Roy Jones as a Middleweight champ

Hopkins improved a bit after 1993, but I think Roy Jones probably improved a bit too.

Jones at his best was just better than any version of Hopkins.

Jones was the best.

 

That´s quite an understatement Jones improved too, I agree but not much while Hopkins improved very much in every department.

I think the best Jones always beats Hopkins. However, that does not mean he would be better.

Not by far.

 

What a dumb,narrow minded,bigoted post.

Jones's resume stacks up very well against Hopkins or Toney who get credit for their "old school" skills and mindset and was miles and away better than the likes of Benn,Eubank or Calzaghe's or whatever contempory around his weight you care to name.

He had some average competition especially after 2000 but prior to that he beat a high calibre of opponent and beat them well.

The ease with which he beat the likes of Hill,Griffin,McCallum,Johnson,Toney,Hopkins etc is what gets held against him imo when in actual fact no one else did it as easily as Roy.Hence the endless attempts to discredit any of Jones's performances/opponents.

I mean people (probably like you) still try to say Jones dodged a Toney rematch despite whipping him 12-0 when they actually fought.He simply can't be given any credit from some people no matter how well he did,and if all else fails lets just play the "he juiced" card.

It's pathetic really.

 

Those are the kind of posts that are better off just not answering.

 

What the ****? It was a close fight that could have gone either way. It was a clearly ****ed up version of Hopkins, too. In fact, I thought he was lucky not to get absolutely stuffed on the cards considering he was in the guy's hometown.

I give Roy a lot of credit for beating Hopkins, but he was far from the finished product. Agenda posting again?

 

He was in an awful state in the Mercado fight. It's clear, he was much more hittable, chinny and wild.

The change in Hopkins was extremely gradual imo. He fought with roughly the same style for his first few title defences, in fact. There wasn't a sudden moment of realisation where he decided to switch styles - not least because there wasn't this massive vulnerability in him that was suddenly exposed that he had to correct: he may have been a brawler/pressure fighter back then, but he still did a very good job of getting to the punch first, protecting himself on the inside etc. He was no mug defensively. The way I see it, he steadily started adding complexities to his game - different angles, throwing different combinations, adding in counter-punching, being more crafty on the inside. Naturally, his legs and stamina declined with age, so he started to hold back more and let the guy come to him. He started little moves against Trinidad to neutralise the guy's attacks. He deliberately didn't impose his strength on DLH, wanted to out-box him instead. When he went up in weight, he had to rely on his smarts rather than physicality. It was a very slow, methodical change.

 

Monzon and Hagler stayed at MW. It looked like Hopkins would as well but he eventually moved up. Hopkins skipped SMW and beat Tarver for the LHW World Title.

Jones only went 2-0 (1) in MW World Title Fights but it doesn't mean that Monzon was better.

Jones beat Hopkins (W12) before either man had peaked IMO. He beat Thomas Tate (KO2) when Tate was at his worst. At MW Jones also beat Jorge Vaca KO1 and Jorge Castro W10. Beating the likes of Glenn Thomas (KO8) and Glenn Wolfe (KO1) isn't a huge deal but he beat these guys more impressively than fighters like James Toney, Mike McCallum, Michael Nunn, Virgil Hill, and Gianfranco Rosi.

What Jones did at SMW, LHW, and even his one fight at HW can't be ignored.

I can't stand the guy but he was a great fighter. H2H he beats Monzon most of the time IMO, maybe everytime.

Monzon was very good, great even but his record can be criticized as well.

Monzon went 62-3-9 from 1963-1969. During this time he beat very few notable fighters. He beat a past prime Jorge Jose Fernandez twice (W12 x2), the first fight was very close. He drew with Bennie Briscoe (D10) as well. The 3 losses were to little known fighters, he also had 9 draws. Imagine if those draws would have been losses... 62-12 with very few notable wins??? Doesn't sound so good.

In 1970 he beat a past prime Nino Benvenuti for the MW World Title (KO12). He beat Benvenuti again 6 months later (KO3). He beat a past prime Emile Griffith twice (KO14 and W15). He beat a past prime Jose Naples (KO7) who was coming up from WW. He alos beat Briscoe W15, Tony Mundine KO7, and Rodrigo Valdez x2 (W15 x2) among others. He retired as MW Champ in 1977.

Go ahead with the hate.

 

I don't know about him being in "awful" shape. I'd say he was in great shape to keep the pressure against Mercado who tired at the end. However I do think that the high altitude may have had something to do with Hopkins struggling, but again Hopkins seemed to be dealing with it better than the native Mercado.

I'd say that his style change is quite visible from 1993 to 1997. He went from being a pressure fighter to a counter puncher. Hopkins was not naturally talented like Roy Jones, he was someone who learned through experience. At the time he faced Jones, he did not have the necessary experience to deal with such a difficult opponent. As I said previously, you don't go from beating Gilbert Baptist to beating a peaking Roy Jones. It just doesn't happen.

This is as complete a performance as I ever saw from Hopkins:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgphmCrLwpY[/ame]


Quite different from the seek and destroy fighter that he used to be:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1BxDNgP4qZQ[/ame]


Defensively he certainly became more adept.

 

How about against Echols and Allen in the first fight, when he was already a long reigning champ. Was he the finished product then?

 

Moore had fought over 100 times though, had been the number 1 contender at both middleweight and light heavyweight and had beaten the likes of Lloyd Marshall, Jimmy Bivins, Holman Williams, Bert Lytell, Jack Chase, Cocoa Kid, so I think we're talking about different calibre wins.

Hopkins had beaten Gilbert Baptist & Wayne Powell and was ranked 7 next to Vinny Pazienza.

 

How can you factor in fights that did happen above the weight limit? Mw Jones would not be able to hang in there with Monzon. Far too inexperienced. And he ranks behind Monzon. At mw more clealry than p4p though.

 

Very good post. I completly agree :good

 

I find it doubtfull you've seen all his fights if you're posting a draw that was clearly a win as evidence Hopkins wasnt near his prime. Hopkins was always a great boxer and slowed his focus would be defense/counter punching, this isnt necessarily an improvement

Hopkins would have been a better opponent than some of those men but he is the 1 who turned the Jones fight down, turning down a 40% purse

 

I think his boxer-puncher mix peaked around Allen II; after that he became more defensive. I would say his defensive peak was probably Trinidad.

 

So you havent seen the fight then? If you have whats your score. Aside from the 2 kds against the run of play Mercado did little. I posted this a while ago:

http://www.eastsideboxing.com/forum/showthread.php?t=186221&highlight=mercado

Just watched this fight and its a good 1, people only seem to remember the older Hopkins, but this Hopkins fights 3miniutes a round, continually comes forwards, looks for the KO/Execution, throws combinations to the head and body.

SPOILER - If you want to watch, skip over to youtube and look it up

First off I'm going to say Hopkins was robbed, he won 9 rounds on my card but it was a hostile crowd in Ecudar with some home cooking. I didn't see punch stats but I'd guess Hopkins threw 3-5 times as many punches, landed flusher/cleaner, beat

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to the punch, was the aggressor, had

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on the ropes for the majority of the fight and

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wasnt landing counters on the ropes.

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was certainly a banger though as many SOuth Americans turn out to be and hurt a somewhat wreckless Hopkins

1. Hopkins - BHOPs starts very fast and aggressive, looking for an early KO, lots of combinations
2. Hopkins - somewhat more cautious round, Hopkins outworks and outboxes

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3. Hopkins - Hopkins winning early,

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was down but the ref ruled it a slip, Hopkins gets really aggressive putting up a hell of a pace really going for the KO after

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was down/hurt
4. Hopkins - Hopkins dominates the round while boxing a bit more conservatively in this round but is a little hurt late, you could give this to

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based on this
5.

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10-8 - Hopkins dominates the round but gets caught and floored later in the round so a 10-8 for

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6. Hopkins - Hopkins fights fire with fire and hurts

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who would have taken a KD if it wasnt for the ropes, could be a KD in some rule sets
7.

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10-8 - Hopkins gets knocked down again after seeming to dominate the round, he is up at about a count 2
8.

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- Hopkins seems to be tiring and taking a round off,

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edges this 1
9. Hopkins - Hopkins turning up the pace again and getting on top
10. Hopkins
11. Hopkins - these last 2 rounds Hopkins is completely outworking

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, both seem tired as the fight is at high altitude and the pace is frantic
12. Hopkins -

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runs for the final round but still gets caught and hurt late

My Card: 115-111 - and it could be 116-110 imo. Closest I could have it would be 114-112 to Hopkins and thats with Hopkins not getting any of his KDs called.