn't immediately obvious.