who is the best p4p ever

Actually I just watched it before posting and the fight proves quite well what I said. Jones threw flashy combinations of 5-6 left hooks which looked like pitty-pats and dropped Brannon with power punches. Brannon is also a terrible fighter but that's besides the point.

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEQ60Dda1e4[/ame]

3:28 & 4:02

 

:deal

 

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FWvBYBiwunY[/ame]

0:40

 

now do you see why we say Robinson's a better hooker than Roy.

 

It's a terrible and disgraceful insult to Robinson that this is still being debated.

 

well its not to much of an disgrace, because Jones is an all time great, but I agree it should'nt be much of a debate, Robinson looks clearly the better fighter on film.

 

It comes down to this at the end of the day.

Jones is as talented as any fighter that I have ever seen on film.

He potentialy had the talent to be another Harry Greb or another Sugar Ray Robinson.

The bottom line is that he chose not to be.

If he wanted to be rated up with Sugar Ray Robinson he could have gone after the best fighters of his era.

 

...Could this be an overstatement, janitor?

I agree that Jones' talent was impressive. But what of his foundation? It was not terra firma -despite the pleadings of so many of his fans beginning with Kellerman.

I'll tell you who comes to mind when I watch Jones. Charley Burley. Devestating athleticism. Power. Those leaps and jerks. The unusual style. And Burley could not beat the classic albeit ATG boxer-puncher in Ezzard. There is no film, but I'd bet that his straight, technically-sound style had much to do with it.

This was demonstrated as recently as last night --by Khan on Malignaggi.

 

couldn't agree more:good

he was a brilliant combination of athleticism and unorthodox styling. you have never seen (with the possible exception of burley stonehands) a fighter like jones and I think that gets lost in much of the debates

he didn't jab. but he could. watch the vinny paz fight and the john ruiz fight and you will see one of the most effective and versatile jabs ever. double, tripling it as easily as tying his shoes

but the fact that he didn't use sound fundamentals and still made it to where he did is a testimony to his brilliance. he would not have been roy jones had he fought like everyone else, if he stuck to an orthodox style.

you never knew where a punch was coming from because he threw that from impossible angles, with impossible speed. it was possibly his greatest asset: the ability to confuse and confound every opponent before he ever threw a punch.

his later career would have been aided had he fought like everyone else but in his prime, it was those ridiculous moves which were his strength and the confidence with which he executed idiotic strategies like leaping with the left from a distance, keeping his hands down (or behind his back) and abandoning all semblance of a jab is breathtaking

 

I don't know about that. It probably had more to do with his superior size and workrate. Burley was a brilliant technician, after all.

 

Burley defeated larger men with ease as a matter of course.

And while I'd agree that he was more of a technician than Jones, his technical excellence was unusual if not unorthodox. The point is that oftentimes orthodoxy exposes innovation.

What I'm getting at this: had Jones fought all those fellow belt-holders at SMW and guys like DM, he may not have emerged unscathed. Particularly if they knew how to cope with Jones' style. Most couldn't get past the power and speed/the talent.

 

Not many would know how to cope with Jones's style. He was unlike anything that had ever been seen before, including Burley. Not to say that he was better, just different. Burley being more reliant on technical brilliance than athleticism, Jones the opposite. Jones took apart orthodox fighters because of their inability to cope with the unorthodoxy he brought, and because of his full awareness of what they brought to the table. That's not to say that the very best of the classic approach couldn't have brought him to task, though he wouldn't be an easy night's work for anyone I feel.

With Burley --while seemingly unorthodox in comparison to the classic, upright approach taught in boxing manuals-- you had a fighter rooted in the fundamentals, who chose to vary those options into a style that both amplified his awareness/opportunities and confounded his opponents. To me, he was all technician.

 

Jones wouldn't be easy, but that is not to say that he'd be undefeated had he fought all that he should have in his own time, never mind matching him up against the best in MWs and LHWs history. I see him having more problems than you do based on his lack of a foundation and what appears to be a lack of confidence underneath that hip hop veneer.

Well, I'd have to disagree. His stance was actually akin to fighters in the 10s and 20s, but his style was that of an innovator. Chavez is a pure technician. Burley? He was just what Moore described him as, a "serpentine" counterpuncher with a style difficult for even a premiere technician (Moore) to solve.

 

I see that as capable of being exposed only by the very best. Certainly not the likes of Michalczewski.

Well then I have to ask: why would a similarly unorthodox (by conventional standards) fighter like Moore classify as a technician while Burley wouldn't? Their stances were quite similar, really. Even Ray Robinson (and many of the fighters of that era) utilized a similar stance, just different approaches with it.

 

It need not be "the best." Was Zivic "better" than Armstrong? Angott than Pep?

Modern fighters have the advantage of fighting less often and fewer times overall than their [basically, greater] older counterparts. I wouldn't favor Michalczewski or Collins or Benn or Liles for that matter over Jones -but if he fought them all and then some 3 or 4 times, you'd see losses increase exponentially with risk.

Neither Moore nor Robinson's stance and style was very similar to Burley. Burley's style was noted by Moore as something like a magician. It was artistic, virtuoso, and even cloud-like (a sparring partner said that Burley "moved like a cloud and punched like a fool"). It was enough of a dangerous riddle to discourage Robinson from signing any contracts.

The fact is that Burley was an expert at distance, at screwing up expectations, and at presenting lures--or false lines of attack. He did that better than either Moore or Robinson.