I personally rate him. Pretty good fighter with skills and power. Performed well against Ruiz despite his age. Maybe he wasn’t the boogieman but the eye test tells you this guy can box. I wish he had fought more top guys a few years ago.
His best years were largely wasted by the late age he turned pro (almost 31, due to having to emigrate from Cuba via raft) poor promotion and fighters avoiding him. Until he fought Jennings, arguably there were no step-ups in 5 years and 21 fights after stopping the tough journeyman Zack Page at 3-0. Even AJ-conqueror Ruiz, who is no *****, tried to break his contract to fight a 43 year old Ortiz with 2 KO defeats so he could fight a washed up kickboxer called Spong in Mexico instead. If you compare his performances against mutual opponents to his rivals before he was 40 (and even at 43 in the case of the Ruiz fight) Ortiz was clearly a highly skilled, tenacious and powerful southpaw, maybe the 2nd best active heavyweight in the world at one point, and even that was likely a theoretically post-prime Ortiz. There's nowhere for him to go at this point. He's well past his best, has taken a lot of punishment and won't be able to get any more really big paydays. He should retire rather than slumping down to gatekeeper level.
Always been an excellent fighter, but got his opportunities too late. If he would’ve got a titleshot around 2015-2016 he likely would’ve got his hands on a title. He also made a very bad career decision when he stepped aside and let Joshua fight Wlad instead of enforcing his mandatory status. Joshua and Hearn were never going to honor their agreement once Ortiz stepped aside. I’m glad Usyk didn’t make the same mistake Ortiz did and forced Joshua to fight or drop his title.
Luis Ortiz as an amateur Ortiz was an active member of the Cuban national team from 1998 (at the latest) to 2008 with a record of 343-19. His best recorded amateur wins were over future cruiserweight contender and World Junior Championship LHW gold medallist southpaw Mike Perez (beat Dorticos, Y. Martinez, Egan, Bejenaru, Krause) Olympic HW silver medallist and World Amateur Championship HW and SHW bronze medallist southpaw Viktor Zuyev (beat Kapitonenko x2, Kossobutskiy, Veryasov, Sergeev, Pavlidis, Hrgovic) Pan American Games SHW gold medallist and World Junior Championship HW bronze medallist Robert Alphonso x2 (beat E. Savon, M. Lopez x2, Rivas x3, Ruiz, Hunter, Fayzullin) and Olympic SHW bronze medallist and World Junior Championship HW gold medallist southpaw Michel Lopez (beat Rivas, Zhang, J. Estrada, Saidov, Solis x3, W. Klitschko). Ortiz also had a notably high scoring fight with star amateur southpaw Roman Romanchuk (beat Russo, Cammarelle, Romanov, Chakhkiev x2, Solis x2) losing 47-64. Ortiz’s best amateur accomplishments were winning the 2005 Pan American Games in Brazil and the 2006 Cuban National Championships, both at HW. Overlapping with Cuban amateur greats F. Savon and Solis in particular prevented Ortiz from winning more silverware (though it must have given him great experience and preserved his hunger for the pros) and his high power but low volume counter punching style was not best suited to the amateurs.
Ortiz’s best winning performances against mutual opponents relative to rivals Page: 3-0 Ortiz KO’d 53 fight veteran Page in 8 in America, who was in the midst of a 6 year, 44 fight streak where only Ortiz stopped him among a slew of contenders and former/future champions, including Pulev and Fury. Jennings: Ortiz outboxed and KO’d 19-1 Jennings in 7 in America, who was coming off a 9-3 loss to lineal champion and P4P No.2 Wlad. Ortiz stopped Jennings 5 rounds earlier than anyone else (Rivas) would in 28 fights and Jennings went on to give Joyce a highly competitive fight over the 12 round distance in Britain. Thompson: Ortiz shut out and KO’d Thompson in 6 in America. Thompson had gone 12 rounds with Pulev in Germany and 12 rounds with Takam in France in the previous 30 months, losing 9-3 both times and had only been stopped by Wlad in 46 fights prior to Ortiz. Scott: Ortiz shut out Scott over 12 and dropped him three times: the only time Scott was outpointed in 42 fights. Scott had previously given Chisora a highly competitive fight over 6 in Britain before the referee allowed him to quit. Allen: Ortiz shut out and KO’d 9-1-1 Allen in 7 in Britain. Allen had landed almost 4x as many punches on Whyte over the 10 round distance in his previous fight. Ortiz stopped Allen 3 rounds earlier than anyone else (Yoka, Price) has in 27 fights. Cojanu: 39 year old Ortiz KO’d Cojanu in 2 with one punch. Cojanu had gone the 12 round distance with titlist Parker in New Zealand in his previous fight.
Why was Ortiz so heavily avoided? He’s a skilled Cuban amateur, highly experienced, a southpaw, billed as 6’4, 240 lbs, had a lot of power in both hands, fast hands, co-ordination, timing, punch selection, combination punching, was aggressive, hungry, mentally tough, a top 5-6 Ring ranked HW from 2015, beat top 6 Ring ranked Jennings very impressively, beat domestic and European level fighters more comprehensively than rival contenders, hadn’t been dropped as a pro over 8 years and 30 pro fights, undefeated, old and allegedly even older (no one wants to lose to grandpa or gets as much credit for beating him up) failed PED tests, was relatively unknown, didn’t speak English, no charisma, countrymen only care about amateur boxing, didn’t have powerful backers, there’s relatively little money in an Ortiz fight, he didn’t have an exciting style, if you beat him other contenders would duck you, if you struggled with him your stock would likely go down and Ortiz would be discredited as a hypejob anyway due to not having enough “good names” on his record, minimising the credit you received.
2017 Anthony Joshua vs 2017 Luis Ortiz Joshua: 6’5.5, 82 inch reach, 250 lbs, 28 years old, boxing since age 18, 4 years as an amateur, controversially won the 2012 Olympics in Britain at SHW, 19-0 (19 inside the distance, 5 in the first round) 4 years as a pro, exclusively fought in Britain and mainly in London, lost 6 rounds, knocked down once as a pro, orthodox. Ortiz: 6’2, 78 inch reach, 240 lbs, 38.5 years old, boxing since age 10, at least 10 years on the Cuban national team (training with Cuban amateur greats F. Savon and Solis) won the 2005 Pan American Games in Brazil at HW, 27-0 with 2 NC's (27/29 inside the distance, 8 in the first round) 8 years as a pro, fought in 8 nations and never at home, lost 3 rounds, never knocked down as a pro, southpaw. AJ's performances against Cubans (E. Savon) southpaws (Nistor, Cammarelle, Usyk) and front foot counter punchers (Ruiz) haven’t been good.
Meh. His best wins are Thompson, Jennings, Hammer, Scott and Martin, and at least the Thompson win is tainted by PEDs controversy. He is well schooled, hard hitting, and southpaw, but his amateur career similarly lacks big victories. He has high blood pressure, and yes, is obviously older than he lets on. He had a couple of courageous losing efforts to Wilder. He is a guy worthy of respect, but nothing special. The five Wilder nut huggers on here try to big him up to something he is not, and someone even had a thread suggesting that he is the best southpaw heavy ever, which is just plain stupid. Bottom line: Useful guy who is more than a fringe contender, but hardly one of the best never to win it as suggested by some. Decent contender who had his shot, and fell short.
When Ruiz nailed him with that right hand. his face looked distorted One eye was looking up, the other seemed to be shut Poor guy looked bizarre I think his days as a top level fighter are over
