What is Roy Jones Jr.’s Legacy?
Roy Jones Jr. has been one of the most divisive figures in recent boxing history. Some fans love his candour and showmanship while other people think that he is cocky and arrogant. His passion for cockfighting has been seen by some people as a quirky interest and by others as animal abuse. But one thing that cannot be denied is that he is one of the most talented and celebrated boxers of his generation.
How we will be looked at decades from now is another question. Many fans have felt that the 41-year-old Jones Jr. (51-7, 40 KOs) has tainted his legacy in recent years by continuing to fight rather than retiring. They point to a succession of less than stellar performances like his most recent one-sided defeat to Bernard Hopkins in April as a sign that Jones Jr. should have hung up his gloves years ago and is tarnishing his reputation by continuing the fight.
There’s little doubt that Jones Jr. is risking having his name added to the inglorious list of sports superstars like Willie Mays, Jerry Rice or Joe Namath who continued playing well past their prime. Needing to compete and refusing to retire is a disease that can impact any athlete but is especially rough on boxers. With his recent performances, Jones Jr. has joined the likes of Sugar Ray Leonard, Roberto Duran and Larry Holmes as champion boxers who kept fighting when they were clearly shells of their former selves.
But the last few years of the career of Jones Jr. shouldn’t diminish just how exceptional of a fighter he was in the 1990s and early 2000s. It’s easy to make an argument that he was the greatest pound for pound boxer of the decade. As he earned championships in the super middleweight and then light heavyweight division, the toughest thing for him to do in many fights was to stave off boredom. He would resort to toying with opponents, refusing to fight all out because he didn’t want to knock an overmatched foe out early.
This rankled some fans but it was part of the total package with Jones Jr. He was there to entertain people as much as fight, and he thought that fans would rather see him dance, move and generally make a fight last longer than it should than see him destroy an opponent within the a few rounds. Jones Jr. always knew that he could turn it on when needed to, either if an opponent gave him a more serious battle than expected or in the rare instances when he was up against a challenger of similar ability.
If Jones Jr. is eventually thought of as being in a class just below the greatest fighters of all time, much of that will have less to do with his own ability than with timing. There simply weren’t enough great super welterweights and light heavyweights for him to battle during his time within the division. In his prime of the 1990s and early 2000s, he had limited opportunities to beat highly-regarded opponents and he made the most of it, claiming wins against fighters such as Vinny Pazienza, James Toney, Montell Griffith, Virgil Hill and Antonio Tarver.
The reality is that Jones Jr. hasn’t beaten a highly-respected fighter near the prime of their career since 2003. Continuing to fight only hurts his reputation and draws people away from remembering him as one of the most uniquely talented and athletic fighters in recent boxing history. MMA champion Anderson Silva recently called on Jones Jr. to sign a deal for a boxing match with him. This sort of “freak show” fight might be lucrative but it’s exactly the sort of event that causes people to remember Jones Jr. for all the wrong reasons.
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