Do You agree that James Toney is possibly one of the most overrated american fighters

You are absolutely relentless.

 

Great fighter and great talent.

 

I think he's more overrated H2H than record. His record is pretty good, he's fought some great fighters, beat some great fighters, won a robbery or two, loss a few, done reasonably ridiculously out of shape at ridiculous weights. Overall has some good scalps.

But H2H I find him overrated, people go on about how skilled he is which is true in terms of being in the pocket/mid range, his upper body movement was sensational and he had a great right hand. But his jab wasn't anything special and his footwork ordinary so how can he be as potent H2H as people say? Somebody like monzon would have completely outboxed him.

 

If I was to some up James Toney, I'd firstly say he is a wanker.. but what a great talent and defensive wizard.

 

Hes a twat, but I love him. Hes a character!

 

You also need to consider he's a drugs cheat... that counts against him.

 

He'd be in with a decent chance of possibly beating Hopkins, Eubank and Benn in his day, that sounds like a pretty decent fighter to me.

 

nope.



Didn't even read the opening post.

 

Hopkins would be a nightmare for him - he can move and can fight. Toney loses that one.

 

Well I was always impressed by his speed and head movement at middleweight but sadly he never fought and beat anyone of note past 160. He pretty much avoided Benn and Eubank only to get outclassed by Roy Jones, then got beat by Montell griffin 2x.

As for going from 160 to 200+ Toney needed to take PEDs and was caught out twice ( against Ruiz and Rahman )

So yeah he is over rated, stick him in the ring with Kimbo already and let him retire

 

I didn't read any of the thread, but no...

 

didnt know he was caught in either of the rahman fights?

 

Yes and No.

It depends who you speak to. The problem with the general forum is that it's full of idiots who are biased towards a certain style, race or "personality". If most of them looked at things objectively they wouldn't over exaggerate and put excessive lavish praise on to certain fighters.

So I agree with you he is overrated when people say he's top 10 ATG, or the best fighter of the last 50 years. Or he's achieved more than Hopkins or others who were more dedicated to the sport and disciplined to perform at their best. Or when they say without any hesitation Toney would've ass whupped so and so... and they always bring up "prime" Toney. The problem is how long was this guys prime and why does he have so many indifferent performances (yes it true he has almost double the number fights that a Calzaghe), but still, he had so many fights when he wasn't prime - that it's ridiculous to always make a fanatasy match up and give him the win.

But I also disagree with you - Toney is sometime Underated - when you have others totally belittling his achievements and not recognising his almost unmatched skill and ability (in primarily defensive work and counter punching). And due to this, he does deserve to be recognised as ONE OF the best (not the best) fighters of the last 20 years. Especially in terms of counter punching skill.

Remember you can almost ruin any fighters resume by bringing up points against the opposition. There's someone on this forum who's always banging on about Hopkins beating Welters... well you could make that argument against Hagler. You see when you start doing that, it won't stop. Check Calzaghes resume or anyone else.... you could tear it apart. One way to recognise the worth of an opponent, is to go back and check the odds before the fight, and who was favourite. In many fights like BHop v Trinidad... the loser was favourite (regardless of him moving up in weight). Also, Toneys win vs Jirov was a really good achievement at that time, considering Toney came from nowhere to win that fight.

Even the steroid point, there is an argument in his favour and Bunce read something out last friday about Toney steroid issue. It's on one of griffs videos - "you've gotta love Toney".

Regarding Toney, Forget what the idiots on the general forum say, just listen to Freddy Roach and what he has said about Toney, or listen to Timothy Bradley after beating E Cherry, or BHop giving advise to mma fighter (youtube clip), or Benn, or Eubank or Carl Thompson or countless other boxers/trainers who are real students of the game. They all recognise Toney for his skills and ability - particular counter punching. And to be honest, even I have to admit.... some of that stuff Toney done in the ring (when he was good) was just pure Art.

If you were to make a compilation of his best moves in the ring... and lets say compare it to Hopkins, Calzaghe and Jones... he would only arguably lose out to RJJ in terms of entertainment and artistic counter punching flair. I know there is an argument to be made for all his off nights, but that could be done for Calzaghe too, and to be fair Toneys resume pisses all over Calzaghes.

Speak to boxing experts and they will all tell you Toney was one of the most skilled fighters in our time. He didn't fulfil his potential, but even as a fat blob his skilled carried him through.

 

Toney was one of these fighters who fought to the level of his competition. He would turn up in shape just enough to get the win against lower level fighters and that resulted in a few like the Tiberi fight. Against Iran Barkley he had a dangerous guy in front of him even if he was past it, and was ready for him. I thought he got robbed twice against Griffin. RJJ was a horrible match of styles for him, but his preparation was a joke too.
He also has possibly the best chin of all time, never really troubled in 80-odd fights from middle to heavy.