He started going to the ropes more as he aged. He took rests and counter punched lesser, slower fighters. I personally think that he’d have respected Artur enough to not have employed those kinds of tactics. A prime version of Roy in his 20’s wouldn’t have gone to the ropes voluntarily.
Where were they against Green and Lebedev etc? We’re talking here about a prime version of Roy who could cover huge distances in just a split second.
Beterbiev isn't that much bigger than Roy. What is the height difference like one inch? Roid likely wins by KO. Roy KO's Kovalev also, and outpoints Ward. The guy he might have a little trouble with would be Dawson. Not saying Dawson would win, but the southpaw Dawson at his peak was more capable then Tarver, Harmon, Harding and those guys. I'm not talking about the weight drained guy that got smacked around by Andre Ward after dropping to 168. I'm talking about the guy that beat Adamek, Tarver and Johnson.
There’s going to be the odd occasion where any fighter can be manoeuvred or pressured towards the ropes. I’m not saying that Artur couldn’t have put him there at some point, just that Roy didn’t voluntarily go there in his prime, like how he did when he was older. Also, Roy could be very dangerous when near the ropes. He actually dropped Vinny twice whilst stood near the ropes. And if you watch the bit that’s been time stamped, you’ll notice that although Vinny had much faster hands than Artur, that almost all of those punches were either blocked or avoided completely.