Name a fighter that would have beaten RJJ the night he fought Toney

I'm calm, mate.

I know who you were replying to. I've seen you say that a lot though, to various different posters, some of whom were not mortal enemies of yours. lol

You know about them but you continuously neglect to mention them even though they're important. I think you're a good guy Loudon, and whilst I know you love Roy, you should try a bit harder to be fair when it comes to Joe sometimes.

The Reid fight was like a comedy of errors. Almost everything that could've went wrong did go wrong. He's was riddled with serious injuries on and off throughout that whole phase of his career early from Juan Carlos Gimenez right up until he fought Omar Sheika (from early 1998 to mid 2000) and he was barely able to do any sparring for both Gimenez and Reid. I think he did 14 rounds in total for Reid and even less for Gimenez. That's **** all sparring for back-to-back fights over the course of a whole year. Even the Sheika fight had to be postponed three times due to him still not having fully recovered from them.

The commentators even mention during the Reid fight that there had been rumours leaked from Wales that his sparring had to be cut short due to him still having injury problems with his wrist and elbow. He had to undergo surgery on his wrist prior to facing Reid, hence why he'd been out of action for 10 months and the fight had to be postponed.

And he was fighting with a badly injured left hand (his power hand) from the 5th round onwards in the fight, up until then he was winning the fight handily (no pun intended) despite all the adversity he'd been through with injury hampering his preparations during training. I'll dig up one of my old posts regarding this whole business later. But in short, Joe was in a completely different league to Reid. Reid just got hella lucky he caught Joe at such a low.

Fair enough. I don't have a problem with you thinking that.

Kessler was a damned good fighter in his prime and Joe beat him comfortably when he was past his own best.

Bika and Hopkins? You can add Reid into that mix as well. What thing did they all share in common when they fought Joe, Loudon? They all had to cheat like **** or employ excessive use of illegal or dirty tactics to give Joe problems or take him down to the wire, including Reid who fought an extremely dirty fight. Reid should've had multiple points deducted from his score in that fight at the very least, so should bloody hit-hold-lead with the head-hit-hold-hold-hold-hold lead with the head and and headbutt some more serial cheat Hopkins.

You only have to watch the first round of the Reid fight to see exactly what his intentions were. The (English) Referee Roy Francis was lived with him. He had to pull him over and angrily rebuke him on a couple of occasions for his flagrant and repeated fouling, you could literally almost see the veins throbbing in his head he was so angry, and had Reid not been the home fighter with the bulk of the crowd behind him, I honestly think he may well have disqualified him.

I very much doubt Kessler would've been able to last the distance against the Calzaghe that fought Eubank and I say that as a huge Kessler fan too. Believe it or not I was actually rooting for Kessler when he fought Joe. That's the god's honest truth by the way.

Joe did beat Eubank pretty easily, and he would've done so even easier had he been fortunate to have the experience of fighting past 8 rounds before and actually faced some world class opposition instead of the motley crew of domestic class opponents and imported stiffs. He may have been more complete when he got older, but he clearly hit much harder in his earlier career and he always possessed natural ability in spades. I think a lot of people fail to realize just how many physical gifts he'd been blessed with and how much natural talent he did possess.

I'm fine. Like I said I think you're a good guy and I do like you. However, I just think you're, to quote your own words, ''very harsh'' when it comes to Calzaghe sometimes that's all, mate.

Brewer didn't drop him and his punch resistance was not what it once was when he fought Roy and Hopkins. Roy isn't the only one who wasn't immune to the effects of ageing and the cumulative effects of getting repeatedly punched in the head for decades, which due to Joe's ultra aggressive style and fiercely competitive nature he did so often for over a quarter of a century.

And Joe was going through an extremely bitter and acrimonious divorce when he fought Salem, which is why he only fought once in 15 months (although it would've been 12 had the WBO not forced him to pull out of the Brian Magee fight) and why he said he's never felt so detached during a fight as he did for that one. His then wife and her legal team weren't just threatening to take him to the cleaners for 50% of his career earnings, they were also threatening to rob him off 50% of all his future earnings, too. It wasn't exactly a top secret that he went off the rails at intervals and was very depressed throughout much of that period. IIRC, he described it as his ''Year and a half of hell.''

And if you watch the Salem fight you'll see that the main reason he got dropped was because he rushed in angrily after being on the receiving end of repeated fouls from Salem who was as filthy as a tramp's sock. He even remonstrated angrily at the referee about his fouling shortly before doing so.

Joe was dropped by an illegal albeit accidental closeline forearm to the face by Jones after his punch resistance was not what it was during his prime years.

Now don't misinterpret what I'm saying here. Yes, he could be dropped and hurt, and I don't doubt for a second Roy was capable of doing that, but many conveniently forget that he did have an excellent chin in his prime and a fierce will to win and a huge heart. The only time he was ever truly hurt and in any real danger of losing (from a legal blow) due to this was when he got caught by a huge shot of Byron Mitchell and he proved his mettle by getting right back up and standing toe-to-toe with him and returning the favour within seconds.

Again, I don't have a problem with anyone picking Jones to win. My main bone of contention is with those who badly underrate Joe and what he brings to the table. At his injury free fully motivated best he was an extremely formidable fighter and he presents serious problems for any of the fighters whose careers I'm familiar with that fought in or around the same divisions as he did during his prime. :good