Lets make it for the Canadian title. Prime for prime Donoven probably wins this. But he was still prospecting in 1987-1988 while D'Witt was still a pretty good fringe contender. Willie won the Bronze in '84 and retired in the late 80's with a pretty good record. The TKO loss to Cooper was devastating but he only had about 14 or 15 fights and facing a tough customer.
Ruddock would win. He had a win over a fading Mike Weaver late in 1986. This is enough to tell me he could beat a china chinned De Witt who had already been destroyed by Cooper. The '88 version of Ruddock was more of a boxer than he was later on, so this might go into the late rounds.
Probably true. Bert Cooper was likely the best fighter Willie ever faced and he got positively destroyed. I don't often like to simplify things that way, but I think it holds more validity here than most other examples. Bert was jumping back and forth between cruiser and heavyweight and didn't have very many fights himself. That doesn't exactly bode well for Dewitt's chances against a contender who was on the verge of peaking. Its a shame Dewitt didn't have better management or some sort of career plan that produced better results. He was talented amateur and a guy who at his best was probably fringe. I can't see him ever doing great things but something tells me he might have gone a tad further than he actually did under the right circumstances.
I'm confident Ruddock would destroy him inside a few rounds. Ruddock was a very talented fighter, I feel he'd be a contender in any stage in heavyweight history I consider him overall better then a number of fighters who captured world titles. I do agree Dewitt could've had a much better career as a pro then he did have but like you said I think he had the potential to be a fringe contender at best.
Good post. With better management D'Witt could've/should've been Tommy Morrison before there was a Tommy Morrison. Oh yeah, Ruddock KOs Willie.
