Reggie Johnson - Is Roy Jones the only fighter to really beat him?

Just watched the Toney fight.

A weird but good fight, Johnson looks incredibly hard to outbox but a awkward style. He sort of threw the fight away by not working hard enough and dispensing off his jab in the mid rounds. I mean, during the middle rounds, a very lazy, James Toney outworked him.

I thought it was dead close, could have went either way really.

Toney : 5,6,7,9,11,12 KD'd 2
Johnson: 1,2,3,4,8,10
Total: 114-113 Johnson (6-6 Draw)

 

I had johnson losing to toney but that fight was so brilliantly difficult to score that I can live with anything from 7-5 either way.

 

Basically everything after 4 coulda went either way IMO.

Surprisingly good fight though, especially when you consider Toney won it on purely workrate. Dosent make it sound good.

 

The real debate point of this thread is being missed imo.

What the hell is knifey spooney?

 

It's a gag from The Simpsons, where Paul Hogan (star of Crocodile Dundee) walks into a bar where the Simpsons are seated and challenges Bart (who's doing nothing but playing with a butter knife) with the old line "You call that a knife? This is a knife." Except instead of a knife he pulls out a spoon, which Bart immediately calls him on, and Hogan somewhat abashedly replies "Alright, alright, I see you played knifey spooney before".

 

Haha cheers!

Which poster said that in your sig

 

Bump

 

Toney vs Johnson is one of the very first fights I ever watched all the way through (like literally among the first three or four) and it seemed obvious to me Reggie Johnson won. But I haven't seen it since...

 

I felt Toney edged him by a point by it was a 1 point either way type fight. Target won pretty clearly IMO but that was Johnson at the end. I remember feeling the Castro fights and Jackson fights could have gone his way. At least one of the Castro fights.

Johnson was a brilliant fighter. He doesn’t get the credit he deserves IMO.

 

I'm Blood Green in this ancient thread.

 

Teddy's commentating is atrocious. I had Tarver narrowly winning 114-113

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Reminds me that was a pretty rough crop of middleweights in the early 90s. At the top Toney came through with Jones and McCellan but just beneath that there were the Reggie Johnson's, Lamar Parks and some clown named Bernard Hopkins.

 

Had the pleasure of speaking with Reggie a few years back. An energetic, fun guy.

Definitely had more bad luck than good throughout his career when it came to judges, and I'd agree that Jones is the only guy who clearly beat him in his prime years. Tarver definitely beat him as well, but as Reggie was thirty-five by that point, in his eighteenth year as a professional, was a little undersized at 175 and had taken that soul-sapping hammering from Roy, I think we can safely say he had seen better days by that point.

Don't have my cards to hand right now (might leave my scores / rounds breakdown here later when I do), but my overall impressions going from memory of his controversial fights are as follows.

I had Toney edging him by a single point, largely due to Toney's strong finish, which was a curious specialty of his at 160. 114-113 Toney, so not a robbery for Johnson. But it was extremely close and not easy to score, so anyone who had to either guy by one, maybe two rounds, or anyone who had it a draw, was 'right' so to speak.

I remember I had Johnson a winner over John David Jackson; my mind is telling me 116-113 right now, but don't take that as gospel. But my overall impression is that, while it wasn't a clear win for Reggie or a highway job, he was unlucky. A draw would have been acceptable, although this would have been slightly kinder to Jackson than Johnson. But a Jackson win outright? I just didn't see it.

I've not seen the second Castro fight - but the first one, well that really was a highway robbery, for me. Reggie got jobbed. Castro's team for away with all sorts of shady stuff, being allowed on the ring apron during rounds to shout instructions and also whip up the hostile, pro-Castro crowd. Reggie seemed to b3 boxing within himself but I still thought he was a comfortable winner, eight rounds to four or something along those lines.

As for the Collins fight, again I don't have my card to hand, but I don't remember it being particularly close. Although Collins had his moments, the skills gap between them was pretty clear for long stretches. Will take a look at my precise score later, but Johnson by a good three points or so is my instinct.

Shame for Reggie. Even with just an equal share of good and bad luck, he could have had Castro at least once and then one of Jackson or Toney on his record, and even a draw against one of them to at least provide an upgrade on one of his losses. His career record is already excellent, but still doesn't do justice to what a top class fighter he was.

 

I had Johnson beating both Collins and Parks but don't recall my scores. As for the others

Johnson v Toney - 115-114 Toney
Johnson v Castro I - 117-112 Johnson
Johnson v Castro II - 107-103 Johnson (the youtube version I watched omitted the 7th round, so I'm shy one round in my score)

 

I remember attending the Tarver-Johnson fight. I was working in Chicago at the time and a bunch of us left work early and went to the fight. It was a really fun night. Watching from ringside, It seemed like Tarver won clearly. It was a good fight. But I recall being surprised by how close the scores were.

The biggest thing that stands out for me about that night, though, was, going in, I think Tarver and Johnson were rated like #2 and #4 in the WBO ratings. They were both right up there. And it seemed the winner should've received the next shot at Dariusz Michaelczewski, who was running around saying Roy Jones was afraid of him.

And on the undercard, this total bum Joey DeGrandis - who was clumsy, awkward cruiserweight basically, fought a total nobody and won a four-round decision.

Then, when Dariusz announced his next fight, instead of picking Tarver (who had just won what was essentially an eliminator) ... Michaelczewksi chose DeGrandis.

Having just watched both in person, I knew Michalczewski was a clown. On that Chicago card alone, I think DeGrandis was like the fourth-best light heavy/cruiserweight. In no way did he deserve a title fight after that
"four-round" decision win.

At that point, I think either Tarver or Johnson would've taken Michaelczewski.

Julio Gonzales ended up doing it (beating Michalczewski) the next year. Now, when I hear people asking if Michaelczewski should be in the Hall of Fame, I roll my eyes. He didn't want any part of Jones or Tarver or even Reggie Johnson.

Anyway, not to sidetrack the thread.

I agree with those who say Tarver defeated Johnson.