So for ages he ruled the world then he goes up in weight and loses a lot after one fight. He loses that fight via ko and ok maybe that was the weight loss. Then he has some time to get used to the weight again and suddenly he is losing against everybody. Its almost like he went from legendary to c grade overnight. SO tell me what happened to RJJ?
He got old. As men, we can defeat many things. Father Time is not one of them. Fact is, he should have retired after winning a heavyweight title. Nothing else to prove as going from middle to heavy and winning titles is a historic accomplishment. Fighters get old... and due to Jones lack of fundamentals, as soon as his athleticism started to decline, so did he.
fighting clean and a slow down of reflexes exposed a fighter with no chin who can't adapt in the ring and can't fight in adversity.
Obviously the cut back from HW was rough as evidenced by how much more sluggish he appeared in every fight back. That being said, he was harboring a fragile mandible long before the HW run and it was the fact that he was slow enough to be caught cleanly that led to the string of brutal KOs and the farce that his latter career became.
Just want to mention that despite his recent losses, Jones is still among the greatest of all time in my opinion. When he was young, he was untouchable.
Its interesting to see how the body slows down. I mean with Ali it was obvious he was getting slower, but was still pulling out wins due to boxing iq. I really didn't see too many warning signs before the Tarver fight
Also, in addition to his boxing genius Ali was an iron-chinned warrior and when he could no longer slip everything coming his way he could just absorb it, even from monster punchers like Frazier, Foreman, and Shavers. The flipside of such manly mandibular fortitude is it got him in the condition that he's in now.
He gained and lost around 20lbs of what looked to be solid muscle in 14 months or so. Seems like those kinds of shenannigans would come with a price.
age and reflexes. Happens to all of them. I never really paid that much attention to the Tarver fights. Roy is great and Tarver is not.