Roy Jones Jr. Vs The Black Uhlan of The Rhine

An example of contemporary write-up. Since the fight was postponed twice, the write-ups are spanning a long period of time, and I don't have the time or wish to look through all of them.

Ed Hughes in Brooklyn Daily Eagle, August 19, 1932
---start quote---
"Walker hasn't shown me anythings as a heavyweight, barring his 15-round draw with a sleepy and lenient Jack Sharkey - a decision that I thought quite sour. He did whip King Levinsky, but he looked bad against Paulino, who I thought really won. Only recently Jawn Risko punched out a verdict against Mickey.
The man doesn't look anything like a great fighter to me, but if he can whip Schmeling I'll be willing to reverse that."
---end quote---

Jonhny Risko was out of heavyweights ratings when he beat Walker shortly before the Schmeling fight, and some experts called him a fourth-rater, he regularly gave problems to top heavyweights, but then lost to nonentities. The loss made many drop Walker out of the list of heavyweight contenders.

 

Klompton
You are attributing to me the things I didn't say a word about. I didn't say a word about Toney or Jones or anybody, except Schmeling, in the first place. I didn't say a word about Schmeling being an ATG or not. I commented strictly on his skills and cleverness. Who's wanting to change the argument here?

In the very first post I said that comparing cleverness and skills of heavyweights with that of lower weights is a faulty practice. A heavyweight may look like Willie Pep against some plodding, slow, flabby heavyweights, but that doesn't make him a Willie Pep in either skills or cleverness. I don't care who was inducted into IBHoF or rated however high by Nat Fleischer. You may consider Risko "respected contender", but he was considered 3rd or 4th rater by some of contemporary writers, who had actually seen him in fights and were following boxing closely.

 

Nice segway to get off the Jones Jr. Max Schmeling debate. To turn and try and make the debate the merits of Mickey Walker, a top 15 P4P fighter who by your own standards must be more skilled than a Third rater like Schmeling because Walker came up from a lighter division unlike a natural heavyweight. Well here's a Contempary write up that doesn't jive with your cherry picked article.

The Urbana Daily Courier July 26th 1932-Mickey Walker knocks out giant Italian heavyweight Salvitore Ruggiliero in one minute and ten seconds of the first round. So quick was Walker's destruction of Salvitore the New Jersey state boxing comission may hold up Ruggeliero's purse and investigate. - From what I could source no illegal tampering was found the bout appears legit. Sounds impressive to me.

I can source more but how bout we let his record speak for itself
Bear Cat Wright giving away 42lbs he defeated
King Levinsky giving away 23lbs he defeated
Salvitore Ruggiliero giving away 36lbs he defeated
Paulino Uzcudun giving away 27lbs he defeated
Jack Sharkey disputed draw giving away 29lbs
And so on-Arthur De Koh- K.O. Christner johhny risko etc.

Just a sample of the Toy Bulldog's ferociousness and gameness.
But against Schmeling TKO8

 

Jones is so much quicker and more skilled than Schmelling who I do respect as the second best HW of his era but he doesn't have many advantages here. His main advantage is his power and his weight, 190-200 compared to Roy who would be as low as 180 in the ring for SMW fights but as big as 198 in the ring at HW. Not massive and power is nothing if you can't land it.

So how can Schmelling land on Roy? Many quicker more skilled boxers couldn't. Schmelling's best punch is the right, but how many right hands ever penetrated Prime Roy's defence? Toney has 1 of the best lead/counter rights ever and couldn't land it.
As for 'Schmelling getting his jab going', his jab is nowhere near good enough to land on Jones.

I see Roy easily landing on Schmelling and Schmelling missing allot and it being a shut out or Jones stopping him late.

 

Once again, this has nothing to do with Jones. I have stated my opinion about heavyweights being inferior in all departments (skills, cleverness, achievements) except fame, on many occasions and in different threads.

You may quote Walker's record all you want, I will rather base my opinion on what I read of writers who had been there in person. Ed Hughes may have been extreme in his opinion sometimes, but he was honest and was reporting boxing for something like 14 years by this time, first out of Newark, NJ, and from 1923 out of New York/Brooklyn. I recall Damon Runyon and Hype Igoe also commenting on Walker's reputation taking a hit as the result of the loss to Risko, but they and other writers predicted that it doesn't mean he wouldn't get some big fight all the same, the promoters would play it down as a hometown decision, etc. And they were right, he got the Schmeling bout despite the loss. Win over Ruggiliero had zero weight in Walker getting that bout.

 

Many writers, Runyon included opinion could be leveraged so to speak so I tend to take their opinions with caution. Gene Tunney learned that the hard way.

You can take their opinions all you like I will go with KO results and available film footage and the consensus of most historians and experts on the merits of Mickey Walker.

 

The matchup is at heavyweight. Roy would not be nearly as elusive as he was as a 160 middleweight or 168 Super middleweght. By time he got to light heavy he was getting hit with more frequency. Even before the retreat back to light heavy when Tarver and Johnson smashed him.

Schmeling was a skilled 196 pound man with a extremely well timed right hand. He was also extremely well conditioned with the ability to go 15 rounds at a fast pace. Jones' whole defense was predicated on his athleticism. In short he never learned a proper defense. Jones coming up in weight would lose some of his advantages and quite frankly he had only one fight as a heavyweight against a mediocre uncoordinated club fighter. If people remember correctly there was talk of Jones fighting Buster Douglas and he was deemed too dangerous. Jones never stayed in the division-he knew his limits he won his publicity stunt fight and went back down to light heavy. I just don't see enough evidence to back Jones at heavy against the Black Uhlan.

 

You prefer the opinion of people who were not there in 1920-1930s, and most of whom, I'm inclined to believe, didn't read contemporary reports for more than a dozen of Walker's bouts? Speaking of Tunney, I have read multiple next-day reports for more than half of his bouts and he wasn't nearly as skillful/clever/dominant/impressive as modern experts want me to believe.

 

Most responsible journalists and historians read contemporary reports to formulate an opinion. Then use said acquired knowledge to put down their own take. Not some internet hack job with a predetermined bias. Tunney was highly skilled, yes some of his wins against Greb are debatable as was his performance against Loughran but nonetheless he is an alltime p4p great. A pioneer in film study and a student of the game.

I am satisfied with my breakdown of the Schmeling Jones jr fight and I concur with the nuanced answer Klompton submitted.

 

Most responsible? You have seen many around? I've mentioned this example many times, but it never gets overused, how many responsible historians, members of International Boxing Research Organization, have taken time to read contemporary reports on Jack Blackburn, to include him at #12 of all-time lightweight rankings? Packey McFarland at #16? Sammy Mandell in "just missing the cut"?

Have you read next-day reports of Tunney's bouts vs Soldier Jones (1921-07-02), Martin Burke (1921-08-04), Jack Burke (1921-10-14), Magnus (Wolf) Larsen (1921-10-25), Jack Clifford (1922-02-11), Jack Burke (1922-04-10), Chuck Wiggins (1922-10-27), Jack Renault (1923-01-29), Chuck Wiggins (1923-02-03), Dan O'Dowd (1923-07-31), etc? Where he disappointed many reporters at ringside.

He may have decisioned Loughran (Record, Evening Ledger, Public Ledger and North American scoring for Tunney, while Inquirer and Evening Bulletin scored for Loughran), but the latter was still green and it was hardly because Tunney showed better skills or cleverness than Loughran, but had more to do with strength and punching power.

 

Roy was very elusive against Ruiz who had a better jab than Schmelling but that aside you can take the Roy from 168 or LHW where he weighed 185 in the ring and just not dry him out to make weight. You can take the '94 version and he's a conditioned 180 or 182 ready to go.

And no I disagree Roy wasn't hit particularly much at LHW, if we had the punch stats he probably has the lowest connect percentages of any top LHW in history. Griffin and Harding landed some jabs, but Schmelling didn't use the jab as well as them and Jones wasn't 100 in the first Griffin fight.

He fought at a slower pace than much of Jones opposition, Jones was much better conditioned than Schmelling, no doubt about it. 1 rounds or not, Jones would play a basketball match prior to a 12 rounder.

This is a myth, Jones punch slipping is arguably the best in history, as is his counter punching. How is his inside defence and high guard 'athleticism'? It's technically very solid.

Even if his punch slipping is based on unique athletic gifts, how's that going to help Schmelling hit him? It wouldn't.

Why? He just needs to not cut weight. Even an '94 version could come in comfortably at 185lbs and make Schmelling think he's in the Matrix.

An often repeated detraction from a very good but not a great win. In reality Ruiz was a belt holder who'd beat Holyfield, Rahman, Golota, Kirk Johnson, Oquendo and deserved a win over Valuev.

No one else ever shut Ruiz out, not Toney or Chagaev where it was close in both fights. That is what makes it a special performance.

Ruiz had a much better longer jab than Schmelling, had a high workrate and 30lbs plus over Schmelling. Schmelling ofcourse was much cuter.

And yes he did only have 1 HW fight but many of his LHW opposition weighed from 185-200lbs once they rehydrated after the weigh in so weren't much smaller than Schmelling.

Jones tried to make far more HW fights than you give him credit for. In reality while Jones waited too long to make the move up he tried to fight Holyfield in '99 but the Lennox fight took precedence. None of the top names wanted to fight Jones after Ruiz, after then both Holyfield and Tyson are on record of turning down the Jones fight. Holyfield said he didn't want to look foolish as he mentioned in his interview for ontheropes radio show.

Schmelling isn't a HW by today's standards, either he's a small cruser or he could make LHW pretty easy with today's nutrition, water manipulation and saunas.

 

Klompton is completely unobjective when it comes to Jones constantly spitting bile.

 

While Lewis wasn't afraid of Jones, of course, but after the Ruiz bout Muhammad offered to split the purse 60% for Jones and 40% for Lennox, Burstein countered with 60% split for Lewis, but after his dissapointing performance vs Kiltschko, Lewis didn't want any fights.
Jones also wanted to fight Corrie Sanders after he knocked out Wladimir Klitschko, but the WBO threatened to strip Corrie of his title if he faced Jones, and Roy didn't see a reason why he had to fight Sanders with no title on the line, and with the bout not lucrative financially.

 

Jones wouldn't have beat Lewis but at that stage he beats Holyfield, Tyson, Byrd and could have put a resume together.

He could have fought a Klitschko but the fight wasn't lucrative and nightmare fights he wouldn't have won. In the end Ruiz became mandatory and Jones didn't see the point, he should have stayed at HW though and beat Ruiz again to open up other fights.

 

Exactly! If the subject is Roy Jones or Carpentier, we shouldn't take anything he has to say too seriously.