If Roy Jones Jr. had retired after Tarver 1 where would you have ranked him?

I agree.

You can’t ignore them. But then you have to see them for what they were.


The guy easily beat Hopkins, Toney, Griffin, Hill and Reggie etc.

Yet he then couldn’t beat Danny Green or Glen Johnson.


It would be like working out where to rank Duran, after looking at his fights against Joppy and Paz etc.

 

Yeah I definitely agree Roy showed his dominance over a longer period of time and through a far wider variety of accomplishments, I just meant more so regarding the ridiculous and almost otherworldly qualities of their fighting approaches which let them get away with certain things. I remember reading Roy was worked hard on a farm growing up by his dad and he watched how roosters fought and taunted one another, I don’t think he necessarily relied only on physical gifts, there was clearly a very cerebral fighter and method behind that magic. Hamed was a great fighter but as time wore on he seemed to believe he just had to bulldoze through everyone and swing wildly for the fences, I know much of that was his ego and lack of discipline and maybe leaving Ingle in I think 98 played its part. I remember reading about his hand issues and that combined with losing whatever remained of his motivations after Barrera took him apart did him in. I think he did respectably enough in the Barrera match up considering the circumstances and MAB turning out to be an atg. I’m not sure if he could ever beat him, a terrible match up really.

 

Naz was done when he left Brendan.

Just before they split, he told Brendan that he didn’t want to do roadwork anymore.

He then hired Oscar Suarez, who just let Naz do what he wanted.

He then briefly worked with Manny Steward, where he disrespected him by not following his advice/instructions.

It’s a real shame that he couldn’t have kept motivated and remained with Brendan.

 

xx

 

Roy Jones was Ring and Boxing writers association of America fighter of the decade for the 90s,went on to win a version of the Heavyweight Title in the early 2000s,then continued fighting when heavily advised not to,the rest is History. Had he retired after Tarver top 5 PFP for me . It’s like there were two careers for Jones,all his accomplishments pre Heavyweight and all his losses post Heavyweight.

 

Just to put things into perspective,Jones was almost 41 when he fought Green and having his 60th fight,when he fought Johnson he was almost 36 and having his 51st fight iirc .

 

They’d have been lucky to have taken rounds off of any pre-HW version of Roy.

 

I'm not one for lists but I used to be a lot harsher on Roy for his late career collapse. Now, not so much. I think he bounced back too quick to face Johnson after the Tarver loss. It was a rough KO and then he got an even more violent KO after and never was quite the same. I remember when he got knocked out by Johnson and was down for a really long time I just worried that he was permanently injured and might be done for good. What's crazy is in the second Tarver fight he came out and dominated the first round and looked great.

He also continued on and fought some serious punchers well above his weight like Enzo Maccarenlli and Denis Lebedev

I remember being at Hopkins vs Orneleas which was the set up to Jones 2 and hearing people in the crowd discussing Green getting Roy out in 1. I never bothered to watch Jones vs Hopkins II but remember people discussing Jones doing well for a while

 

It would be ideal if Roy Jones Jr. retired after defeating John Ruiz. What would the ATG P4P list look like then?

 

How much steroids is one allowed to take before it starts being questionable?

 

There are many fighters that need that asterisk next to their names but we need to keep the same energy on all of em

 

People should

 

You are right.

 

Hard to say
No doubt talented but I don't think he was ever really the top man of any division for any period of time
Fast and talented and definitely would be held in high regard for winning world titles in different weight divisions including HW