In your heart of hearts you think he beats Holyfield? I'm a Wilder fan but I'm not seeing it. Moorer? Would love to see it. He'd definitely be a contender. I think he'd be able to compete for sure. So I take it back.
You mentioned Parker and Whyte as "top heavyweights" but omitted Fury lol. You're not a serious person. Just before Fury-Wilder 1 Fury was rated 7th by Ring, was close to even odds and was favoured on this forum to beat Wilder, in contrast to every Wilder opponent since Stiverne 1 at minimum. Fury was highly rated the first time and was rated No.1 the 2nd and 3rd times, so you need to get your facts straight. Wilder didn't have to rematch Fury after the draw and didn't have to rematch him after the first loss but he did, because he's got more heart in his pinky toe than yellow AJ has in his entire body. Wilder could have got more money at 30-70/40-60 with AJ but was holding out for 50-50, which Hearn/AJ were not offering because they were afraid and thought they could bide their time, age Wilder out. This backfired when AJ got beat down and quit against a 25-1 underdog late sub, short, morbidly obese Mexican fringe contender. Even coach Reynoso said that Wilder was "a dangerous fight for Ruiz" and that he needed a tune-up against Arreola first. Then Ruiz got dropped, hurt multiple times, had a war with a 40+ semi-retired Arreola and hasn't fought since. You missed the point totally. None of the fights you listed are relevant to Ruiz and Wilder: Arreola is, Liakhovich is, Alvaro Morales is. They are all mutual opponents and they all fought Ruiz AFTER they'd fought Wilder, so if anything Ruiz should have beaten them more convincingly.
Pretty much. Wilder was a manufactured champion who needed careful matchmaking, but he still had some tools that made matchmakers think he can be cashed as a champion. Tall, rangy, explosive, with power to kill. Add advantages like being the A-side and always fighting home, and you get an almost impossible obstacle to overcome for the has-beens and never-haves with somehow recognizable name he was matched against. Elite boxers or counterpunchers would likely dismantle and embarrass Wilder with lateral movement and ring craft. Inside fighters would murder him, but inside game is dead.
"Tall, rangy, explosive, with power to kill. Add advantages like being the A-side and always fighting home" That's a pathetically short list of advantages, at odds with the reality of the situation. Wilder's competition improved in quality slowly (important yardsticks being Morales in his 10th, K. Price in his 26th, Stiverne in his 33rd, Ortiz in his 40th and Fury in his 41st) but this makes sense given a number of factors: Wilder's late start in boxing, his limited time in the amateurs before turning pro and the lack of an American heavyweight champion in 7.5 years. AJ was moved more quickly and got destroyed by Ruiz. Many other dominant champions were also upset (even multiple times) by similar quality contenders, Wilder was not. Wilder has only lost to an undefeated champion who is billed as 6'9, 275 lbs, who had already schooled Wlad in Germany years prior. This isn't compelling evidence that fighters below Fury's level can probably beat Wilder, let alone do so easily.
I really don’t know why anyone bothers with Neet. The guys got more time on his hands than the rest of the forum put together and whatever point gets made the goalposts just get shifted.
The most protected fraudulent champion develops a severe superiority complex after knocking over bum after bum and then breaks after he gets badly beaten down
Wilder's best win is Ortiz, unless you want to argue that a draw against fury is a successful defense and therefore a "win". No matter which way you spin it, Wilder's reign has been disappointing bar his last 5 fights. AJ has had a much better one in attempting to unify, retiring Wlad and basically fighting anyone put in front of him (Usyk). I'd respect Wilder more if he faced better opposition even if it meant more losses.
I like how you used the plural of game plan. Let's be honest Wilder really only ever had one game plan, get the KO. Breland was brutally honest about Wilder when he was his trainer. Despite his desire to make Wilder a more complete fighter, Wilder only wanted to work on his existing strengths and not his weaknesses. You say it's rare to see him out boxed. Well 3 times vs Fury, both times vs Ortiz and even Washington swept the early rounds. That's 6 times, would of been more had he not been so over protected and fought so few serious contenders. The two quality guys he fought both out boxed him and one of those guys barely beat Charles Martin. He is vulnerable that's clear to everyone. Wobbled by Molina of all people and that was with Molina's weaker left hand, dropped by two journeymen, hurt badly against Ortiz and now stopped twice by Fury, who isn't the biggest puncher. Plus he has no inside game at all so can't press opponents can only sit back and wait for opportunity to land big, he can't press the action at all if he finds himself out boxed because of that. Unlike Fury or Lewis who when struggling could mix it up and press and use their size on the inside and mix it up when required. If Wilder tried that he'd get KO'ed quickly as we saw when the two times he tried to finish off Fury he got hurt. No you have it backwards. If he had the ability to acquire the skills to ensure he doesn't just have to rely on waiting for his opponent to tire and then landing a killer blow. Hi strategy worked for him against guys like Szpilka, Ortiz and Washington but let's be honest none of these guys are top level, not even Ortiz who's best win now is probably Charles fricken Martin, hardly the resume of the top contender. As the Fury fights proved his strategy is flawed and when it failed the first time, instead of adapting and changing things he had no new strategy or skills to fall back on he simply came in heavier and hoped the extra weight would get him the KO but instead Fury wiped the floor with him. Then again after failing twice with his get the KO at all costs strategy in the 3rd fight again we saw no real change in strategy, no new game plan, he again came in even heavier and big shock it didn't work again against perhaps the worst version of Fury we've seen since his early years. If Wilder's strategy is such a nuanced and clever strategy why couldn't he come up with a better game plan in the rematches other than coming in heavier? Your giving Wilder far too much credit and trying to spin his limitations as some kind of clever new tactic. I didn't fall for it when Wilder spouting that BS and I don't believe it now from you.
The gameplan's against say, Stiverne 1 and Ortiz 2 were not identical. Breland is not a reliable source because Wilder had thrown him under the bus for stopping the fight and he was understandably resentful. He was defending himself from criticisms and putting the blame on Wilder as a consequence. Breland also came across as a egomaniac, much like Wilder. "The two quality guys he fought both out boxed him and one of those guys barely beat Charles Martin." Haters were saying that Ortiz was in his mid-40's when he fought Wilder the first time so logically he must have been about 50 when he fought Martin, who wasn't green or there to take a dive as was the case against AJ. We'll see how 50 year old Ortiz does against AJ's conqueror Ruiz in 6 weeks. "You say it's rare to see him out boxed" Who came close to winning a decision against him aside from Fury 1? Fury schooled Wlad (who was a master boxer) so being outboxed by Fury isn't an exposure. The first fight was close in terms of punch stats according to Compubox (84-71) with Fury outlanding Wilder in 9 rounds but by only 1-2 punches in 7 of them! Wilder was keeping the fight close enough so that he was in with a good chance of getting a decision as the A-side, especially if he scored a KD or two. Wilder looked especially bad in the 2nd Fury fight because he was caught totally off-guard by Fury's tactics. In the third fight Wilder did much better. You make the excuse that Fury was not on his best form but I could throw that back by saying that Wilder wasn't either due to the inactivity and brutal beating he suffered second time, which damaged him physically and psychologically. In the first fight Ortiz was down on the cards after 9 rounds (85-84) then he got KO'd in 10. In the second fight Ortiz was 5-1 up after 6 but one round later he was KO'd, he still had over 15 minutes of fighting without getting KD'd multiple times or KO'd to win the fight on points. Washington was even on the cards after 4 rounds, should have been 3-1 up but then he got stopped in the 5th, with another 21+ minutes of fighting to go. In reality none of Wilder's non-Fury opponents were remotely close to winning a points decision. The later rounds are also the most perilous against Wilder as that's when the damage is adding up and the opponent is slowing down due to activity and pressure, while the opponent typically hasn't been able to make a dent in Wilder due to him minimising his openings and being economical with his punches. Wilder got dropped once in 43 fights prior to Fury 2: if you were to forensically go through the careers of Lewis or Wlad you could find no shortage of occasions when they were rocked or buzzed, the fact is that Wilder never got destroyed by the fringe contenders that they or AJ did so Wilder's vulnerability is overstated. Wilder can't fight on the inside against Fury, who is not just a brilliant inside fighter but 40 lbs heavier (and even then Wilder took a massive amount of punishment before succumbing, rather than quitting against a backfoot Fury as Chisora and Hammer did). He could however batter 6'5, 236 lbs Duhaupas on the inside, who Wilder was able to dominate more effectively than prime pressure fighters Teper and Miller. He wasn't going to mix it up on the inside with Ortiz because plan A was working and that would have been stupid considering what Ortiz did to Jennings on the inside. "Ortiz who's best win now is probably Charles fricken Martin, hardly the resume of the top contender" In what universe does Martin go 12 with Wlad and give him problems or lose a controversial decision to Joyce in Britain as Jennings did? This is laughably dishonest. Vitali's best win could well be a fresh Chisora, who was no better than Jennings. Skilled southpaw power puncher Ortiz also had the problem of most avoiding him before he was 38+, everyone knew how good he was and even Hearn said last summer that "no one wants to fight him". Ortiz wasn't a Chisora, who is so relatively unthreatening that he's KO'd only one of his 14 best opponents (twice KO'd Takam in 8 after 7 rounds of war). You claimed in the past that Ortiz "struggled" with Dave Allen and Malik Scott, which is ridiculous to say the least. Allen landed 4x as much on Whyte in his previous fight as he did on Ortiz and Ortiz stopped him in 7 with half as many punches landed as Whyte, who went the full 10 rounds. No one has ever stopped Allen that quickly. Scott on the other hand didn't win a single round, got dropped three times and landed virtually nothing of consequence, whereas he was able to win multiple rounds against Chisora in Britain and land more shots on Chisora than Ortiz over a much shorter period of time. From the perspective of power, pointfighting, offensive and defensive skills, Ortiz was far superior to Whyte and Chisora and had Ortiz had Chisora's referee, Scott would have been stopped in the 4th round when he spent 15 seconds on the canvas after being dropped. As I said previously Wilder was not close to being outboxed in any fight save Fury 1. He did just enough boxing to stay ahead on the cards and then stop his opponent in the 2nd half. From a minimising risk and wear perspective it made a huge amount of sense: Wilder was better defensively against Arreola than Vitali, better against Fury 1 than Wlad, better against Szpilka and Ortiz than Jennings, all of whom are regarded as more skilled boxers. Joyce is a far greater offender in this regard: he doesn't just lose rounds to the likes of washed Takam and Hammer; he gets clocked by numerous flush haymakers early in the fight. But we understand that there is method to the madness.
It would be a very interesting fight. The first important question is who is the A-side? Because that could go some way to determining strategy for both men. I don't think a relatively light punching, 6'1, former 190 pounder Holyfield would have a realistic chance at a KO here, especially in the first half of the fight and he may be deterred from going for it by Wilder's power. If Wilder was the A-side he would probably box with Holyfield as he did against Fury 1 and look to keep the fight relatively close. If he was the B-side he'd solely look to setup KO/KD punches (unlike Lewis, who looked to pointfight) which is at odds with Wilder's typical strategy of keeping his nose just in front or at least being competitive just in case it goes 12 rounds. Holyfield was very tough but not invulnerable (Cooper, Bowe, Ruiz, Toney) and he'd be at a huge height and reach deficit, against the fastest and most powerful big heavyweight he ever faced, who would rather die in the ring than quit and had enough skill to win a bronze medal and outpoint a star amateur gold medalist over 4 rounds on 2.5 years of boxing experience. Holyfield had a tendency to get into wars even when he didn't need to, which would be very dangerous against a puncher like Wilder. Moorer lacked Holyfield's solid chin and Wilder has a lot of experience against southpaws. I'm confident in saying that at some point over 36 minutes the former 175 pounder would catch a big right hand and it would be over. If Wilder can land on a defensive Fury while also trying to pointfight a bit, he's got a good chance of landing on anyone.