What if Tyson Fury retires after beating Wilder

He KO'd Chambers with very little time to go after being hesitant to let his hands go all night against a much smaller man who lacked serious punching power. Had that been the fight before Fury, you would be saying this is proof that Wlad was a gunshy shot fighter, yet that was prime Wlad. He would usually KO his opponents over the course of 12 rounds because he had incredible power and accuracy but he would also let fights drag on a lot longer than they needed to due to his conservatism. The consensus was not that Wlad was shot at 41, 17 months off and defeated by Fury, it was that Wlad was going to be rusty and a good bit less athletic than he used to be, which is why the bookies had him around 30% to win the fight rather than 5%. Against Fury, Wlad was a huge favourite because he was not regarded as having slipped much if at all, was very active, fighting at home and on a 22 fight win streak. His performance against 27.5 year old, 18-0 AJ in Britain after the defeat and extended layoff at 41 proved he had a huge amount left in the tank when he fought Fury. I gave you the example of Hopkins, who was probably in his prime in his early 40's. It depends on style, genetics (his brother also had great longevity, despite his injuries) discipline, PED's, prior wear and tear and experience can be a huge compensating factor for a decline in athleticism. This is even more true at HW than the other weight classes: the modern HW top 10 is dominated by fighters in their early-mid 30's.

 

That would be super gay

 

Maybe if Bowe had a trilogy with razor Ruddock instead of Holyfield

 

You can't lay all of the blame at Ortiz's doorstep for not beating undefeated fighters because he was regarded as a very dangerous though unglamorous contender who they would rather avoid, like Hrgovic today. Highly skilled, 6'3, 240 lbs, undefeated Cuban southpaw with serious power: not going to get many takers. Hearn had Ortiz on the AJ-Molina undercard fighting Dave Allen when AJ-Ortiz and Allen-Molina would have been vastly more competitive. But fighting Ortiz would have been a massive risk for AJ in late 2016, so it didn't happen.

Ortiz fought Jennings 8 months after Wlad, Thompson 4 months after Scott, Allen 4.5 months after Whyte, Cojanu 11 months after Parker and Hammer 2.5 months after Wallisch, which Hammer won by 5th round KO. I don't care for the Scott fight because Scott made zero attempt to win, got knocked down or fell to the floor a dozen times and lost every round clearly. Your "context" is pure spin because Ortiz was often the 2nd or 3rd to win in a chain of 4, 5 or 6 and still did better than his rivals. For example: 2nd to beat Jennings but beat him better than 1st Wlad, 3rd Rivas and 4th Joyce, 2nd to beat Allen but beat him better than 1st Whyte and 4th Yoka, last to beat Thompson but beat him the best, 4th to beat Cojanu but beat him vastly better than 3rd (home) Parker, a bit better than 6th (home) Dubois and much better than 7th Ajagba, 6th to beat Hammer and while a younger home 5th Povetkin and 7th home Yoka beat him better, Ortiz still won every round and was officially 40 at this point (previously KO'd by Wilder as well) against a Hammer who came to win after a very good result against a 19-0 opponent for the European title in his previous fight. In the case of Rivas (Whyte's best uncontroversial win) he only just managed to scrape past twice-beaten Jennings with a 12th fight stoppage in a fight he was losing, Rivas then went on to go 112-115 with Whyte, knocking him down heavily with an uppercut in the 9th. Ortiz conversely was winning the Jennings fight and stopped him conclusively in the 7th. Based on the performances against Jennings and the Rivas-Whyte fight, it suggests that Ortiz would have been a much harder opponent for Whyte than Rivas and Whyte-Rivas was a very tough and competitive fight for Whyte, which suggests that Ortiz would have KO'd Whyte.

Referring to Jennings as a "top 20 gatekeeper" is absurd as he was ranked in the ring magazine top 10 6-7 years ago, at the time he was seen as a serious contender. Jennings had stopped former heavyweight champion Liakhovich, was the first to stop 16-0 Szpilka and had a win over Mike Perez, who had a draw with a prime 29-1 Takam in the fight prior, who you have had in the top 10 at 37 and after 3 losses according to that rankings website. This chain puts Jennings above prime Takam (best win may be Jerry Forrest a year ago lol) who gave Parker a very close fight. Chisora's best official win (in your view as well) is an 8th round KO over an aged, 4 times defeated version of Takam in a fight Chisora was losing, actually putting Chisora more on par with Jennings resume-wise and that's if you don't count Chisora's double digit losses against him. Ortiz beat Chisora-tier Jennings very impressively, which is more evidence that he was better than Whyte and Parker who could not beat Chisora impressively at all and many believed that Chisora was unlucky to lose those fights.

Ortiz was 28-0 and officially 39 in the first Wilder fight. If you look at Ortiz's two defeats they were both in the 2nd half of the fight against Wilder and Ortiz gave Wilder his most challenging two fights of any non-Fury opponent: he didn't get KO'd by a shot 41 year old Povetkin at home. Losing to a long-reigning champion twice in competitive fights is far less of an indiscretion than losing 11 times officially and being stopped 3 times, including a loss to Euro level Kabayel. There is a consistent pattern of Ortiz beating opponents better than rival contenders had beaten them, even those who came many fights and multiple losses after. If it were just one journeyman that would be one thing but there are too many examples for it to be a fluke. Comparative wins strongly suggest to me that Ortiz would have beaten Parker and Whyte, maybe an older but non-shot Povetkin too.

 

Well yes and no. I believe the counter spin has always been: Ortiz was ranked 6 by the IBF, Molina was ranked 8. Molina was a common opponent of Wilder, Ortiz was an unknown Cuban (plus the language barrier). Ortiz was quite happy to sit on his WBA ranking, rejecting a number of opponents with the purpose of building his profile; with Allen being last resort. Then throw in some PED issues, and later rejecting an offer from Joshua and it has always been a difficult fight to make.

Nothing I said was untrue. My context is just a simple sequence of facts that unfortunately has caused you to type a wall of text trying to spin things again.

Again, here are some simple facts: every time Jennings has tried to beat a top 20 guy he has lost. His best win was against a guy ranked 21. i.e. he is the perfect gate keeper to the top 20. He has now decided to try his luck at Bridger weight.

um...I never said Chisora had a better resume than Ortiz, I said they are on even footing in terms of wins.

So, to summarize you disagree with most of what can be objectively proven, you still believe Ortiz is better than Parker and Whyte, based on the eye-test (fair enough) and now maybe an older but non-shot Povetkin too (not sure about that)

 

Would forever be known as a ducker.

 

The only Reason Jennings beat Perez was due to a point being wrongly deducted from Perez in the late rounds. Had it not been for that the judges would have scored it a draw.

On Takam vs Perez being a draw the majority of people thought Takam deserved the win. So I'd argue Takam deserved Jennings high ranking at the time.

Ortiz only has two notable wins (if you can call them that) are against Jennings and Hammer. Which is why Ortiz resume falls short compared to the guys to with the top 10 resumes in the divison (no where near Whyte, Parkers and Povetkin quality of resume).

Ortiz also has an official age but there are many that dispute this. Including Yoel Romero who trained at the same Olympic Centre as Ortiz and knows him, stated on a Joe Rogan podcast that Ortiz was at the very least is two years older than he claims.

Ortiz being Wilders biggest challenge prior to Fury is not saying much at all looking at his very poor opposition. Even then he has been trouble by being out boxed by the likes Spzilka (who Chisora KOed in a round) and Washington untill he was able to finally KO them. Being dropped by Sconiers, wrongly having KD ruled a slip against Nicholls, being rocked by Molina and having his face busted up by Duhaupas.

Ortiz being avoided like Hrgovic is now is a myth to promote his fights with Wilder - turned down a fight against Whyte and also turned down career high purse to fight AJ.

 

So you apply revisionism to Jennings-Perez and Takam-Perez but don't apply revisionism to Whyte-Chisora 1, Whyte-Chisora 2 and Parker-Chisora, which were themselves highly controversial fights that could have gone the other way if not for official intervention.

I don't claim that Ortiz has a better resume than Povetkin at all but old Ortiz deteriorated less than old Povetkin, especially if you believe Ortiz is two years older than he is officially, so I may have favoured a late 30's Ortiz against a late 30's Povetkin. Whyte got controversial wins against Chisora x2 and Parker, struggled against Rivas (who struggled with Jennings) and got blasted out by young AJ and shot Povetkin. Parker struggled against Takam in NZ, outpointed a green Hughie, got controversial wins against Ruiz in NZ and Chisora, lost controversially to Whyte and was outpointed by AJ. Ortiz outboxed and KO'd Jennings in 7, who on comparative wins was slightly better than prime Takam, who gave Parker, prime Povetkin and Chisora a lot of problems and against Chisora, Takam was old and worn. Ortiz at an official 40 shut Hammer out, who was a junior world champion beating Hunter and Teper and beat K. Johnson, Teper and KO'd Price in the pros. Ortiz's performances against Allen, Cojanu and Thompson also compare favourably with the likes of Whyte, Yoka, Parker, Dubois, Ajagba, Pulev and Takam. If you ignore wins against C level heavies, the dominance displayed in those wins, ignore when a fighter badly struggles with B level heavyweights and ignore losses, then I can see why you would have Parker and Whyte clearly above Ortiz but the official rankings don't work that way. In terms of their comparative performances, Ortiz a few years ago > Whyte and Parker.

The degree to which Wilder's opposition was poor relative to AJ's is exaggerated. Szpilka beat an old but still serviceable Adamek pre-Wilder and Wach post-Wilder and Wilder KO'd Szpilka faster and much more emphatically than Jennings. Szpilka came back 18 months later against pressure fighter Kownacki and got KO'd in 4, had a couple of fairly tough fights that he won and then got KO'd by pressure fighter Chisora in 2 but Lukasz Rozanski isn't better than Chisora because he KO'd an obviously shot version of Szpilka in the 1st round. Washington KO'd Jerry Forrest in two rounds, who the fight after that went the 8 round distance with Michael Hunter. Washington and Duhaupas both KO'd Helenius and Duhaupas beat Charr, who had wins over Ustinov, Leapai and K. Johnson. When Wilder boxed against Stiverne (who had beat prime Arreola x2, much more comfortably than Ruiz beat 40 year old retired Arreola) Arreola and Duhaupas he won every single round and he won nearly every round against Molina, who has some skills, power and length (though a brittle chin and often a quitter's mentality: Wilder-victim Arreola beat a younger, fresher version of Molina better than AJ and Hrgovic). Duhaupas was very durable, big and relentless so ofc he was able to mark Wilder up with his jab but Wilder won every round and stopped him late. Wilder was a relative novice when dropped by Sconiers (Nichols rightly doesn't count, Wilder lost his balance and was not hurt at all) and 201+ lbs professional boxers have the power to hurt each other, especially if they don't see the punch coming.

Compare Wilder's 8 punches landed previous, one punch KO against Breazeale to AJ's 166 punch stoppage against Breazeale and Ruiz's 10 round fairly competitive fight against an older and more worn version of Siarhei Liakhovich than the one Wilder KO'd in under 2 minutes. Then consider that AJ was destroyed by fringe contender Ruiz, who struggled more with Kevin Johnson than Charr did. Ortiz was a lot better than 2nd tier Jennings and disposed of 3rd tier heavies in brutal fashion but he had 50 minutes to KO Wilder and got KO'd twice in the 2nd half, his only defeats in 34 fights.

In 2015//16 Ortiz was heavily ducked and this was well-known, before a fight with Wilder was even on the horizon. Fury was talking about it before the Wlad fight. Hearn could have made AJ-Ortiz and Allen-Molina instead of AJ-Molina and Ortiz-Allen, why do you think he didn't? PBC fighter Ortiz was pursing fights with Wilder in 2018 and 2019 so it's bizarre to accuse him of ducking challenges at that time. There are also rumours that Whyte ducked Ortiz and I believe it considering he'd rather fight 41 year old Povetkin than Hunter and Parker in Britain than Pulev in Bulgaria and turned down the AJ fight when he had nothing else lined up. Now he's talking about fighting sub-Dave Allen Jermaine Franklin, a shot to bits Chris Arreola and wanted a trilogy with shot to pieces Povetkin after he'd beaten him up, truly disgraceful.