Michael Grant vs. Oliver McCall

Good post. Both of these guys were too iffy to make a solid pick one way or the other. I do however feel that Grant gets underrated as a contender. His career might have fallen short in some aspects but he was a winning machine in the late 90's.

 

Grant dec with some shaky moments.

 

McCall by decision over the underachiever Grant, who barely hangs on for a decision...getting decked a couple of times in the last couple of rounds.

 

Depends on McCall's state of mind as he had mental issues. Grant was a soft big man with a shaky chin. Maybe he was the better boxer here.

On their better nights, I'd pick McCall via TKO;

 

McCall by late KO, in a better than expected fight.

McCall had far better chin, hit harder, and as slow as he was - he wasn't slower than Grant.

McCall can eat Grant's best punches, unlike Grant.

However, Michael was tough enough to get up and last few rounds even when his chin failed.

 

Before Grant had his confidence shattered, I think he proved he could deal with a guy like McCall. He beat Savarese, Izon, and Sullivan who shared some similarities. The one guy who really fought a lot like McCall was Purrity though. Going on boxrec, Grant beat him when he was hot; Purrity was in the middle of 15-2-1 streak with wins over Hipp and Gonzalez, and a draw with Morrison. The other loss was to Rahman.

 

Good post! Prior to the Lewis fight Grant was a different fighter. After the Lewis fight he was never the same guy again. I remember him being heavily hyped as the next big thing back then by HBO among others. I'm going to go against the consensus here a put a vote in for the much larger and very athletic Grant. I've seen McCall look sloppy vs guys like a past prime Tony Tucker, I've seen him outboxed early by Bruce Seldon (before rallying for the tko) i think Michael can get this W.