James Toney as a heavyweight

Most folks do not give Toney credit for his heavyweight adventure. People tend to forget that this was 5ft 10 former middlweight who was in his mid 30's when he moved up.

He did beat Holy, Ruiz, Oquendo , Guinn and drew with Rahman.
According to most observers he won the first Peter fight.

I doubt Hopkins or Jones would have been able to do it.Toney's poblems were always discipine. Had he trained properly for the first Rahman fight, he would have become WBC champ.

 

Toney had a chance to fight for Wlad's belt at a point when he did not have one. Wlad wanted it. Toney declined and fought some obscure guy instead. It would have been a mis-match.

Toney was small heavyweight in statue, but he was also durable / defensive with good skills. Few could counter punch as well as Toney could.

He was good enough to beat old Holyfield. He defeated and Ruiz, but you have to wonder if he could have beaten Ruiz without testing positive for Riods.

The first Peter fight was close, but Peter easily won the second

I view Toney as a heavyweight who picked the right oppoents, and was worthy of a spot in the top ten for a short amouint of time

 

I can't really see him beating the elite heavyweights of the past. Who was the biggest name on his list ? A shot Evander Holyfield,that's who.


He would have got taken apart by the likes of Ali,Frazier,Louis,Lewis,Foreman,Dempsey,Holmes,Tyson and Bowe (in shape) Even a prime Holyfield would have beaten him.

 

One of Toney's problems at heavyweight was his fluctuating body shape and muscle mass levels.

He was on the juice BIG TIME, and he got busted twice .. (I think you have to be doing a lot, the old fashioned 'roids, and staying on right up to the fight to get busted for those particular drugs with normal testing) ... and he lost the WBA title because of it.

You can see different physical versions of Toney at heavyweight.
When a fighter relies on steroids to that extent he's going to have peaks and troughs and probably going to burn out quickly in that particular weight class.

 

To be fair I would bet on most of the top 10 being on some sort of ped. Toney, because he was smaller and from a different era, had to use more and did so inefficiently.

 

Robbed against Peter the first time but clearly lost the rematch.

Might have been well on his way to defeating Rahman in their rematch but got a gift draw against him in their first encounter - and by 2008, Rahman was done. Rock was, as of the rematch with Toney, just coming fresh off a close affair with Zuri Lawrence and nearly became the only KO victim ever in Lawrence's professional career!!!

Arguable gift over Oquendo.

Beat Ruiz, but tainted, popped for PED use.

So his resume boasts a UD over Guinn (ho-hum), one over Booker (who?? Pretty record and all but never fought anyone before or since) and exactly ONE quality untainted scalp at the weight: Holyfield, then on a 2-3-2 skid.

Stopping even a 2003 Holyfield is still a very good heavyweight win, but if that's your only one I don't think we can say you were a very good heavyweight.

 

Well said. :good

 

Too short 5-9, and too fat to fight effectively over a long period of time at Heavyweight, busted 2x for roids, Oquendo, and Rahman were robbed against him, Sam Peter could and should have stopped him in that 2nd fight, but let off the gas, I wish Tobey would have fought Wlad Klitchko he would have gotten his slurring head knocked off, and the guy was a complete ******* to boot..

Oh yea and Toney NEVER beat Ruiz it was a NO CONTEST because the dumb**** failed to post fight drug test, I guess cheaters get busted sooner or later.

Listen to him talk now if you can stand it, the guys brain is fried..

 

In my opinion Toney did not take the Wlad fight because Wlad would punish him and he'd lose whatever " Street credit " he had in 313.

Bottom level top ten heavy for a short amount of time is how I see it.

 

Yes, I agree with that.
I just think he was so far from being a "natural" heavyweight that his performances, strength levels, power, conditioning was all over the place.
It's hard to get a handle on Toney as a heavyweight because of that.

 

I agree that he would have beaten Ruiz on that night even if he were "clean", but the unfortunate fact of his testing positive taints it and precludes us from numbering that among his quality heavyweight wins. (or rather, win, since we can't even pluralize with it literally being only Evander Holyfield on paper...unless we care to expound on the "untapped potential" of Rydell Booker or, similarly try spinning a "what could've been" yarn about Dominick Guinn 'brought along the right way'...)

 

...and said as a huge Toney fan, for the record.

He just wasn't much of a heavyweight. Slip-in-the-pocket reflexes & chin intact enough to guarantee that even the big guys couldn't seriously hurt or stop him, but too fat, poorly conditioned and light hitting at the weight to ever be a serious contention threat.

Much like with Adamek and Haye, my problems with Toney start at the frontier beyond 200lb.

All three gypped us of some potentially amazing runs at cruiser. Damn their eyes. Fie on them, I say!