The better overall fighter- James Toney or Floyd Mayweather Jnr

Mayweather, and I don't think its actually that close.

 

Mayweather always looked petrified in there, bouncing around like a rabbit and leaning back against ropes.

James Toney stood still with a poker face and you still couldn’t lay a glove on him.

Toney is the superior fighter.

 

I prefers to watch Toney, well at least at the lower weight scale of his career, but Floyd s in a world of his own.

 

Toney is the superior in "I can lick any sonofabitch in the room" mentality, but Floyd was a superior boxer.

Toney didn't move his feet all the time and with the bending from the waist in the pocket, took punches on the back of the head - combined with countless hours of hard sparring, then his slurred speech is more understandable considering he is supposed to be a defensive master.

Early Floyd didn't look petrified breaking down the likes of Corrales, Burton, Manfredy, Ndou, Gatti etc. - later Floyd was very much a proponent of hit and not get hit and not one to get into unnecessary ego wars in the middle of the ring.

Toney's career is flashes of brilliance mixed with ill discipline and longevity (PED use/cheating on both sides) - with Floyd it feels like he boxed within his ability in the ring. When you then consider his flaunting of money, the Pac saga and things like McGregor and Berto to get to 50 - 0, his business dealings and non-macho style may make some underrate his prowess as a fighter (not saying that you are doing so) - Floyd is genuinely one of the greatest skilled fighters to wear gloves and with his dedication and professionalism of staying in shape and consistency of performance and winningness, he is far above Toney in accomplishment - not necessarily skillset, but he definitely doesn't have the mediocre inconsistency of performance that is levied against Toney.

 

Great post! I'll add that I saw Floyd fight as an amateur a couple of times on the Midwest circuit back in the 90's way way before all the money Mayweather marketing. The guy fought so differently in those days. He was aggressive, hard hitting and literally destroyed all of his opponents. I never met him but he had a reputation as a total gym rat that did nothing but train and fight. He definitely became more defensive minded in the pro's probably in part due to his hand problems.

 

I much prefer to watch Toney but Mayweather was better.

Mayweather was more complete. The both obv had amazing defense and good chins. Neither was a ko artist. But mayweather had better conditioning bc of being more focused and disciplined. And toney was no dummy in there but I give floyd an edge in ring IQ. Guy did what he needed to win rounds and as mentioned above floyd made adjustments and took over fights.

 

Toney does what Toney does better than anybody. But Floyd does everybody better than anybody.

 

Mayweather, I think.

Toney took the tougher challenges though, and that might be why his career looks like it does. PBF would never have come within sniffing distance of RJJ and you can take that to the bank. Toney's inconsistency also tells against him in the resume stakes.

 

Mayweather started countering Oscar's jab beautifully.

DLH started gassing from all those missed punches, his jabs got sloppier and as usual FMJ started countering him with his left leads. In the final rounds DLH looked completely hopeless, and Mayweather started hitting him with straight rights.

 

Can you imagine Floyd fighting (/equiv) Nunn, R. Johnson and McCallum twice then Barkley all in about a year and a half? Jheez, all belt holders too so at their best. Toney came through it all unbeaten. Him destroying unbeaten Tim Littles would’ve been akin to Floyd demolishing Cotto in 05, then facing Margarito or Paul Williams and winning via one-shot Kayo to match the Prince Charles Williams title defense.

Toney beating Jirov would’ve been like Floyd coming back and beating a peak Kovalev a few years back, toe-to-toe!

Not the same.

Floyd fighting all the big names like Oscar, Gatti, Mosley etc would’ve been like Toney choosing Leonard and Duran over the top middles/super middles he did beat.

 

I suppose Mayweather has to get the vote here, but Toney is far more fun to watch. It's hard to root for a guy who made a career of avoidance. That's contrary to the very essence of the sport he's supposed to be great at. Just feels like cheating in a way, going against a code of conduct somehow.