Best Defensive fighter of all time!

Whitaker, Locche, Pep, Benitez, and Floyd are the top 5.

 

Since no one has mentioned him, I will give a deserved shout to Tommy Gibbons, who was one of defensive boxing's better disciples.

 

Oh please REED, Roy's chin not getting checked had everything to do with his lack of competition than it had to do with his defense. Fighting garbagemen and guys so pathetic that he could play a semi pro basketball game before the fight will cause that kind of curiosity. When faced with a guy who was actually able to match his speed and reflexes in Montell Griffin, Roy was hit quite often and even had a lump under his eye.

All that aside I actually do agree that Roy had very good defense but I don't think he ever proved to be one of the top defensive guys on the level of Floyd or Pernell. Roy's offense was so devastating that it made his opponents more reluctant to engage, so Roy didn't really have to worry about defense that much.

 

You've out done yourself again!!!! I'm a new fan and will be studing his every move. Amazing! Makes Floyd Jr. and Sweet Pete look like punching bags!!!!:bears:

 

Agreed absolutely. And Re: the 1st Griffin fight I have to say - every time I watch it, it convinces me more that Jones would not have hung at all well with a Moore or a Charles, or even lower echelon LHW greats who were great tacticians in there. I don't think it was Griffin's speed at all, I just think he really had Roy sussed out that night - kept the fight at mid range, held the centre ring, forced Roy into making moves with his distance, countered aggressively when Roy led, until he was reluctant to at all, banged to Roy's body when Roy covered up, throwing the occasional headshot then retreated back to mid range before Roy could respond, etc. Very tactically smart fight, he'd been watching the final third of Hopkins-Jones, for sure. And like you say, in the face of that, Roy's defence suddenly started looking a bit average.

But to Roy's enormous credit, you can see in the lead up to the DQ when Roy hurts Griffin that Griffin hesitates, just for about 5 seconds, eases off the distance by 9-12" or so giving Roy a moments space & time and he pounces on the opportunity just like that. From range and given time, Roy was probably the greatest fighter of all time.

 

Floyd HAS to make at least top three P4P alltime for certain. As good as Pep and Locche were, they did not defend against the offensive speed that Floyd has I say Pea, Floyd, Benitez, are the 3 best ever and Igive the nod to Pea by a whisker over Wilfred

 

Glad I can help Otis. Here's his title winning effort.

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Locche against Fuji & Cervantes are probably the two greatest displays of pure boxing skill ever committed to film for my money.:bears:

 

Moore and Charles lost. To fighters not as good as Roy. And they also lost plenty of rounds in fights they won. Roy, for the most part, dominated his competition.

Roy had some problems with Montell and Harding and maybe Hopkins if you're generous. But he also looked to be on his way to a win against Montell and he clearly beat Harding and Hopkins.

Roy isn't perfect which was the point of my earlier post. I don't think he's some great defensive fighter, but he was a great fighter. He just happens to bring the homo out of some fans, similar to Tyson.

 

The Self Professed "Fan of Roy Jones" has Resorted to LAME Ass Generalizations All of a Sudden???::...

The "Garbageman"/"Policeman" Schtick is TIRED Dude...For the 100th Time, the VAST MAJORITY of Prizefighters MAINTAIN Daytime Employment...Marvelous Marvin Hagler Worked CONSTRUCTION Up Until he Became World Champion...Glen Johnson Worked Construction AND Moonlighted as a Nightclub BOUNCER, Up Until he Hit the Lottery & Beat Roy Jones...

For a So-Called "Fan", U Sure Know NATHAN about Roy's Resume..."Lack of Competition", REED's Ass...F.Y.I., the Guy that Roy Beat After Playing the Hoop Game (Eric Lucas), Went On to WIN a Supermiddle Title, Years Later...Lucas is Actually a LEGITIMATE NAME on Mikkel Kessler's Resume, yet he's just Some "Pathetic" Fighter on Roy's...Yeah, that's Consistent...

N his Prime, Roy Jones Fought MORE than Enough Quality Fighters to EXPOSE his Defense...They just COULDN'T...Shame on YOU & Your "RJ Fandom" for NOT Recognizing...



REED:kidcool:

 

Traditionally, Roy had a Harder Time w/CRAFTY Fighters...Guys that Made HIM Lead...While Griffin Stayed Close to Roy, he Also Made him LEAD More than Roy Ever Had to Before then...

Roy WASTED Several Rounds Playing the MENTAL Game w/Griffin, when he Should've just BLASTED His Ass Out of the Water, as he Did in the RE....



REED:kidcool:

 

There's no point going down this route. To retort with 'Moore & Charles lost and they lost rounds' is just such an unbelievably silly counter argument there's demonstrably no point opening this discussion up further.

Roy was great. But not nearly as great as his lack of A class competition made him look.

 

And for the 100th time I can still be a fan of a fighter yet criticize him at the same time. I gave Shane a shit load of it after his fight with Floyd. Yes I feel Roy fought subpar opposition, but I also realize it wasn't all his fault because for most of his reign their wasn't much of anyone to challenge him. Still, my point is, it's hard to really gauge a guys defense when he's unable to really fight any top notch fighters in his prime. Toney was one but gave such a shitty performance it was moot. Hopkins was the other and he did okay, but I don't pull much from that fight either way. It was just a good win for Roy.

And Mike, Roy was definitely on his way to beating Griffin. I remember back then Roy was my favorite fighter (believe it or not REED) and I was very pissed he lost his undefeated record. I actually found out from Ring Magazine because I was stationed in Germany at the time and also didn't get to see the fight until weeks later because I had to order on vhs from the states.

 

Bite me. The easiest way to lose a fight is to lose rounds. Moore and Charles were not losing rounds to 30-1, 43-0 types, they were losing rounds to the 45-10, 50-8 types.

Compare what Roy was fighting and whipping:

29-2 won 2/2
44-0-2 won 10/12
26-4-1 won 1/1
40-5 won 6/6
37-6-1 won 3/3
26-4-2 won 2/2
19-2-2 won 11/11
16-0 won 2/2
49-3-1 won 12/12
26-0 won 5/9

I mean it's such a weak argument it doesn't deserve a response. People have magically gotten better at every sport known to man except boxing where everyone learned how to suck.

 

Yup because records between avoided black fighters in the 40s & 50s (who had to fight the toughest guys 3,4,5 times, often weeks after other tough fights) and groomed, well promoted TV era 90s fighters are numerically comparable. As I said, there's no point going down this route because you'll just make more gloriously silly arguments like that. This argument has been done to death.

 

Boxing isn't quite the same as most sports, though --- it truly isn't. If you picture most sports, they are a one-dimensional environment. What I mean by that is that the competitors can only go up & down, figuratively. Take sprinters. It's their job to bolt one or two-hundred metres down a trackway, & that doesn't & won't ever change. Look at football (any kind). The team's job is to play everyone in their league, week-in, week-out. That hasn't & won't ever change.

Boxing, however, is a 3-D environment, of sorts. You can go in different directions --- you don't, "have to" fight anyone, or do anything, by requisite. The money & exposure which now flows through the sport wasn't always there, meaning many, many fighters can now afford to take an infinitely gentler route than those of the past. Miguel Cotto being groomed following Olympic success & finding Arum's guidance to put the right men in front of him at the right time, & having him fight so sporadically when compared with champions' of the distant past is worlds more different than, say, a basketball team in 2010 having to undertake the same essential task as a team in 1910 --- playing everyone in the league, & winning the title under a similar format to their fore-runners.

 

Good point!

And the 3-D environment you describe, besides making it difficult to compare fighters across time, makes it difficult to compare them in general.

Whereas one fighter may have ascended to championship levels by fighting and beating the best guys in and around his division, another may have done so with only the most careful consideration as to who he fights.

It's because of the 3-D environment of boxing that competition isn't perfect: the best don't necessarily make the most money or get the most exposure.

 

Just as I see it, Double L. To take one of a thousand instances, look at Henry Armstrong. Armstrong fights, what was it, something like twenty-seven or twenty-eight blokes in a single year, knocking almost all of them out. How could someone like Cotto gain the kind of experience which would go hand-in-hand with a feat of that nature? Fighting at that rate of frequency creates a fighter you just cannot in the contemporary climate of carefully-arranged bouts & nurtured future stars.

The gulf between something like this & a structured, "1-D" sport, like football or basketball or many others, cannot be overstated.

 

If A) 1/10th as many kids were playing football as previously & B) those players who did come through were only playing 15 times a season instead of 60 & spending 6 months of every year sitting on their ass when once they were training & practicing, then I don't think many people would doubt that the number of talents on the level of Pele, Maradona, Cryuff etc would've started to dry up by now.

'Ah but what about improved training & nutrition'.....all fine and well in sports which actually make use of it, but 98% of boxers still do push ups & sit ups (or highly ineffectual high rep toning or machine weight work) and call it strength training & still think long distance running is the best way to build their stamina. Boxing has not made any widespread, effective advances from the same conditioning methods guys like Robinson & Charles made use of. The outliers to that are the Klits & Haye who actually train like modern athletes.

I think some aspects of technique & strategy have improved and some have inevitably receded due to above points A & B.

But as it pertains to this convo - I'd bet big on Charles or Moore knocking Jones clean out.

 

hut x2 makes some valid points, but I still think he overestimates how good the old timers were compared to today's best. i could be wrong.

anyway, this comment about fewer boxers reminded me of a great post at boxrec that i ran across recently http://boxrec.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=101907:

These stats came out yesterday, as posted in the Editors Forum:

Decades
1840s: 3
1850s: 8
1860s: 57
1870s: 154
1880s: 2,515
1890s: 10,213
1900s: 24,978
1910s: 60,505
1920s: 173,295
1930s: 178,721 (the most of any decade)
1940s: 168,335
1950s: 136,543
1960s: 89,937
1970s: 96,133
1980s: 126,501
1990s: 137,541
2000s: 167,753

As of May 17, 7:30 p.m. (Pacific Time), the total bouts in the BoxRec database: 1,416,009
**************

now there may be fights missing in the past, but we all know that old timers had a lot more fights than current fighters...i'd be surprised if it didn't average 2x per fighter so I suspect there really weren't more fighters back then. Even with these numbers, it isn't that large of a disparity. Also note the gap in the 60-70's. Whatever these numbers prove is debatable, but I like them.

 

Dude, these numbers don't mean shit! In fact, whoever published them is irresponsible.

What is it you think these numbers prove? Or suggest? Why subject us to them? They're meaningless.

 

CLEARLY those are incomplete stats

secondly, I guarantee newspaper decisions were not included

not that you have any idea what that means

 

Whether the stats are accurate or not it is quite an interesting line of investigation - you think there is a more reliable way of finding out how many registered boxers there were at different times? I'd be very curious to know.

I assume there were many, many more kids taking up boxing from the 30s through to 60s than now but I've been surprised by things like this before.

 

if you guarantee that no newspaper decisions are included then you are wrong

if you guarantee that most newspaper decisions are missing, then I suspect you are wrong and you should back it up

if you guarantee that some newspaper decisions are missing, I already conceded that i believe that to be the case

the reason I don't have any idea what your post meant is because its meaning isn't clear

 

nevermind if the numbers are accurate. what exactly are they supposed to demonstrate?

 

I said many more people took up boxing in previous times, he was using those stats to refute that. It's an interesting discussion if we can find some more definitive answers.

 

that's what i thought he was trying to suggest with the numbers. but it's a bogus comparison. it's like comparing the price of coca-cola in the 1920's to its price today, and concluding that its more expensive today. well, what about the supply of money?

what about population size? what about the fact that the pool of people eligible to box (and be recorded as doing so) was much smaller back then?

 

what about it? I'm not suggesting that boxing per capita is as popular as it was, particularly in the us. Hell, it seems like there were boxing gyms on every corner and you had it as a college and high school sport, but

there is more to the sport than the usa. Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico...these countries seem to have a very large percentage of kids boxing (not sure if that is the case, but it seems like it). Then there is south america, now europe, now indonesia, and Japan is a lot more now than it used to be (i assume). And Russia and the eastern Europe countries. And Africa.

I also suspect that there is more amateur boxing now...or at least that there were far fewer guys way back when who had so many amateur fights. Does it really matter that 1930's Joe Bob Bumfuck was a tough sob with a 22-9 record on some great's resume when Joe Bob had 12 amateur fights? While the total fights are less now, a lot of these 'bums' on todays' guys' records might be 20-3, but they may have had 100+ am fights. Yet the benefit of the doubt seems to always go to considering JB Bumfuck to be a superior opponent.

As to your last point, I don't think per capita arguments help the pro old-timer side. Pool size is relevant in a bell curve because it makes for more people in all positions of the bell curve, including the top notch guys at the far right.

 

I'm just not sure what your point is. I'm neither pro-oldtimer, nor the opposite. I'm simply trying to figure out what you think the numbers mean that you posted.

As for your comment on the bell curve? I don't know what it means. You seem to be saying the bell curve of boxing skill has not shifted? So the same proportion of guys now are good as back then? I'm lost.

 

Nah. The point was that because there were so many fewer fighters the top end quality & depth was likely to have been diminished. Population size doesn't have anything to do with that.