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

Not really, Ruiz sucked. He got destroyed in 19 seconds by David Tua.

 

And yet, only two guys gave a prime Ruiz an easy fight. Tua and RJJ.

 

Fair enough.

You have your method of ranking and I have mine.
The methodologies are influenced by matters of opinion.

I draw your attention to this extract from my earlier post (#45)

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I counted his past prime (but still close to prime) losses to Tarver, Johnson and Calzaghe.
For his post Calzaghe bouts (wins and losses) I consider that he was shot or very near shot and did not factor them in.

 

Boxing is subjective, its why i love it so much.

I just think out of everyone RJJ gets judged the worst for past prime losses and quite often he gets ranked below people who themselves lost when past prime.

But then again like you said, here I am calling you a harsh judger despite you ranking him higher than I do lol.

 

If Roy had retired after the victory against Tarver for me he was in the top 10 p4p all time. He had beaten two great champions like Hopkins and Toney (McCallum is too but he was at the end of his career), three great fighters like Tarver, Hill and Reggie Johnson. Only one defeat, by disqualification, then avenged with a victory by knockout. Unfortunately he didn't retire after the first match with Tarver and he went badly knocked out in the rematch with Magic Man and with Glen Johnson.

 

Ruiz was so bad that Oquendo, Rahman, Holyfield, Johnson, Golota, and McCline couldn’t beat him.

All of those fights were either close wins or clear wins for Ruiz.

I thought Valuev also lost their first fight clearly. Didn’t watch and score the second fight but I read it was similar to the first fight.

 

Always a voice of reason on this forum

 

Then so is De La Hoyas,Mosley, PAC, and company.

 

Right he just made HECTOR CAMCHO look like a power puncher.

 

The problem is that people are idiots that actually think being 35 years old is still "prime".
The only division that you could make an argument for 35 not being too old is heavyweight but outside of that 35 is old in any other division.
Never have met a boxer who all the sudden " peaked" at 35 years old after fighting for years.

 

I really don't think you understand the power and strength that a natural heavyweight has.

 

I think he should have called it a day after the Ruiz fight. Made history with that win. Go out on top.

 

There was no controversial decision. Roy outclassed Tarver that night. People were mostly surprised that Roy had a semi competitive fight once for a change and let me repeat that, yes semi competitive.

I personally would rank Roy lower if he would have retired after that fight.

 

I completely agree. I find it odd that people claim a speed and reflexes based fighter was still prime - or close to prime - at 35 plus. He was post prime after '98 IMO. And certainly declining for the Ruiz fight. Definitely post prime for Tarver. And absolutely finished as a top level operator by the Johnson fight - anyone watching that fight and claiming he was still anywhere near prime - or just after prime - wasn't watching the previous decade ...

 

It seems like his team never figured that out. Crazy he continued fighting well over a decade after his prime ended.