Roy Jones - Pound for Pound
Recently, Roy Jones moved up in weight to fight for the WBA heavyweight championship. He fought against a respectable, if not spectacular, heavyweight "champion" by the name of John Ruiz.
Since the fight Roy Jones has received various amounts of praise and criticism about his choice of opponents. Some have stated that his opponents have been picked carefully by him so as to avoid taking risks. Some have called him the greatest fighter pound for pound, ever. And many have derided his accomplishment by beating a heavyweight title holder while others have lauded his accomplishment as being on par with Michael Spinks defeating Larry Holmes for the heavyweight crown. Some of this is justified while some of it is ridiculous.
I will begin by stating that I am in the corner with those who think that Roy Jones is the best pound for pound fighter, ever. Jones has beaten every opponent put in front of him convincingly, if not always spectacularly. And, while he has defeated some not so spectacular fighters he has, also, defeated some very good champions and challengers. In fact, many of the challengers that he has faced have gone on to be champions and regarded very highly in the boxing community. Some of the champions that he has defeated have become champions again, either because Jones moved up in weight class or by them moving up and out of Jones division. As a quick reference see Bernard Hopkins and Virgil Hill.
The claim that he has hand picked his opponents is not entirely baseless while not entirely truthfull. Unfortunately the ranking systems are amok as is the lightheavywieght division, in which he has been fighting. Roy, has consistantly faced the number one challengers as ranked by all of the sanctioning bodies. True, his best challenges came at middleweight, but is he required to move down to a lesser weight class because his current division is weak? Is he required to campain at heavyweight because he can defeat anyone in his current weight class? Other than Larry Holmes, no other fighter has been criticized so much because he is so superior in a division filled with weak fighters.
So far as Jones accomplishment against Ruiz, for the "heavyweight title" goes...well, lets just say that he defeated a solid but unspectacular fighter for this so-called title. Anyone who rates this as the accomplishment that Spinks made against Larry Holmes is living in a dream world or doesn't know boxing. Larry Holmes was the true heavywight champion while Ruiz was a champion on paper, only. Michael Spinks defeated a great champion in Holmes while Jones defeated, what amounts to, a heavyweight contender. However, it must be remembered that Ruiz had hurt, badly, Evander Holyfield who, while in decline, is still a solid fighter with a chin like granite.
At any rate, Jones has proven and continues to prove that he is the greatest fighter, pound for pound, ever. How? By making every fighter that he faces look like a pretender. This man is so good that he makes great fighters look bad. To complain about the lack of talent that he has faced is ludicrous. He has faced some excellent talents. He is just too many steps above these other fighters.
So, to all of his detractors, show me one fighter that he cannot beat or has not beaten in his weight class and I may change my tune. Until then, you may want to stop griping about him or those that he has faced. He is that good.