Comparing Roy jones Jr at LHW to Artur beterbiev is crazy talk

It really has nothing to do with a 'delusional fanbase' here - though I do accept that the win can get overrated sometimes. Nobody (from what I've seen) here is saying that Ruiz was an amazing heavyweight. Or that Jones became THE champion. But by any sensible metric, whether you like him or not, a fighter who wins titles at middleweight, super middle, light heavy and then jumps up to beat a heavyweight is an I!impressive and unusual feat. the fact you can't give any credit at all, respectfully, I think actually hurts your argument. Yes, he hand picked Ruiz to gain a belt. But he still had to be good enough, despite being undersized, to do it. Many boxing publications at the time had Ruiz the favourite.
And yes Moorer and Spinks moved up from LHW to beat the man (abeit briefly, in both cases) But this wasn't the point I was making - I was pointing out how rare it is for former middleweight champions to beat heavyweights.

 

Jones was coming off a dominant stoppage win over Jeff Lacy before The Green Machine who was a heavy underdog annihilated him.

 

Again, this is rewriting history. It was well known that Jones was finished at this point, so travelling to Australia to beat a hard punching cruiserweight was absolutely not seen as 'an easy win.' Jones had not beaten a top level operator in years and many fans had been calling for him to retire since after the Johnson fight in 2004. Again, I'm happy to have a sensible discussion but what you saying here is simply untrue.

 

Again this is not true - and I'm getting tired of correcting your factual inaccuracies. Lacey was finished after Calzaghe and Jones was finished after Johnson. Lacey v Jones was seen as a battle of two washed up fighters. Jones was absolutely not a heavy favourite going in against Green - certainly not in any publications I read at the time. In fact, it was barely covered here as Jones was seen as so washed up. the boxing world had been calling for him to retire since 2004 - listen to the HBO commentary on the Johnson fight. Jones had been knocked out twice previously and hadn't beaten a valid contender in years. I'm not sure how that would make him a favourite when stepping up a division vs a big puncher in his back yard. You are blatantly rewriting history to suit your own argument.

 

What? There are people in this very thread fawning over that win even though it wasn't even what the thread was originally about. Obviously Roy was a talented fighter. I don't think anyone disputes that. He also ducked fights, cherry picked and had such a horrible fall from grace at an extent that has never been seen before or since from such a highly regarded fighter. It's not that impressive because Ruiz sucks and posed little threat compared to other ranked heavyweights. Ruiz was smaller, couldn't punch and had minimal skills relative to his peers. a glorified clubfighter without the aid of Don King. Lots of fighters from lower weights past and present had the skills required to whoop Ruiz. He was a total joke of a fighter.

 

There's nothing of a revisionist nature in that post. Please point out the falsehoods.

 

I already did.

 

Jones was a solid favorite to win. That's an irrefutable and documented fact.

 

I'm convinced that most people either rely on highlights or near 30 year old memories when it comes to Jones. Whilst Jones looked amazing for the most part, if you watch his 175lb career he absolutely had some vulnerabilities. You can't watch the first Griffin bout or the Del Valle knockdown and then tell me Jones utterly stomps. Beterbiev at his best would be Jones' best H2H opponent at 175lbs. If you don't think he has a chance to land a cross like Del Valle did then you're just being bias. Beterbiev would trouble Jones by fighting out of a crouch using his strong jab.

Discussions about Jones at MW, SMW and HW are absolutely irrelevant here for a H2H match up.

Also, reminder that Jones was rarely drug tested in his prime. He likely wouldn't even be allowed to compete today.

 

You cried about me saying Green beating Jones was embarrassing and going against the script at the time. Jones was a significant betting favorite. You didn't point out any falsehoods that were stated or show how I was attempting to rewrite history.

 

Nobody cried.
It WAS an embarrassing loss.
I never, ever saw Jones cited as a betting favourite. The context of where he was in his career at that time tells you what was likely to happen - and it did. That is my point. People are trying to paint him as having anything left in the tank in 2009, which he did not.

 

Green was a 4 to 1 underdog at the time thats a fact lad

 

Toney should have a win over Peter same guy who knocked Wlad on his ass. Peter would annihilate Beterbiev, you can't tell me otherwise.

 

Yeah, Roy didn’t look as invincible at 175 as he did at 160&168. He was showing some weaknesses, even before made the jump to HW and came back down.

But there’s also the flip side of the coin.

Roy was dropped by a light punching Del Valle, but Artur was dropped by a club fighter long before his KD against Callum Johson(eventhough it was a flash KD). While he clearly has the edge over Roy in durability, he ain’t George Chuvalo either.

There are certain things that Bivol does better than prime Roy. More consistent jab, better high guard and better defensive fundamentals. But he’s very orthodox in his ways. He has good movement, but nowhere near as good as prime Roy’s. He does throw good combinations, but he’s mostly content with 1-2s. I remember posting in Bivol/Beterbiev RBR that 1-2s weren’t cutting it, that Bivol needed to throw more combinations to stop a wrecking machine like Beterbiev. Roy could throw those combinations, and throw them from weird angles. He’ll throw a short left hook when you expect a right hand, he’ll throw a right cross when you expect a jab. I keep thinking of the left uppercut that KOd Griffin, Beterbiev will be walking into a lot of those shots.

One more thing Bivol lacked is a check left hook, which is essential for a boxer going up against a pressure fighter. And Roy had a tremendous check left hook which would help him keep his distance from Artur.

As acknowledged by Serge above, Beterbiev gets hit a lot due to his style. Aside from the KD against Callum Johnson, Marcus Browne and Yarde were touching him a lot and giving him problems with their speed. When It comes to speed or power, those two can’t hold a candle to prime Roy, even the LHW version.

Another note is that Beterbiev had a serious stamina advantage over those guys, an advantage he would not hold against Roy who had a great engine himself.

I can certainly see Beterbiev trapping Roy on the ropes, scoring punches to his body and grazing shots to his temple even if he couldn’t find his chin flush and scoring a few KDs. But even with the KDs, based on what I’ve seen from both, I would have to favour Roy by a close, competitive decision.