GGG vs James Toney.

A fully motivated Toney wins against GGG.

A Toney who has ballooned to over 200lbs and has 4 weeks to cut the weight and get into fighting shape? GGG beats him quite smartly.

Peak for peak - Toney.

 

Yep, the concept of Toney not handling pressure well seems to rest on the Tiberi fight. He did just fine against Barkley, Williams and Jirov. I also think a very overweight Toney deserved the decision against Rahman, who showed an insane work rate for someone that size.

 

I also had it something like that or even more clearly for Toney. Yes, Jirov was the aggressor, but not an effective one. He mostly missed and walked into Toney's counters.

Lederman (who I think is a terrible judge who always scores heavily for aggression whether it's effective or not) totally missed that aspect in his scoring, as usual.

 

Thats like comparing a volvo200 series to a 230E. Or comparing Poison to Bon Jovi.
Or comparing Barnsely FC to Man UTD

 

A faded Howard Eastman was punching Arthur into a clam shell for multiple rounds and lost a close decision. I think Toney was a lot better than Eastman and would win more rounds than Eastman did.

You needed legs , speed and angles to beat Toney. Arthur and GGG don't bring those attributes to the table.
Thats no knock on Arthur who was /is a brave galient warrior who was unafraid to take risks and welcomed challenges.

 

Toney is in a different league. AA lost soundly every time he stepped up it to the elite level.

 

It is really a shame that Toney was not in shape in arguably his biggest fight in bis career against Rahman. I thought the draw was fair. However, I think Toney deserved the nod in both Griffin fights, and the Thadzi and Peter I fight.

 

Let's be honest: Tiberi beat him like a drum.

Yes. Yes, he did. But those performances were at higher weights than middleweight. I repeat, yet again: Toney was a lesser fighter at MW than he was at higher weights (imo, due to lax training habits and the weight drain killing him) and people that think Toney beats GGG are basing their opinions largely on his performances at higher weights.

 

The toney who drew with McCallum eats a swarming GGG alive. Decisions the jabbing version.

 

While I respect your opinion more highly than most others here, I think you are wrong.

Two comments.

1) In what way is Golovkin similar enough to McCallum for you to derive this conclusion?

2) I've noticed a trend to dismiss Toney's flat performances due to varied reasons. Everytime he struggled guys have an excuse ready. My personal view is that he is over rated at MW and that it's somewhat cherry-picky to take a couple of performances when he looked great and extrapolate that to all opponents. Golovkin has looked less than his reputation would suggest (eg, Ouma) but even when he struggled, he still won clearly in the end. I call this the Buster Douglas Syndrome, where a fighter is automatically granted his best performance ever and the rest of the body of work is ignored.

To me this is unfair on the fighters than spend the countless hours in the gym keeping themselves in shape and delivering consistent performances time after time.

 

McCallum is a faster version of what GGG does at his best aside from power, and the simple fact is a puncher has never bothered Toney. He's been dropped for a moment or 2 but never truly hurt. I just can't see how a slower version of McCallum with greater power does anything but get beat to the punch time and again. Toney at 160 had blistering hand speed, could match the punch output of anybody on the right night and take or not get hit by the hardest of punches.

At the same time Toney is a faster Canelo with better stamina, and IMO an even higher level of skill. GGG would not beat this guy. Because this guy is one of the best fighters, if not one of the best middle weights ever.

For guys like Duran and Toney the loss overshadow the wins for some. Especially if we are talking best vs best versions, as I believe we should in these conversations unless specified otherwise.

 

Judging Toney based off the Tiberi fight is like judging Billy Joe Saunders off his hopeless performance against Arthur Akavov.

When you have to reach that far your argument has lost all credibility.

 

Also it would be one thing if like Buster Douglas, James only produced one great performance. Tokyo Douglas is a mythical creature for a reason, we only saw that performance ripped from him by his mothers death once. Toney has at least 4 of that type of performance across a bunch of weight classes.

As far as I am concerned the always in shape guys deserve respect and that comes at the time, in the form of win bonuses and career boosts. For the classic section, with the benefit of hindsight if you aren't making the hypest version of this fight you are doing yourself a disservice.

 

What hasn't been mentioned yet is Toney's great uppercut and Golovkins weakness to that punch.

https://imgur.com/r/Boxing/2SgAvkf

https://i.embed.ly/1/image?url=http...cted.gif&key=522baf40bd3911e08d854040d3dc5c07

https://gfycat.com/gifs/detail/dearestleadinggnat

See ^

Toney takes full advantage of that weakness which in return makes Golovkin too hesitant and cautious to apply his pressure.

 

Your 2nd image is broken but this is a good point. James would even counter jabs with it. https://i.imgur.com/tWml90U.mp4