P4P better

Again, what has this to do with anything?

 

You Paz losing to Roy at 168 and compared it to Tommy`s resume which is silly, Paz wa too small to be a top super-middle or a top middleweight, he just didn`t have the reach and never proved himself at those weights, Benitez wa a better light-middle than Paz which is the highest weight that Paz actually won a would title.

 

You're just throwing weird stuff out there. Yes, Hearns arguably best win during this period was better than one of Jones's lesser ones. So what?

That says nothing about their total body of work at these weights. And you still haven't explained why above 154 shouldn't count for Hearns. He was still in his 20's when he moved from 154 and had his first fight at 160 when 24, but it doesn't count because he wasn't quite as successful as before?

 

Fantastic career as Jones had, there is an interesting "what if" if he hadn't been so carefully managed early on. Despite in reality cruising to an Olympic gold in '88 he didn't fight for a title or a ranked opponent until five years later. That's a bit weird, I think. In '90-'92, when the MW division was at one of its all time peaks, he was after all 22-24 years old with a great amateur pedigree. I think he could have mixed it up with anyone in the division even at that early age. I mean, Hearns was only 23 and already a title holder without Jones's amateur pedigree when he faced Leonard.

Imagine if Jones had cleaned out the early 90's MW division...

 

Jones never even contested for a lineal championship, let alone won one. He wasn't a champion nor did he try to be. The only reason Tommy is more inconsistent than Roy is because he actually took on legit challenges wherever he could.

 

The Ring magazine recognized him.

Hes also lineal champ via KO only rules cause he knocked out Virgil Hill.

 

Because to what I first said which was that Hearns was easier to hit and hurt at the higher weights, that`s the only point I was making.

 

The Ring recognised him without reason though, they gifted him their belt. Virgil Hill vs Henry Maske established a LHW lineage then Dariusz Michalczewski beat Virgil Hill for the lineal and unified titles. Dariusz was beaten by Julio Cesar Gonzalez, Gonzalez was beaten by Zsolt Erdei, and Erdei was beaten by Denis Grachev, who was then beaten by Edwin Rodriguez. Rodriguez was beaten by Ward at SMW, so the LHW lineage wasn't at stake afaik, but he did lose to Thomas Williamson at LHW, who then lost to Adonis Stevenson, who lost to Gvozdyk, who lost to Beterbiev, who is the reigning LHW champion whether you recognise the lineage back to Hill or not thanks to his win over Bivol. Boxing historian Springs Toledo wrote the following about Roy's claim to the LHW lineage:
"As for Ring Magazine and its recognition of Jones -it was a real head-scratcher given their justified attacks on the WBS organizations and all the problems caused by multiple faux championships. To turn around and make a Jones-inspired allowance to get him recognized as champion, when it was his own fault he wasn’t fighting the next best contender in the top two (and didn’t at middle or super middle either -and certainly not at heavy) was and remains illegitimate. Jones was the best fighter in two divisions and arguably three (though McClellan’s presence at middleweight #1/#2 right next to Jones makes that one unclear), but let’s face facts: As great as he was, Jones was a belt collector. He was chasing trick titles. No, the Hill-Erdei succession is the one any self-respecting boxing historian is going to acknowledge."

 

You started with saying that Jones was bigger than most of his opponents, which just isn't true. I can't come to think of a fight where he clearly outsized his opponent, and at LHW he was smaller if anything.

When I called you on this you started with that Hearns only ever was hurt over 154 and that Jones was hurt many more times, by which I suppose you meant for some reason Jones above 168 compared to Hearns below 160.

When I said that that comparison made no sense, you now go back to the fantastically unoriginal statement that a fighter gets hit more the higher up the weights he goes. Yes, that's almost exclusively true, but has nothing to do with our original disagreement about Jones being bigger than his opponents.

In between that you managed to compare one of Hearn's best wins with a quite average one of Jones's in a bizarre attempt to diminish Jones's MW/SMW run compared to Hearns's at WW/JMW.

You are a bit all over the place, to put it somewhat politely. And I think that's because you have such a hard time with a simple "oh, my mistake".

 

Toney had ATG ability. But "NO" he shouldn't be by Robinson, Napoles,
Armstrong, or Moore .
He lacked what they had consistency. No ATG loses to Montell Griffith,
twice, and struggles with Dave Tiberi in their primes (A fight I saw live, and thought Toney
won,but wouldn't have argued with if they gave it to Tiberi)
plus many more close calls he had against less than stellar competition.
Toney is what I call a should've been.
But check the history of boxing, there's been many of those .

 

I think the Hearns domination of Cuevas and Duran is better than the Toney win. Also the SRL 2 fight of course. I would say the Benetiz and Hill wins is on par with the Toney win. Hearns has my vote in a close one, I'll take the fighter who fights everyone over the one who played dodgeball

 

I think Hearns dodged McCallum more deliberately than Jones dodged anyone. I think Tommy's team thought there was a serious risk that he'd lose to McCallum. I don't think Jones thought that of any fighter.

 

And I don't know how keen Mugabi was on Hearns, but that was definitely a worth while fight which never was made.

 

LOL. cmon man. Hearns didnt dodge McCallum. He was making more money fighting Duran, SRL, and Hagler. Also he had hand problems for the better part of his career which 2 of these had to be rescheduled.. Not Hearns fault that Mike wasnt a draw and was a distraction.

RJJ campaigned at 168 for 2 YEARS !! After Toney, he fought NO ONE. He missed out on the better fighters at 168 because he was a protected HBO fighter. Whether he didnt want to go oversees because what happened to him in the Olympics or whatever the reasons were, He simply dodged the better fighters for less money and took soft touches. And his legacy clearly suffers for it. If he challenged himself and fought the better guys at 168 and won, this wouldn't even be a close comparison. We would be talking about RJJ being a top 15 p4p great of all time, maybe top 10

 

Absolutely.

It was a bizarre situation.

Roy Snr had helped to develop a guy who had extraordinary skills and a highly unorthodox style.

But then he wouldn’t let him off the leash.

It was the most frustrating situation.

He used to beat him with lead pipes and make him fight with one hand literally tied behind him.

Then when he turned pro, he hid title fight opportunities from him.

That has been confirmed by Roy’s handlers back then, the Levin brothers, Stan and Fred.

Stan offered Roy Snr title fights, and he went back and told them that Roy didn’t want them, without Roy’s knowledge at the time.

Roy Snr also wouldn’t tie in with a promoter or a TV network.

Roy’s career only took off, after he’d split from his father in 1992.

Roy Snr shot a dog belonging to Roy’s friend which they were looking after. Roy Snr said that it had bit his sister, so he shot it.

Roy was outraged, and then he split with him. They then didn’t speak to each other for around 5/6 years.

Roy then signed with HBO.

Within a year, he was fighting Hopkins for Toney’s vacant title which had just been relinquished.

Roy should have been in that MW mix of the early 90’s along with Toney and Reggie Johnson etc. He also sparred Lindel Holmes and Reggie at the time.

It was a travesty.