Roy Jones Fall From Grace - Never Saw Anything Like It ..

We all know the last 15 years were a train wreck. But he objectively had a great prime from 93 to 04. He won over 20 world title fights and there was no fourth rate WBO title among his titles. If you let all the post prime losses affect ypur judgement its a form of myopia.

Seeing Ray Robinson and Ezzard Charles' post prime fights would not lessen their standing in my eyes.

Something is missing in your logic.

 

I personal train (er, get beat up) by a guy here in AL who was trained by Jones Sr. in Pensacola and sparred with Jones there at his gym in the mid to late 90's and asked him this very question. His response was that Jones was even better than we thought he was and that the gap in skills, even when pros came to Pensacola to spar with him, was so great that he got tired and bored of training like a spartan when it all came so easy and naturally to him. Hearing how hard Jones Sr. was on my trainer, and he reported some absolutely throwback brutal workout sessions, I kinda can see how this all happened. His take was also that after Jones got beaten and was on the downside, it became challenging again and somewhat more enjoyable than before.

 

Some great diverse contributions everywhere on this thread...this board really is roy jones jnr in his 1989-2003 prime!

 

If Joe Louis was alive I'd suggest he make a comeback to clean out the heavyweight division after cleaning out the cruiser's of course.

 

One of the strangest occurrences ever, he seemed to literally be asleep after taking a half decent shot once his bubble had been burst.

 

The Macrinelli fight....when that Russian anthem played for Roy...Ive honestly never been so moved by a anthem in sport since SRL 1976 it was rousing...in HD 4K tv it seemed like it was in my living room....than I thought it was Apollo Creed all over again the way Roy got knocked out I thought he was going to die :-(

No offence to Macrinelli but hes the kind of dangerous mule a prime Jones would make a plaything for 5 rounds before closing the show like a master thespian

 

Man oh man I had about 2 hours sleep before a game of football the night before the Calzaghe Jones fight. I must have been 14/15 at the time and I was so disappointed. Absolutely ecstatic for Calzaghe, but I was very ignorant to how good Jones once was and how far he’s deteriorated. Instead it was a one sided, 11 round beat down of one of the best fighter of his generation.

 

Honestly it had gone way to far at this point, but Enzo? Honestly man, why was Enzo even boxing still, let alone Jones. That was an absolute travesty.

 

Y'all musta forgot. No one can take away from Roy what he accomplished in the ring. He achieved ATG status long before he met Tarver. But his losses hurt his legacy, yeah. It showed that he had no longevity whatsoever past prime, unlike most other special fighters. Nearly every ATG has that one last great performance in him when they are past their best, Roy tried and tried but never had a great win after the Tarver KO loss.

Roys aura of invincibility was worth a lot. He had a great advantage going into his fights because, at least deep down, most of his opponents knew they were but opponents, no matter how good they were, and going the distance was going to be the best they'd try to achieve against Roy. His athleticism was just too much to overcome. But Tarver didn't care about that. Montell Griffin didn't care about that either and gave Roy hell in their first encounter. Not saying he was better than Roy, far from, and neither was Tarver, but these two didn't care about Roys aura of invincibility and did great. And what little respect Tarver might have had for Roy in their 1st fight, was all gone in the rematch. Both Tarver and Griffin were real good fighters though, never forget that.

But after that, the pattern to beat Roy was laid out. Roy was beatable and his punch resistance was gone. Some of his opponents later on were able to take advantage of it, and some weren't, because Roy was still a good boxer after all.

Glad he seems to be doing good these days, his speech and mind still seem quick after all these KOs. The guy has a great boxing IQ, it'd be a shame if he couldn't share it anymore.

 

There's nothing wrong with the logic at all. Seeing someone get destroyed is different than hearing about it.

Seeing someone you consider great get destroyed by nobodies is even worse.

Ask younger fans what they think of Roy Jones. None of them are saying he's #2 Pound-For-Pound all time, like even veteran fight people were after he beat John Ruiz and won a heavyweight belt and was 48-1 (and had wiped out that one loss in a single round in the rematch).

They don't because they saw what came after. They don't just focus on 'his prime.'

It's easier to focus on someone's 'prime' when all you can see are them fighting in their 'primes.'

You can't forget something you can click on right now and watch all over again any time you'd like.

 

Meldrick T|aylor fell apart pretty quick after out-boxing Chavez, he was ner the same again, he got blew away by Norris and Espana and that was it, Curry was similar too except he looked decent v McCallum after being battered by the unheralded Honeyghan.

 

Don't know about that. Leonard's embarrassing loss and blow out against Camacho was as ugly as they come in my opinion.

 

Taylor did move up and win a welterweight title after Chavez. It was really after Norris that he started to fade rapidly.

 

This is actually true. People will always argue about "prime", but getting out at the right time does affect how you're perceived.

Suppose Joe Frazier retired after the FOTC.

Suppose Rocky Marciano didn't retire in 1956 and stayed on to fight Patterson, Johansson and Liston.

If Jones retired after Ruiz, he'd be invincible today.

Someone who got KTFO by Tarver and Johnson can never be invincible.