Ray Mercer vs Deontay Wilder

Sure, but he also fought Lewis and Holyfield. Levels of gap between competition.

 

Witherspoon is probably better than any Wilder win

I assume we are discussing a decent version of Mercer

 

Probably?????

 

Wasn't the decision controversial?

 

Witherspoon was 38 years old and the decision was highly controversial that most felt Witherspoon won.

Not to mention Witherspoon would go on to lose 5 out of his next 6 fights.

So whilst it appears an impressive win for Mercer based on name value. But when you add the context to the name its not as impressive.

 

He beat them?

 

Probably gets his ass handed to him by Ortiz.

 

And that was universally accepted as a robbery.

 

Had some more thoughts to add.

If we're going to give Mercer credit for fighting well against Lennox and Holyfield why exactly is Wilder knocking down Fury 4 times and getting a draw not valid?

Mercer was trailing in the Morrison and Damiani wins. Outside of these he is 4-6 against title contenders with 0 KOs and like 2 KDs. People can act like Wilder is "a fraud" who doesn't know to box but Wilder had one win he would have lost if he didn't get the knockout. But Wilders dominance is treated as evidence hes a "fraud" while Mercers lack of it is a badge of honor. Ray Mercer is only considered an official HW champ today because the 3 year old organization that gave him a belt won politically.

However you feel about Wilders cherry picked title opponents if you don't count Stiverne, Molina, Duhaupus, Szpilka, Arreola and Washington Wilder still had more fights against HW title contenders then Ray Mercer. He has more fights with HW contenders then Usyk who according to some has a "fabulous resume".

Almost beating Holyfield in a 10 rounder is not a rare feat that should be elevating Mercer. Holyfield dropped a ton of rounds at HW. We don't have important 10 rounders anymore so people forget this but its harder for the better fighter to avoid losses and especially close fights. And 10 round scores should be treated accordingly. The Lennox win was a good performance but its being weighed too heavily when its an outlier. Briggs almost knocked out Lennox and people don't rate him this high. McCall and Hashim Rahaman did knock him out and they don't get rated this high.

Somehow young Buster Douglas losing a close fight to undefeated Jesse Ferguson is embarassing. But when Ray Mercer has 2 close fights with Ferguson in Mercers prime thats totally fine. Double standards.

 

Cmon Briggs got destroyed after round 1. I agree that Mercer is overrated but it's his physical attributes are going to be a problem and I like to take into account styles make fights. Rahman has a weak chin, Wilder has a far better chance on knocking him out than knocking out Mercer, and when you take Wilders power away he's a terrible boxer, not even fringe contender level. Is

Is Wilder just going to take a beating from Mercer and then land a KO shot ? Realistically he won't outbox Mercer, he'll be down on the cards

I wouldn't pick Wilder over Samuel Peter either despite Wilder having a better legacy, why would i ? He ate Klitschkos shots for an entire fight, so he'll probably eat Wilders shots, but Wilder telegraphs them so bad Peter will dodge more power shots that you think, and he has his own KO power, he would walk Wilder down and likely knock him out.

 

Somewhat.

 

Almost beating Holyfield becomes an impressive game changer given Wilder's lack of accomplishments. If Wilder had an actual decent resume it wouldn't be an issue.

And Wilder doesn't get much in the way of kudos for Fury because so much of Fury's reputation is based on beating Wilder. Holyfield and Lewis have a lot more in terms of accomplishments outside beating Mercer. The struggles with Pavjic, Cunningham, Wallin, etc also don't help.

 

Briggs who Mercer quit against?

 

Mercer never almost beat Holyfield.

 

Cmon Mercer was like 10 years older and 44