Jones v Hagler @ MW

Roy Jones Jr, did weigh in on the same day for the Hopkins fight. The weigh in was the morning of the fight. He complained about it.
But it's still by far his best win at middleweight.

 

Hiya pal, how's things?

You know how much I love our debates on Roy. They're always great fun.

I read some of your posts yesterday on the Tyson/Douglas thread and they made me laugh. I might contribute.

Regarding Marvin, I only used the Hearns version as an example. I used it because Marvin was still great then, and it was probably his biggest win, in what was one of the greatest fights of all time. But feel free to use any version of Marvin for this debate.

Of course I have to use a version of Roy from his 20's, because that's when he fought there.

I agree about Hagler's chin, it was great. But I don't see how that would mean he'd have handled Roy easily and taken him out in a few rounds. To me, that's illogical. Again, I'm not saying he couldn't have beaten Roy, but I'm certain it wouldn't have been both easy and early. Yes, Marvin was a destructive puncher, but there's no guarantee he'd have found Roy's chin. Despite not having a great MW resume for obvious reasons, Roy has to be one of the fastest guys ever to have fought at the weight. Unless he'd have gotten careless, he'd have been awfully hard to have pinned down. I'd have given McCallum a much bigger chance of beating Roy, than I do Marvin.

I think Roy would have given him nightmares with his unorthodox offense. Then you've got to factor in that Marvin often came in under the limit, and Roy was a SMW on fight night. So not only was Roy faster and more elusive, he was also bigger and heavier. So unless you're specifically looking at Roy with a same day weigh in, you're looking at a guy weighing between 157-160, vs a guy weighing 167 plus, who possessed one punch knockout power. It would have been a tall order for Marvin. I've seen how much Ray's movement bothered him, and although he was faded in 87, he certainly wasn't shot. So that tells me that Roy (who was basically a bigger, more powerful version of Ray) would have caused him major problems.


:good

 

I don't follow-- Hagler only had Vito in trouble because of cuts caused by 2 massive head-butts.

 

The Hopkins fight was very tactical, and Roy had a fractured hand.

Ray Leonard stayed away from Marvin and frustrated the hell out of him, so I don't see how it wouldn't have been possible for Roy to have replicated that performance.

 

He could probably have made 160 with a same day weigh in, just briefly in the very early stages of his career. But I don't really understand what you're asking.

If you want to debate what could have happened had they fought, why don't you do one of the following:

Assume that he wouldn't have been drained.

Choose an early JMW version of him.

Choose a MW version of him we actually saw fight.


Then we can debate. I don't see the point in speculating what would have happened had he been drained.

If he had have been drained and he'd have fought Marvin, you would have had to have favoured Marvin. But that goes without saying. But surely it's better to do a best vs best thread?


:good

 

But why can't we do a fantasy fight between Marvin at his best, vs the best version of Roy from his time at MW?

In my opinion, Roy's absolute peak was when he was 25/26 at SMW. But he was 25 in his last ever fight at MW, when he fought Thomas Tate. And that was just 5 months before he moved up to fight Toney. He looked absolutely sensational against Tate, stopping him in just two rounds. Tate had previously gone 12 rounds with Julian Jackson. So the version of Roy that fought Tate, was just about the best version of Roy there ever was in my opinion.

So choose that version of Roy, and choose the best version of Marvin. The only issue is, Roy would have been a SMW on fight night. But if you ever put Roy in a fantasy fight at MW, in my opinion, you should always choose the Tate version. The Hopkins version of Roy was also a great fighter, but it appears that he had a fractured hand going into the fight. Alton Merkerson says that he pleaded with him to postpone the fight, but he wouldn't because he was 24 and he'd waited four years for the opportunity.

Below is the Tate fight if you're interested:

http://youtu.be/Rt8X8XYwaQw


:good

 

he couldn't get away from hopkins.. how is he going to get away from hagler, who really knows how to step over (ambidextrious), throwing punches all the while from all angles?

hagler ko jones :deal

hagler would walk through fire to ko a lip-a-dip mouth anyway.. something you won't see today

 

I've never felt comfortable picking Hagler against Jones.
Marvin was a special middleweight but he was not a big middle at all, and Jones had that insane speed, unorthodox style and for what it's worth, plenty of pop at 160.

 

I don't see the connection.

Hagler and Hopkins are nothing alike, and Roy was very cautious because he had a fractured hand.

There's a lot of you on here that are certain that Hagler would have taken Roy out, yet he couldn't do anything with Ray Leonard. Again, I'm aware that he was faded at that point, but so was Ray. Ray frustrated the hell out of him with his footwork and his hand speed. When Roy was at his best at MW, his offense was equal to Ray's, and he was bigger, stronger, heavier, and he possessed a lot more firepower.

So please explain how he would have taken out Roy, when he couldn't do anything to a peak WW, who hadn't fought for 3 years, and who'd never fought at MW before?

It's obvious that Roy's speed would have caused Hagler major issues.

 

Exactly.

And he was bigger, heavier, and very hard to hit clean.

Roy at his best at MW, is just a bigger, more powerful version of SRL in my opinion.

 

first of all, throw out leonard-hagler just like you should throw out spinks-holmes or camacho-leonard

lol just watched jones-hopkins.

hagler ko jones

jones wasn't that fast or that strong (compared to what jones afficianados would have one believe) at middleweight. he threw a lot of arm punches.. a bit stiff in his stance.. a bit intimidated against hopkins .. confused in what to do.. inconsistent

no way in hell was jones a better middleweight than hagler.

 

Jones by 4-6 points

 

Since this thread has degraded into talk of Jones being drained, I'll take as a good indication that he would've won. Stop fishing.