Today or then? Or both? Your line of inquiry here is basically getting at the major problem with this kind of scenario. The more 2021 context you import into the 80s to make sure that Wilder is still the Wilder we know, the less Wilder is authentically competing in the 80s. If Wilder is essentially vacationing in the 80s with a Tardis to transport in his family, coaches, and internet connection from 2021 whenever they're needed, he's not really abiding by the spirit of the thread. If he's born in the 1960s with no trace of his current backstory, he's no longer really Wilder anymore.
Holmes was past his best, out of shape, inactive Spinks was a light heavy, chinny and terrified Bruno was slow, gassy, chinny and terrified Tucker broke his hand early having won 2/3 of the opening rounds and still went the distance I don't subscribe to the view that this cast of characters from 35 years ago were better than Wilder's best wins. And at least prime Wilder lost to the No.1 ranked officially 6'9, 270 lbs lineal HW champion, rather than a 42/1 journeyman/fringe contender who'd been KO'd multiple times by pathetic opposition. As soon as Tyson faced opponents who weren't afraid of him, he started going the distance frequently or getting KO'd.
Ortiz is a level above Whyte and Parker. He has a better win (6th ranked Jennings TKO7) and no embarrassing losses or controversial decisions, rather than a collective half dozen or more. His other wins against the likes of Scott, Thompson, Allen, Cojanu and Hammer, while not amazing by any means, compared well with the performances of rival contenders. Scott was outboxing Chisora before the British stoppage at the end of the 6th wheres Ortiz schooled and battered Scott, Thompson went the 12 round distance with and had success against Pulev in Germany and Takam in France before Ortiz smashed him to bits in 6, Whyte went the distance with Allen before Ortiz stopped him in 7 in Britain, Parker went 12 with and lost several rounds to Cojanu in NZ (I mean come on) before Ortiz obliterated him in 2 rounds and an officially 40 year old Ortiz pitched a shutout against Hammer, emulating a several years younger Povetkin in Russia before and a vastly younger Yoka in France after. He was also a longtime member of the Cuban national team and a high level amateur, neither Parker or Whyte were nearly as good. Claiming though that Parker was a better opponent than Ortiz really displays a lack of ability to understand what a credible opponent is. Parker has KO'd exactly 0 of his top 8 opponents and knocked only one of them down: an exhausted Whyte in the 12th. AJ fought Parker in Britain and was given 10 rounds on two cards and 11 on the other, in a fight where the play was constantly being broken up by the referee to give AJ periodic breaks. AJ was even allowed to call his own time out! So a point fighter like Parker had practically no chance in a fight like that, given his undeniable lack of power and aggression. Say what you want about Ortiz, he's a big puncher, skilled, aggressive and a southpaw (a breed of HW that virtually didn't exist until recently and still exist in small numbers, making them extremely hard to prepare for) so he's inherently a much more dangerous opponent than Parker, unless maybe you travel to NZ, which AJ wasn't about to do. It's questionable whether Parker is even as dangerous as Gerald Washington or Johann Duhaupas were (let alone Stiverne) seeing as they have KO'd a higher calibre of opponent.
No, that's not true. Calling Ortiz a better win than Walcott is quite ridiculous to be honest. We don't give additional points for "the draw" here though.
Thank you. It is very satisfying to hear this in light of someone recently saying I am “not worth listening to on Heavyweight boxing”.
The same does apply. I agree that both Wilder and the 80s guys should be dismissed together as never being anything more than regular contenders. However, By comparison the 1980s “strap exchange” took place higher up in the division than Wilders dubious “reign”. So this whole debate is really about arguing between one, albeit consistent, non champion reigning in a lower part of the division against a pass the parcel of non champions much higher up in the division. much like the difficulty in deciding if a long serving Euro champ from an earlier time should ever be regarded over a Micky mouse “world” champion from a split title era.
You've completely misrepresented my words as you've obviously not understood them. I said "He looked like a beached whale during his break and little wonder his timing was off in their first fight." I said absolutely nothing about Fury being too fat in the first fight as you claim in your post. Fury apparently weighed 375 pounds in the period i am actually talking about. Even in the second and third fight he was 100 pounds short of that so there's no need for me to address this any further. I'm not quite sure how you interpreted things the way you did as i was extremely clear in my wording GCC. Regarding the part about the knockdowns yes Wilder did drop him in the last fight. Do you think Fury looked near as good as he did in the second fight? I thought he looked somewhat complacent and overconfident once he hit his stride. There was a lot of speculation before the fight that Fury would not be in the same condition. Fury's been dropped hard before. Wilder's dropped him twice in two fights and failed to win either. Wilder can punch, we all know that but it's not a good look having that many chances and not taking any of them.
Good response. I do understand why Wilder garners a fair bit of kudos for the knockdowns (Wilder has power. We know that.), as well as his persistence (There is no quit in him. He just keeps going until he cannot go any further). But there comes a stage, when one has to question Wilder's effectiveness and the truth is he just wasn't really making any kind of sustained impression in any of the contests - for all his KDs and staying on his feet, his control of these fights was next to negligible. Fury, to my mind, was operating at 70% (perhaps even less) for the first fight; 90+% for the second and, while I think he was physically fit for the third contest, he was nowhere near as defensively minded or sharp in his work, as he had been in the first rematch. If we're going to speculate on how Wilder would do in another era then his effectiveness matters.
I call it ridiculous to suggest Ortiz couldn't beat pint sized Walcott and that a draw with Fury doesn't matter.
For neurological conditions, especially congenital ones, there's not much that can be done. His daughter has spina bifida. I'm not sure what was done on her, but surgeries like tube shunts were around in the 80s and still are used in some of those kids. Anyway, fat, coked-out Wilder is as invented as mentally stable Golota.
Holmes was past his best, and he had been inactive. That's true. It certainly wasn't the Holmes of the Norton fight. But at the same time, he was still an elite level HW. Mike was the only guy who ever knocked out Holmes, in a career that spanned 20 years with 75 bouts. We also have to note that 5 years later when Holmes was in his 40's, he was still an elite level fighter, who was able to beat guys like Ray Mercer. Ray Mercer was a top 10 HW who beat Morrison and who had an extremely close fight with Lennox, with many people believing that he actually beat Lennox. That means that despite what you've mentioned, it was still a very impressive win. Wilder doesn't have a win as good as that. Michael Spinks wasn't at LHW. He was a former LHW, who proved in his close and controversial fights with a younger version of Holmes, that he was an elite level HW. Nobody was saying that Holmes was shot in 1985. Bruno wasn't great, but he was decent. Tucker was a very capable fighter. Yes, Mike's wins over those guys were better than Wilder's best wins. What are Wilder's best wins? Ortiz x 2 Stiverne? Then who? Like I said yesterday, it's okay rubbishing Mike's opponents, but if you do that, you're also diminishing Wilder's thin resume. If you don't rate a win over an old Holmes, you can't rate a win over an old Ortiz. If you don't rate wins over Tucker and Spinks, then you can't rate wins over Stiverne and Molina etc. Mike has better wins than what Wilder does. Regarding Douglas, he wasn't a journeyman. He was actually a very capable fighter who was terribly inconsistent. He was similar to James Toney and Riddick Bowe. Sometimes he was hot, sometimes he wasn't. He was a prime example of the 80's HW's that we're discussing. Yes, he did have some bad losses. But he was also good enough to beat Greg Page, Oliver McCall and Trevor Berbick. As we know, he shocked the world against Mike. But Mike just went through the motions, where he hardly trained for the fight and was gassed after 5 rounds. Douglas for Mike was like what Dave Tiberi was for James Toney.
