Revisiting Rivalries Edition I: Jones Jr. Vs Hopkins: "60-40 I'll tear your ass up!"

Hopkins was at fault. He wanted 50/50 and didn't deserve it. I thought 60/40 was very reasonable. Let's start at 50/50 and reallocate based on merit:

Roy was the bigger draw: +2%
Bhop would be moving up in weight as the challenger, with Roy the champion: +3%
And most importantly of all: ROY ALREADY BEAT BHOP: +5%

There you have it, 60% to Roy, mathematically and objectively calculated. And that's being generous. In those circumstances you usually see splits closer to 75%/25% or a simple flat fee paid to the challenger. The only reason why Hopkins was even offered a split that good is because he was a proven b-side against Tito.

 

That was classic

 

Fans from both sides will blame the other side but in reality both were to blame. Both were notoriously difficult to deal with throughout their careers. So making a fight between them was always going to be difficult.

Hopkins had a slightly inflated self worth after beating Tito and believed he was now in the driving seat having suddenly become a star and having been involved in a PPV that had sold considerably more than any Jones Jr PPV including his fight with Toney. Jones also had no other options for a big PPV opponent below heavyweight which is why he fought Ruiz.

Jones Jr believed having won the first fight he should get the bigger share when in reality that never happens, the bigger draw always gets the bigger purse. The problem with Jones Jr he had a inflated self worth due to the ridiculous HBO contract that offered him $5 million a fight. This contract allowed Jones Jr to take minimal risks while making heavyweight kind of money with routine defences.

 

Jones Jr was not the proven bigger draw. His biggest PPV at that point was 300,000 when he fought Toney which of course was due to Toney being the star then. Every other PPV Jones Jr had sold between 100,000 to 150,000 and lost HBO money.

Hopkins/Tito drew 475,000 PPV buys so in reality Hopkins had the biggest PPV draw though of course that has to be discounted as Tito was the draw. Though Hopkins fights with Taylor drew 370,000 and 410,000 which were double anything Roy was drawing during his PPV's prior to fighting Ruiz.

So any assertion that Jones Jr was the bigger draw at the time is false because his PPV numbers simply do not support that fact.

 

Hopkins !

 

Hopkins was living in a bit of a fantasty world for that one. He'd lost to Jones before, would have been the challenger to Roy's titles in the rematch, and was apparently wanting Jones to meet him halfway at a catchweight rather than just challenge him at 175 without all the small print. I see what Brighton Bomber is trying to get at, but he's said it himself - Hopkins didn't turn in decent numbers in any fight where HE was the main attraction until the Taylor fights, a full three years after the supposed rematch date. And in the meantime, Jones did 600,000 PPV buys against Ruiz, only a few months after the supposed rematch date and STILL more than Hopkins managed against Taylor and Tarver. So all things considered, given he'd been a pound for pounder for so many years, I'd say that Jones was the bigger star, too.

60-40 was reasonable on Jones' part. You could argue that, for the sake of his own legacy and to satisfy the fans, he could have just said, "You know what, sod it, I make enough money as it is, let's do 50:50." And I understand people saying that (similar to what Wlad did against Haye, for instance). But he wasn't obliged to by any means.

Never really been convinced that Hopkins was that keen on a rematch in 2002, but naturally he had to give the impression he wanted it. Given that he didn't move up to 175 lb until Jones had long since been vanquished and after he'd already lost his Middleweight title, and that he didn't bother asking for a catchweight against a naturally bigger man than Jones in Tarver, it makes me suspect that he was merely putting up smokescreens and putting out a bluff. But we'll never know.

 

The video clip was from Feb 2, 2002, when Hopkins beat Carl Daniels. It was a good year and a half after Tito and a couple of years before De La Hoya. The Trinidad fight was Hopkins' one and only PPV at the time, and he was the B-side.

While Jones was never a huge PPV attraction, Hopkins hadn't shown he could be an attraction as an A-side at all. Definitely not for PPV, and not even for regular HBO ratings, where at least Jones has a regular and sizable following.

Hopkins might have been in a better negotiating position had this conversation taken place in, say, 2005, after he beat DLH and if he beat Taylor and proved he could carry a PPV. But he was in no position to argue he was a bigger draw than Jones, or even as big a draw. Remember, pre-Tito, Hopkins languished in relative obscurity. ESPN, undercards, and untelevised fights. Tito was the 100% draw in their fight, and everybody knew it but Hopkins himself.

 

Damn, B-Hop probably could have been a much bigger star if he could just put a sentence together without stuttering or stammering. His trash talk sucks, Roy even told him to get some English lessons.

 

The money offered from Roy would have been one of his biggest purses at the time ,and as far as Hopkins drawing power the guy couldn't capitalize on it after his fight with Tito .Hopkins was to blame he wanted nothing to do with a Jones at that time .

 

:roflatsch

Roy Jones was never a PPV draw.

 

Hopkins - "Roy Jones can't expect to get more than Bernard Hopkins after the tournament."

atsch

 

uhh 3gp. its been so long

 

Bhop didn't wat any part of RJJ at that point lol