By Tim Williams: Whether Joe Calzaghe wins on Saturday night against Roy Jones Jr., it will not give a true indication of who the better fighter would have been if Joe hadn’t waited until Jones was far over the hill to decide to fight him. What it will prove is that Calzaghe, at 36, has more left in the tank than the 39 year-old Jones, who has been in a big career slide since 2003.
However, it would have been interesting to see how Calzaghe, no matter what stage of his career, had faired against Jones between 1993 and 2003. During that time, Jones was considered first the best middleweight and then the best light heavyweight in boxing. Along the way, he defeated Bernard Hopkins, Eric Lucas, Mike McCallum, Vinny Pazienza, Thomas Tate, James Toney, Montell Griffin, Virgil Hill, Lou Del Valle, Otis Grant, Richard Frazier, Reggie Johnson, Richard Hall, Eric Harding, Glen Kelly, Julio Cesar Gonzalez, Clinton Woods and John Ruiz.
In contrast, Calzaghe was busy facing much softer competition such as Omar Sheika, Robin Reid, Mario Veit, Byron Mitchell, Evans Ashira and Charles Brewer, to name just a few. In terms of talent, defense and speed, Jones was a much superior fighter than Calzaghe.
Not only was he much faster than him as far as hand speed goes, Jones was almost the much harder puncher, with the type of power that could end a fight with one punch. His speed created knockout opportunities for him over and over, as he would land blinding shots to take out opponents like Hill and Griffin.
Jones faced the best fighters during his generation, and even defeated a young Toney, before he began dealing with weight issues. Calzaghe would have had serious problems against Jones during his prime. Calzaghe is more of a volume puncher with good speed, who tends to overwhelm his opponents with a constant flow of short, fast punches.
However, the reason he’s been able to succeed at this is because most of his opposition has been sorely limited in comparison to the opponents of Jones. This has allowed Calzaghe to get away with his bad technique in which he comes in standing square, throwing punches in bunches while not putting much focus on protecting himself.
Against Jones, however, Calzaghe would he dealing with a fighter that fights on the outside, moving a lot of looking for spots in which to throw lightning fast flurries and then getting out. Back then, Jones never stood in front of his opponents for any length of time. Instead, he moved, looked for opportunities to throw his shots, and would come in quickly throwing fast punches – much faster than anything that Calzaghe would be capable of defending against.
Jones wouldn’t be there for Calzaghe as a stationary opponent, something that Calzaghe is dependent on in order to start up his own offense, and would keep him constantly guessing. Under the best circumstances, Calzaghe might win a round, but that’s only if Jones wanted him to. Believe me, if Jones wanted to win every round of the fight, he would with ease.
If he wanted to take Calzaghe out in the first round, like he did with Griffin, Jones would have simply turned up the volume and taken Calzaghe out with a blur of punches, leaving the Welsh fighter lying on his back, staring at the lights while the referee counted him out.
Ultimately, a young Jones would have made a monkey out of Calzaghe, embarrassing him and making him look like a hopeless amateur. It’s too bad that Calzaghe couldn’t have sought Jones out earlier in his career, because it would have been interesting to see the outcome of the fight at that time.
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