Which Super Middleweight fight will be more important historically?

Let me get this straight...

Two guys flat out say they didn't want to fight Roy and you call them liars. ::

Wow.

 

Maybe Kessler would "beat the living shit out of Toney at 168" but he hasn't proven so yet biggest fight was against Calslappy and he lose competively but he lose other than that who? Mundine and Beyer are his biggest wins.....Toney beat most of those guys you mention and some of those fights were above the 168 division...


i don't know about Calslappy vs. eubanks..wasn't eubank..past..past..past his prime at the time? :dunno: wasn't that fight a passing of torch kinda fight?

 

Yes. (who was the other fighter?)

Fighters/People say shit they don't mean all of the time. You believe everything a fighter says? Ever listen to an HBO broadcast with Foreman?

The better proof is what a fighter does and fighting McClellan took more balls than fighting Roy.

Benn and Eubank and Collins all proved they would fight away from home. Roy didn't.

 

at best, I'd say Calzaghe-Eubank in a historical sense is equivalent to Shane-Cotto. The win was Calzaghe's coming-out party, an introduction to potential superstardom, but the win itself not instantly making him a superstar or even earning instant accolades as the best in his division. But even at that, Shane is more of a relevant factor in today's loaded welterweight division than Eubank was to the 1997 version of the SMW divsion.

Then you have Toney-Barkley, where Barkley was coming off of a Fighter-of-the-Year-worthy campaign, and at or damn close to the top of the 168 lb division heading into the fight.

it's easy to dismiss Toney's win NOW - in retrospect, it's probably no different than say Floyd earning linear claim as welterweight king after beating Baldomir. But there's no way that Joe's win was far more impressive/significant, if even at all.

 

Eubank was the other fighter, he said it in an interview either last year, or earlier this year.

 

Calzaghe proves that Kessler is beatable, but his (calz's) style is so unique I'm not sure it is relevant to a Kessler/Toney fight. I don't think it is.

Toney 'beat' some of the guys I mentioned, but he was life and death with them or he lost in reality and got lucky. If Kessler starts getting beaten or lucky in his post-Calz life, I'll back off, but right now I think Kessler is the clear (and easy) pick over Toney at 168.

Eubank was on the way out, but I would say it is similar to Tito's win over Whitaker--quite big, but arguable as to how much it really meant.

 

Benn and Eubank are the two who said they didn't want to fight Roy.

I recall Collins calling Roy out at 168 after Roy had been at 175 for a few years and Collins had been out of the game.

Here's a tidbit of info for you...

Collins himself didn't think he could beat Roy and neither did his trainer. I'm sure you're going to ask, "well, how could you know this?" I'm glad you asked.

The week before Roy fought Ruiz, I had a conversation with Freddie Roach (who is a longtime Roy Jones hater) and he said he thought Ruiz would KO Roy in seven or so. I told him that I'd expect him to have harsh words for Roy since he was with Toney and asked if he had any other reasons to dislike Roy. Freddie then said "he ducks people" which of course made me ask who did he duck. That's why he brought up Collins name.

So I said, "Oh really. How did he duck Collins and there's no way he would have beaten Roy." Roach then replied, "yeah, probably not but it would have been interesting to see." The comment was more wishful thinking than actually believing Collins had any semblance of a chance.

That's three and the three most commonly (and wrongly) brought up when discussing who Roy didn't fight at 168. Hell, Larry Merchant even defended Roy on that front and we know how much Larry hates Roy.

 

I said this a few months ago, I would pick Joe over Toney at 168 all-day everyday simply because Toney was prone to not show up in shape and give piss poor efforts.

if he could get out-hustled and outworked by Montell Griffin twice, I certainly think Joe would have done the same.

I think a middleweight version of Toney vs Hopkins is a better mythical matchup. Toney was so unreliable at 168, it's difficult to think he'd fare well against Calzaghe.

 

Toney was more unreliable at 160 than he was at 168.

 

Yeah.

Here's The Ring's p4p rankings in late 1993 and late 1994 (they fought in Nov 94')



<TABLE cellPadding=2 border=1><TBODY><TR><TH style="BACKGROUND: #efefef"><CENTER>1993</CENTER></TH><TH style="BACKGROUND: #efefef"><CENTER>1994</CENTER></TH><TH style="BACKGROUND: #efefef"><CENTER></CENTER></TH></TR><TR vAlign=top><TD>

1. Pernell Whitaker
2. Julio Cesar Chavez
3. James Toney
4. Michael Carbajal
5. Orlando Canizales
6. Evander Holyfield
7. Ricardo Lopez
8. Roy Jones, Jr.
9. Kennedy McKinney
10. Yuri Arbachakov

</TD><TD>

1. Pernell Whitaker
2. Roy Jones, Jr.
3. Orlando Canizales
4. Ricardo Lopez
5. Humberto Gonzalez
6. Frankie Randall
7. Felix Trinidad
8. Gerald McClellan
9. Miguel Angel Gonzalez
10. Kevin Kelley

</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>

 

This also craps on mikE's assertion that McCellan was a more dangerous opponent than Roy Jones.

 

He's unreliable at every weight, including heavyweight.

::

 

True, thanks in part to his laziness.

But at 168, the Jones fight was Toney's only real bad performance or close fight. Toney dominated Barkley, beat Thornton by a wide margin, stopped Littles after suffering a bad headbutt cut, and KO'd Williams. Toney didn't look too good against Prince Charles early on, but he slowly broke him down and stopped him late.

At 160, Toney squeaked by Johnson after getting hurt early on, arguably lost the McCallum rematch (I thought Toney won fight 1 and lost the rematch by a point), and got a gift over Dave Tiberi.

I always thought the weight problems were a convenient excuse for people to bash Roy. Toney was always having problems @ 160 and had been so inconsistent, but he seemed a lot better @ 168 and wasn't struggling with his opposition like he was @ 160. Then after Toney gets dominated, people bring up Toney's weight problems and training.

 

I didn't help that Toney was saying he wanted a rematch at light heavy immediately after the fight.

he talked about being sick etc...

Isn't that the night he threatened to kill Jackie Kallen?

 

The threats were a few days later I think.

 

I meant dangerous in the literal sense.

Like Margarito or Cintron are more dangerous than Floyd at 147.

Better? Different question with likely different result.

 

:nono:

Roy was considered one the hardest punchers P4P at 168.

"Ya'll musta forgot."

Could McCellan crack? Hell yes, but you must remember that he was ordinary otherwise. He didn't have the skill Jones had and his best attribute was he could crack...but he could also be hit.

Jones on the otherhand, was viewed as a guy who could crack with the best AND you couldn't lay a glove on him. Plus you got hit with things you never saw coming.

Again, it's popular to say McCellan was a bigger threat...doesn't make it true.

I'd also like to get back on message...

Historically speaking (and I've said this several times) Calzaghe-Kessler is more meaningful to the division.

 

Damn, I didn't think Tito was rated p4p in 1994.

 

I guess it was '93 that I had in my head which is why I reacted when Sly said "top PxPer".

Even so, RJJ was rated due to his talents/skills; more than his actual accomplishments....he had beaten Hopkins but at that time it did not mean much.

RJJ just had Vaca and Castro on his resume.

I don't keep track but I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have rated him that highly at the time yet.

Peace.

 

Even IF it was '93..YOU ARE WRONG and I am right! :tease:

Top 10 P4Pder is all I'm saying bra. Going into that fight two of the top 10 were going at it (both undefeated), hence its significance at the time.

 

Calz-Kessler was a fight for undisputed supremacy in the division between the #1 and #2 SMWs...and BOTH were partially unified champs (basically, despite Calzaghe being stripped of the IBF).

Both were long-standing champions in the division.

This fight has undoubtedly cemented Calzaghe's legacy in a way no other fight at SMW could....and not to mention, has KEPT Kessler's legacy in a good place despite a loss.

Plus - it was thrilling, competitive, fought at a tactically HIGH level...all sorts of good stuff (vs. a one-sided domination).

Remember we are talking which will be more important historically in the Super Middleweight division itself.

To me, that's why for the division, this fight is more significant.

Peace.

 

No doubt you were correct.

My own bias...when I hear "top PxPer" I think top 3, 5 at best.

Most don't rank PxPers after #10....so top to me has to mean top 5.

But by '94 he was (at least by Ring standards - wasn't on mine).

Kudos!

Peace.