168 James Toney vs Canelo?

There's more than one way to beat Toney. You don't have to out box him from range. Canelo is a bigger puncher than Toney and can fight well on the inside. Canelo could walk Toney down, punish him to the body, and Toney will end up on the ropes covering up and trying to slip shots, but he'll end up getting caught with big shots. He would have no answer to Canelo. Toney's defense and ability to slip punches is superb and very comparable to Canelo's ability to slip punches. But SMW Toney was very slow on his feet and he wouldn't be able to avoid Canelo's body attack or power punching. Canelo is a much bigger puncher and overall is a better inside fighter than Toney, when it comes to punch technique, power, and ability to time you and catch you.

Toney makes ordinary fighters look silly, but he's never dealt with anyone like Canelo, and Canelo would have no problem fighting him toe to toe and trading round after round. Toney could throw the kitchen sink at Canelo and Canelo isn't going anywhere, but can Toney take Canelo's body shots? I doubt it. He might be able to absorb shots and survive but he'll take a lot of punishment. He's not going to be able to land as many eye catching shots as Canelo. He doesn't have the work rate and his punches can't compare with Canelo's. Toney would be dealing with stamina issues as well.

It's always going to be an interesting fight but you'd have to favor Canelo when you look at how dominant Canelo has been at SMW, no one's come close to beating him. Toney had all kinds of problems with Charles Williams, a fight that almost went the distance and was a war. if Charles Williams could take Toney into those kind of deep waters, imagine what Canelo would do.

As Lampley pointed out at the beginning of the Tim Littles fight, "Toney was accused of being lazy and fighting only in spurts, it is said of Toney he only fights 1 out of every 3 minutes in most rounds".

Against Canelo, that's a recipe for disaster because Canelo, while is accused of fading late in fights, isn't lazy in the ring and doesn't just fight "1 out of every 3 minutes in most rounds". Canelo would be able to apply consistent pressure round after round while Toney would be taking too much time off and would give away rounds. In the first two rounds, Littles was having a lot of success against Toney, and was landing clean shots on Toney, including some nice body work in the 2nd round. If Tim Littles could land body shots on Toney, imagine what Canelo could do. And Toney's not getting Canelo out of there.

While both Toney and Canelo are known to have stamina issues or take parts of rounds off, it would likely turn into a grueling battle of wills and a lot of inside fighting. Canelo can win an inside fight vs anyone, the fighters who have given Canelo trouble are fighters with quick feet, who jab a lot and are able to keep him at range from the outside. (Lara, Mayweather, Bivol, Khan to an extent, etc) Toney doesn't fight like that. Toney's has good all around skills, but does not have great footwork. At SMW he was very flat footed and did a lot of covering up, taking parts of rounds off, etc. Why anyone would think he woudl be able to outbox Canelo doens't make sense. Canelo has less stamina issues than James and better footwork than James. He can pretty much do everything James can do but better.

 

Toney by decision simply a better fighter and more talented at his best.

 

I basically disagree with everything you've wrote, in my 20 years on this board I've never disagreed with a post as much as this one.

Toney's chin will negate Canelo's possible edge in power, as hard as he hits he doesn't hit as hard as Rahman or Peter who couldn't KO Toney. Canelo isn't walking down Toney and beating him on the inside and beating him at his own game, it would be competitive because Canelo is that good but I can't see how he ever beats a fully fit Toney fighting like he does.

Toney is the better fighter inside and would beat Canelo here. This is coming from a person who as far back as the Mayweather fight compared Canelo to Toney as I could see in training footage he was using similar defensive techniques but it really wasn't until later that Canelo felt comfortable enough to start using them in actual fights and really started to show the type of slippery defensive skills he would be known for. But having said that, he's never got to the level of Toney in terms of defense, I'd argue Toney has a better shoulder roll than even Mayweather. Mayweather is the only fighter since Toney that is comparable in terms of defense on the inside. I'd give the edge to Toney because he counters better out of a philly shell than Mayweather.

Canelo has worse stamina than Toney, that's not even up for debate. Yeah sure you can pick fights individual fights where he hadn't trained like Tiberi or in your case against Littles who was known to be a high volume puncher who threw at a pace that would see Canelo have a heart attack after 6 rounds. Even if what you are saying is true and Toney fought in spurts, Canelo with is meagre work rate isn't the fighter to take advantage of that. He simply does not throw enough. Littles threw 297 punches in just over 3 rds, that's like 85 punches a rd, show me a fight were Canelo threw 85 punches a rd? Canelo fights in spurts far more than Toney does their punch out put numbers makes that clear.

It would be a gruelling fight, with Canelo up against a bigger man, who is better defensively and better on the inside and a better counter puncher. Maybe Canelo has the edge is power and he does have an edge in footwork but that's not going to help him here. Both guys fight best against opponents that come to them, so they can counter, but both are capable of walking fighters down if they can time them with counters too. But in both regards Toney is simply better, throw in the higher punch out put and Toney wins.

 

Toney might not lose a single round and would win via dominating UD.

 

Well it's not surprising the only guy who disagrees with you on this topic is a Canelo stan.

One of his earlier comments "Fought very competitively vs Mayweather earning a MD" that's all you need to know about who your debating with.

I didn't think losing 10-2 is my definition of "very competitive" but what do i know.

As for stamina ? Toney landed over 300 punches vs McCallum, Jirov, and actually came on strong late flooring Jirov late and almost stopping McCallum in their 1st fight so that put's that argument to rest.

 

Past SMW who would beat Canelo at 168.
Calzaghe
RJJ
Toney
Kessler
Ward
And perhaps Froch

 

First of all, bringing up the Mayweather fight isn't that relevant because we're talking about the SMW Canelo of today or the past few years when he was collecting belts, not the LMW Canelo of 10 years ago before he was prime, when he fought Mayweather. Nonetheless, since the Mayweather fight was brought up, I made a very accurate point that Canelo's match vs Mayweather was far more competitive than James Toney was vs Roy Jones. Why is this important? Because James fought RJJ at Super Middleweight, which is what this topic is about. The James Toney who showed up against RJJ would be dominated by Canelo and probably stopped. RJJ was playing around against James Toney, made him look silly. There's no way in hell that version of James that was completely dominated by RJJ beats SMW Canelo.

If you wanna take the best version of James at SMW and say he would beat Canelo, that's one thing. If you take the best version of Canelo at SMW, i.e. perhaps the BJS win, I doubt any SMW version of Toney could beat him. If you take the worst SMW version of Toney (against RJJ, or against Charles Williams?) James was beat up in both those fights. Those versions of James are not gonna beat Canelo. If I'm not mistaken, Toney only defended the SMW Titles successfully 3 times. He had other non-title fights during his SMW reign which if I'm not mistaken were at Light Heavyweight. So how many great wins did Toney actually have at SMW?

Tony Thornton? Who already had 5 losses and a draw when he fought Toney.

Iran Barkley? Who already had 7 losses when he fought Toney.

Charles Williams? Who already had 5 losses and 2 draws when he fought Toney.

Tim Littles? OK he was undefeated. Good win.

By my count, Toney had exactly 1 SMW win over an undefeated fighter, Tim Littles. His other 3 SMW wins had a combined 17 losses and 3 draws when he beat them.

Compare that to Canelo. Canelo beat 3 Undefaeted SMWs and beat GGG who's only loss was to him. So, you seem to be forgetting that we're talking about SMW Toney. SMW Toney was not that impressive. Toney was much better and tougher to beat before moved up to SMW, back when he was at Middleweight. James was arguably past his prime by the time he was SMW Champion. Certainly by the time he got destroyed by RJJ. And the fact that he had non-title fights at LHW during that reign speak to that. He was obviously ballooning up in weight. James did not have the weight discipline Canelo has when he was at SMW. As Lampley pointed out very clearly at the beginning of the Littles fight, James was known as being lazy, and "only fighting 1 minute of every 3 minutes in most rounds". Lampley said that, watch the footage.

Well because he didn't lose 10-2, you're just pretending he did in order to make arguments based on fantasy scoring. It's irrelevant anyway since that match didn't happen at SMW. But 10 years ago at LMW, and not even at LMW but against a drained Canelo at a 152-lb catchweight. Even while drained and pre-prime, he still came a hell of a lot closer to beating Mayweather than SMW Toney did against RJJ. And that's not really debatable. People like to delusionally call Canelo's loss to Maywather a schooling, while ignoring the fact that it was in fact very close on the cards. That's not my opinion, that's the official result. On the other hand, RJJ's win over Toney was far more one-sided on the cards, and that has more relevance here because, again, that was at SMW, Canelo's loss to Mayweather was not.

You're using irrelevant examples. Toney did not fight McCallum at SMW. We're talking about SMW Toney. He fought Jirov at Cruiserweight. We're talking about SMW Toney. Try again.

 

James Toney was weight drained vs RJJ and it was well documented he has having problems make the weight, regardless losing to a prime RJJ who is probably H2H the best fighter ever at Super Middleweight. Is a bit different than losing to a 37 year old past it Mayweather who never weighed more than 151 pounds in his entire career.

RJJ is also not one bit stylistically similar to Canelo in anyway what so ever, where as Mayweather/Toney have more in common style wise which is probably more significant.

As for Mayweather vs Canelo you said it was "very competitive" no it wasn't that's a false statement on your part. And you tried to use "MD" to further your argument in a very dishonest way. Pretty much everyone agrees the 114-114 scorecard was a total shambles, and no surprise that the judge was "C.J Ross".Who is heavily criticized as a judge for also scoring Bradley/Pacquiao in favour of Bradley which is considered a robbery.

Two judges also scored it 116-112, 117-111, and 86 out of 86 media scorecards scored it with an average score of 119-109. So no Mayweather winning the fight 10-2 is not a "fantasy" by me as you tried to dishonestly claim.

Well of course your going to think that your heavily biased towards Canelo, your the same guy who debated for 100 pages about punches landing on shoulders. So debating this subject with you is a total waste of time.

I'm not forgetting anything Toney had some of his most eye catching performances at Super Middleweight vs Williams, Barkley, DeWitt, etc. At Middleweight he could be hit and miss he was great vs McCallum the 1st time, but then looked beatable vs Tiberi, Johnson. Toney probably had more consistent performances at Super Middleweight than he did at Middleweight, although he had bigger wins at Middleweight vs Nunn, McCallum.

As for Light Heavyweight yes Toney did move up in weight straight after the Jones fight, which means he was struggling to make weight at the end which is what i said earlier about being weight drained vs Jones. So Canelo being weight drained is excused for his performance by not for Toney ? not that i think either Canelo beats Mayweather or Toney beats Jones anyway.

As for the stamina again both men are known to fight in spurts, but Toney has shown for consistent stamina at his best. He landed as i said over 300 punches vs Jirov and McCallum and came on late in both fights, he also showed good stamina vs Williams stopping him in the 12th round of a good paced fight.

Well he was heavier vs Jirov so he would be more likely to throw less punches no ? but if you want to discredit them fights which i don't understand BTW. Then look at the Williams fight which he fought at a good 12 round pace and stopped his man in the last round.

Canelo on the other hand faded vs an old Golovkin in their 3rd fight, and recently faded down the stretch vs Ryder. Both fights taking place at Super Middleweight which is "relevant."

 

I've made this point several times in the past. It's no secret that James was not disciplined outside the ring during his run at SMW. And this is more reason to favor Canelo in a fantasy SMW matchup. Just the fact that he had so many non-title matches at LHW during his SMW run says it all. He remained active but as a SMW he was clearly struggling with the weight and that was a big factor as to why he lost to RJJ the way he did.

That's my exact point and why I favor Canelo. James was not at his best as a SMW. He was said to be lazy and only fighting in spurts. I understand why people rate Toney so highly and consider him at his best to beat Canelo. At Middleweight he was an amazing fighter, but not SMW not so much. As a SMW, he started to show signs of decline. While Canelo has arguably reached his peak at SMW. He certainly hasn't struggled with weight like Toney did, he certainly never has been accused of being "Lazy" like Toney was. These are reasons why Canelo should be favored. James as a SMW was simply not at the level Canelo has been at. I mean he was still very good, and would give Canelo a tough fight, but we can't ignore the weight struggles, the lethargy in the ring that allowed lesser fighters to give him problems. The Charles Williams fight, for example, was very close on the cards at the time of the stoppage. The cards were 103-105, 102-106 x2 at the time of the stoppage. Toney's left eye had completely swelled shut. Williams won 5 separate rounds (1,3,4,5, and 8) on different judges scorecards against Toney.

So if you want to argue that James at his best would beat Canelo, which version of SMW would you say is at his best? Lets take all the versions of Toney at SMW, and ask yourself which versions beat Canelo and which don't. And then look at Canelo's fights at SMW. Do you really think Toney who lost to RJJ would beat the Canelo who dominated Callum Smith? Do you think the verison of Toney lost 3-5 rounds against Charles Williams, who's left eye had completely swelled shut, would beat the SMW Canelo who beat undefeated Champion after undefeated Champion each in convincing fashion without sustaining any significant damage?

You really have to think about the struggles Toney had at SMW and compare that to how Canelo has fared at SMW. You also really need to ask yourself if the fighters that Toney beat at SMW were better than BJS, Plant or Callum Smith. It's a very interesting comparison when you really take a hard look at how Toney performed at SMW compared to Canelo.

Mayweather was 36 and he wasn't past it yet. He was P4P #1. He went on to beat Maidana and Pacquiao, it wasn't until after Mayweather beat Canelo did he start showing signs of real decline. It's dishonest to, on the one hand, praise Mayweather's performance against Canelo yet try to act like he was past it. That wasn't a past-it kind of a performance. So you're trying to play both sides of the fence in regards to the Mayweather fight, and as I pointed out, however you see that fight, it really has no bearing on this topic, because that was 10 years ago pre-prime LMW Canelo, not current Undisputed SMW Canelo. Trying to use the Mayweather fight to argue Canelo would be no match for James is silly. Canelo is not the same fighter now at SMW that he was when he lost to Mayweather. But James did lose to RJJ at SMW by a much larger margin than Canelo did to Mayweather. Now we can argue that RJJ was close to his peak then, and Toney was weight drained. But again, that was a version of SMW Toney which only illustrates that he wasn't poised to beat RJJ, and the RJJ fight wasn't all that close. That verison of James would not beat Canelo. Now would earlier versions of SMW James be able to beat Canelo. It's debatable but it's not anywhere near a sure thing.

Never said he was. But James struggled mightily against RJJ that night. He was completely exposed. It's one thing to lose to RJJ in a competitive fight, but it wasn't really that competitive. James looked lethargic and unprepared, he had to kill himself to make 168 because he ballooned up in weight between fights. This is why he would be no match for Canelo at SMW. He couldn't manage his weight, he was said to only fight 1 minute out of every 3 minutes in most rounds, according to Jim Lampley, going into the Littles fight. I think you get my point. I rate Toney very highly and recognize his skills, but he was not at his best at SMW, he struggled a lot and didn't look good vs RJJ.

The Charles Williams fight was a 12 round WAR. It was an amazing fight but do you really think Charles Williams would give Canelo that kind of trouble? Come on, you know Canelo would handle Charles Williams more comfortably than James did.

How competitive Canelo Mayweather was really isn't relevant to this discussion. Because again, that was Canelo from 10 years ago at a much lower weight. We're talking about SMW Canelo, not Mayweather Canelo, so it's not very relevant to this. I didn't bring up Mayweather Canelo here, I was responding to that and pointed out that it was a lot closer on that cards than Toney RJJ was.

You've just highlighted a problem with James : Inconsistency. James looked very good in his first few fights at SMW. Like against DeWitt and Barkley. If you put those versions of James up against Canelo I can see why you'd favor him. But if you put the 1994 versions of Toney up against Canelo, surely you can see why I'd favor Canelo. So it depends what version of SMW James we're talking about.

If we're talking the "average" of all the SMW versions of Toney vs the "avereage" of all the SMW versions of Canelo, Canelo has been consistently great. James was only great in those first couple of SMW fights, then he started to struggle. That's my reasonsing as to why Canelo is the better fighter. Because he's more disciplined outside of the ring, he's a more consistently in shape fighter. There's less wondering what version of James is gonna show up.

 

I think the weight is very relevant in both cases. But the difference is that we're talking about SMW. Mayweather Canelo was at 152 lbs 10 years ago, so obviously that has no relevance to what would happen at 168 lbs. James vs RJJ is relevant because it happened at 168 the weight we're talking about. If you take the Toney who fought DeWitt and put that version up against RJJ it's a much different story. Maybe James wins, maybe he doesn't, but he does a lot better against RJJ.

Lets put this part of it to rest : Would you agree that any version of SMW Canelo beats the weight drained James Toney who got massacred by RJJ? That doesn't mean your wrong for thinking other better, earlier verisons of SMW Toney beat Canelo. Toney at his best is definitely capable of beating Canelo, but it's not a forgone conclusion that he beats Canelo. Even at James best, Canelo is better than anyone he fought at SMW by a mile not named RJJ.

At his best, but at his worst he had more stamina issues than Canelo. Canelo is known to fade late in fights for example, but Canelo works very hard in the first half of his fights. He loads up on big shots more than Toney, he's a better body puncher than Toney, etc. So Canelo has plenty of intangibles that make him difficult stylistically for James. At his best, it's a tremendous fight I think we all would agree. Even if James managed to win a UD, he'd have to go through hell to win a fight against Canelo. All I'm saying is that Canelo is very capable of defeating James at SMW. And if we're honest it's a very even matchup. Nothing wrong with picking James "at his best" to beat Canelo, but lets not act like it's beyond debate.

Agreed, and I would argue that wasn't Canelo "at his best". I would say Canelo at his best at SMW was probably against BJS or against Callum Smith. That was Canelo at his best. So who wins, the BJS or Callum Smith versions of Canelo vs the DeWitt or Barkley versions of Toney? That's a hell of a fight if you put the best Toney vs the best Canelo. But you're trying to take the best versions of Toney against just an average version of Canelo. If you're gonna take the best versions of Toney, then you have to put him up against the best versions of Canelo. And then put an average version of Toney against an average version of Canelo, and the worst. James at his best is very hard to beat, not just for Canelo, but for anyone, even RJJ. But the same is true for Canelo. When Canelo's been at his best, he's never been beaten. In Canelo's losses, he was at considerable weight disadvantages and had a hand injury against Bivol & GGG 3. So you have to throw out the GGG 3rd fight if you wanna talk about the best versions of Canelo.

 

Canelo has no level whatsoever to fight a prime Toney.

 

@shadow111 i had to quote you like this because the message had too many characters.

If we're talking the "average" of all the SMW versions of Toney vs the "avereage" of all the SMW versions of Canelo, Canelo has been consistently great. James was only great in those first couple of SMW fights, then he started to struggle. That's my reasonsing as to why Canelo is the better fighter. Because he's more disciplined outside of the ring, he's a more consistently in shape fighter. There's less wondering what version of James is gonna show up.[/QUOTE]

That's not how mythical match ups work though we'll be pitting the best versions of each fighter eachother. And the only time Toney looked to be effected by the weight at Super Middleweight is vs Jones, but again i don't think any version of Toney beats Jones who is the best fighter ever H2H at Super Middleweight IMO.

Well alot of people consider the Williams fight to be a very good performance from Toney, i certainly think the 105-103 scorecard is flattering for Williams. It was more like 9-3 or 8-4 for Toney in my opinion with a very good finish from Toney showing his stamina late in a fight with a picture perfect right hand KO.

As i said before i think Toney was actually more consistent overall at Super Middleweight, but at Middleweight he had the bigger wins. Toney never had an off night at Super Middleweight like he did vs Tiberi at Middleweight, nor was he dropped and hurt at at Super Middleweight like he was vs Johnson. But as i said he had the bigger wins at Middleweight for sure with wins over McCallum, Nunn.

Well no i don't think the version of Toney vs RJJ beats Canelo, but i think the version of Toney who looked amazing vs Barkley could beat Canelo yes. Callum Smith was also drained vs Canelo and didn't put up much offence to be fair, for example looking at Canelo against Golovkin at Super Middleweight where faded down the stretch quite badly vs an old Golovkin. To me looking at a fight like that Canelo looks beatable to me against someone like Toney.

Well Canelo wasn't flawless in all those fights either though, Saunders was arguably ahead on points or the fight was near enough even until the eye forced Saunders to retire. Plant also won his fair share of rounds in what was a close fight up until the stoppage, against Smith he was dominant in i agree but as i said earlier Smith was drained and didn't offer up any resistance.

The only reason i brought up the Mayweather fight is because you said it was very competitive and then brought up the MD. And as us Brits would say i thought that was a bit cheeky of you, because you know full well that the 114-114 scorecard is total BS from a biased judge who has bad history of scoring fights. The majority of the fans who watched the fight scored it very wide for Mayweather as did i it wasn't competitive at all to me.

I never alluded to that the fight has any significance in regards to a fight vs Toney at Super Middleweight, although it probably has a bit more relevance than Toney vs Jones does. Due to the fact that Toney and Mayweather do share some of the same traits regarding shoulder roll, slickness, counter punching.

As i've already said no i don't think the version of Toney who fought Jones beats Canelo, but i do think the best version of Toney at Super Middleweight is capable of beating Canelo.

But as i said to you when we're doing mythical match ups we match both fighters at their best, so Toney vs Jones doesn't come into it. It's not that i dislike Canelo or favour past fighters against modern fighters, it's just i think Toney was just that damn good. I rate Canelo pretty highly H2H at Super Middleweight, but there is a few fighters at their best who i would be fairly confident of beating him. And that would be......

RJJ
Calzaghe
Toney

For me they're the creme da la creme H2H at Super Middleweight.

 

James Toney would beat all the peanut butter outta Canelo.

 

The problem with Toney is that he was lazy. He had all the talent but did enough to coast along. Canelo might be less talented but he works 3 x harder. You can see that he really slogs in the gym. As unlikeable as I find ginger, the fact is that the grind pays off in the ring and his record bears it out. I think that it would pay off against Toney too.

 

Despite all that hard work he still has suspect stamina and can fade in fights.