Manny Pacquiao and Roy Jones

Sure that's true. Jones fought a lot of unarmed civilians. But still, if you look at guys like Toney and Hopkins, even though guys make a lot of excuses for them (e.g. green, weight drained etc.) they still looked excellent against Jones and Jones still soared above them. Guys like Morales and Barrera looked like they had seen better days against Pac and DLH and Hatton simply weren't in the fights. With Hatton that might have more to do with incompetence than anything else though.

I know I sound like I'm taking all credit away from Pac, but I will say that I do think him a great fighter. I'm just being a bit conservative with him.

 

I don't know why you'd say that, it's not like Roy never lost or had a tough fight even in his prime.


Besides, how much can you rate a guy based on what you think he "would" or "wouldn't" do rather than what he actually did?

Roy had some big wins and big achievements, but he also had big shortcomings, big questions marks, and ultimately big failures - all of which have to be considered when doing a full assessment of him.

 

What were the tough fights in his prime? Losing three rounds to Montell Griffin before being on the verge of knocking him out and being silly enough to finish the job whilst Montell was on the ground?

The 3 or 4 rounds he lost in a listless display against old Mike McCallum?

Roy pretty much coasted past everyone in his prime. I don't see what someone like Morales or Juan Manuel Marquez would do to outbox him.

You can rate a fight quite a lot on what you think his level of ability is. I don't see the evidence for thinking Morales or Marquez level fighters beat a prime version of him. I don't think either are much better than the Toney or Hopkins that Roy toyed with.