Realistic evaluation of Wilder

The guy gets a ton of hate, and to some extent I can see it, he's taken fairly weak title defenses after taking an unusually long time feasting off lower level opposition while working his way up. That's a recipe for criticism. But it seems a lot of people are arguing he's not even a top 10 hw? Does anyone really believe that? By any objective standard, he's got to be evaluated in the top 10 (and realistically top 5). Let's break it down.

First, let's not even evaluate Fury, Wlad, Povetkin, Ortiz, Joshua, or Parker. They are all opponents that, at least facially logical arguments can be made are better than him. After that, though, the pickings get slim as far as making a credible case they deserve to be ranked higher. Let's evaluate the best three wins, in order, of Wilder and others seen as rivals to be considered better than Wilder right now, and other information relevant to those wins.

Wilder: Best 3 wins: 1. Stiverne (easy win, whose best wins were Arreola and Austin) 2. Scott (easy win, whose best wins were Thompson and Leapai, and got a draw against Glaskov) 3 Spilzka, close win, whose best wins were against shot Adamek and McCline)

Jennings: Best 3 wins: 1 Perez (close win, resume reviewed below) 2 Spilzka (also beaten by Wilder in his 3rd best win) 3 White Wolf (also beaten by Wilder, not one of Wilder's top three wins)

Pulev: Best 3: 1. Thompson (also beaten by Scott, Wilder's #2 win, fairly close win, Thompson won early rounds and gassed out) 2. Dimitrenko (fairly close win, Dimitrenko outboxed him early on, but kept flopping to the ground and seemed to lose his heart, Dimitrenko's best win was shot Krasniqi or fringe top 30 Sosnowski) 3. Ustinov (easy win, Ustinovs best win was shot Tua). So, Pulev's best win was beat by Wilder's 2nd best win, and Pulev's 2nd and 3rd best wins resume was composed of shot former contenders, just like Wilder's 3rd best win.

Takam: best 3 performances (since win's would be too big an imbalance) 1. Win over Thompson (also beat by Wilder's #2 victim Scott) 2. Draw with Perez (see Perez below) 3. win over shot Michael Grant (also beaten by Charr, who was beaten by Duhaupas, victim of Wilder who doesn't make the Wilder's top 3 list)

Perez: (he doesn't deserve here at all but still has a big following so I'll humor people) best 3 "performances" (since looking at win's would be too big an imbalance). 1. Abdu (close win, and Adbu's only win was against shot McCline, who Spilzka also beat, and a vastly better version of whom Arreola, a victim of Stiverne, beat more easily) 2. Draw against Takam (see entry on Takam) 3. Close loss to Jennings (see entry on Jennings). And this is a guy people are saying should be rated above Wilder? You never know what happens in boxing, but his resume is a joke next to Wilder.

Others? Teper? His best win was a close victory over Duhaupas, who Wilder won every round over and is maybe the 4th best opponent Wilder had. Martin? His only win was a farce against Glaskov, who was arguably beaten and at best got a draw against Scott, whom Wilder destroyed. Chagaev? Much better resume overall than Wilder, but he's 37 and the last indisputably top 20 fighter he beat was Valuev back in April of 2007. Pianeta is by far the best HW he's beaten in the last 5 years and Pianeta is simply not on the level of Wilder's top 3 wins that all came in the last 2 years.

The point is, Wilder may have gone about getting his resume in a more annoying way than others, but the facts remain that Wilder is indisputably top 10 if you have any intellectual honestly at all. He may very well be destroyed by Povetkin, and be a level below the rest of the top 5, but he's going to be around for a while, like it or not, unless his confidence gets blown by a loss. Personally, I rank him #4 right now in the division, below Fury, Wlad, and Povetkin.

I'm making a poll. If you don't think Wilder is top 10, please post a list the fighters you have above him. Realistically, you can have faith that those fighters would beat him, but on resume they are currently not on his level, I've looked at all of them out there.

 

Anybody else? Would like to see some more poll results. I'm assuming the one who voted outside of the top 20 is just a troll. If you vote outside of the top 10 or 20, please list the fighters you would rank above him.

 

:good100% agree. Povetkin deserves a slightly higher ranking and deserves to be favored in their match, but I'm gonna go with Wilder to win.