In Defense of Roy Jones Jr & Other European Fighters

By Brian Kenneth Blackwell: In coming to the defense of Roy Jones Jr, yes, one must recognize that he did fight his mandatories, as he should have. While many a boxing critic would put up the argument that there should be a higher system that makes people fight their mandatories, for the purpose of having a more legitimate, recognized system, ironically, when fighters follow these unwritten laws, those same critics write them off by stating that they are ducking bigger fights.

To begin the argument, you first have to come to the realization that styles make fights. How was Roy supposed to know what kind of fight any of the fighters he boxed would have given him before stepping into the ring? Montell Griffin in particular, was a mandatory, and gave him a better fight than he should have. Afterwards, how was Roy supposed to know how Montell would rebound from his loss to him? Montell, like many of Roy’s opponents, had a good record coming in. In fact, he had just beaten James Toney the fight previous. The argument is that because his career went under the radar from that point (plus the beating that he took from Roy at the time) is that he must not have been that great of a boxer at the time? So if Montell Griffin were to have won every single fight from that point on, he would have been the greatest fighter Roy would have had on his record, and Roy would have one less fighter to critique on his record? I watched Roy beat Hopkins and Toney just as easily as he did John Ruiz. Julio Cesar Gonzalez was 27-0 when Roy fought his mandatory against him. Just because Roy did not make the mistake of getting in the ring with super-heavyweights like Andrew Golota, Michael Grant, Lennox Lewis, or the Klitschkos, we slam him for not wanting to get the best fights. We forget that Bernard Hopkins made 20 title defenses of the Middleweight championship. Do you want to know how? By fighting mandatories!

I never hear anyone criticizing the record of Julio Cesar Chavez. This man fought fighters with 0 fights on their record 65 bouts into his career. Chris Byrd, a heavyweight champion at the time, and someone who many boxing critics were calling Roy out to fight, was 28-1 when he fought Val Smith, who was 10-11 at the time. Chris Byrd’s last bout was against Matthias Sandow, who is 4-3. When Muhammad Ali was champion, he took on Leon Spinks, who was 6-0-1 at the time, and lost! You want to talk about looking for easy fights?

People always forget their boxing history. Calzaghe was getting the same criticism throughout his career because he was fighting his mandatories. It just so happened that his so-called, most crowd appealing fights came at the end of his career, because the American boxing networks were finally showing his fights on television in the United States. I would not say that they were his most competitive fights though. And this is not to say he was not already recognized as a great boxer in Europe. What makes recognition by Americans so much greater than recognition from Europeans? We credit Joe way too much for his win over Jeff Lacy, simply because Jeff was an American fighter. The argument is that Jeff was better than any of Calzaghe’s previous opponents, simply because he was American. Jeff was never that great of a fighter.

The argument that European fighters (and other fighters from around the world) need to come to the United States to get big fights is getting to the point of absurdity. One by one, fight by fight, we are learning that fighters outside of the United States are just as, if not better than fighters groomed here at home. The thought that the United States has the best fighters is extremely arrogant and false. We Americans make comments like this, but come back and say that our best boxers are now in the NBA or NFL. Are Europeans supposed to make the argument that their best boxers are playing soccer? From what I have seen, it is usually the American fighters that are unwilling to take on the Europeans. Look how long it took for Calzaghe to get a shot from even Jeff Lacy. Look how long it took for the Klitschkos to get their recognition, and they still do not. We continually slam Wladimir for having a weak chin, but we forget that Lennox was flattened twice by one-punch knock outs.

And the climax of them all, look at the career of Lennox Lewis. When Lewis became Riddick Bowe’s mandatory challenger, he threw his WBC belt in the trash so that he did not have to fight Lennox. It took years before Lennox was taken seriously. Throughout his career the writers and fans criticized Lennox for his “boring” and “timid” European boxing style, even though he possessed great knock out power. Does this sound familiar (Wladimir)? Give me one American fighter that can beat Wladimir. Arreola? No. James Toney? No. John Ruiz? Lennox would not even take the fight with this guy 8 years ago, laughing at the thought of flattening him in order to get back a belt that John was wearing, that he was stripped of after becoming the Undisputed Heavyweight Champion. I say we Americans shut up until we take this sport as seriously as the rest of the world.

I agree with many boxing critics who say that we should have only one belt per weight division; so I like what is happening with the recognition of the Ring Magazine championship as the legitimate title in each division. Let’s get a fight between Kelly Pavlik and Arthur Abraham in Germany. There are more boxing fans in that area of the globe anyhow. Abraham is undefeated, and he is the more recognized champion. Let HBO cover the fight, but let the fight take place in Abraham’s back yard, where it is deserved. Not in the United States.

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