By William Mackay: In the past eight fights spanning three years time, heavyweight James Toney (71-6-3, 43 KOs) has won three fights, lost two with another two ending as no decisions and one a draw. If that’s not an indication of a fighter that has seen better days than I don’t what is. Toney, 40, appears to have run into the limits of his fading talent in the last handful of fights, showing that he’s lost a couple of steps, slowed down a lot with his hand speed and along with it his once high work rate.
That was never more apparent than in his last bout against Fres Oquendo on December 13th, a good B-class fighter, who boxed circles around Toney, jabbing and landing right hands all night and appearing to beat Toney by at least three rounds. However, Toney had the boxing Gods on his side on that night, because he looked bad, really bad, nothing like a top #8 ranked heavyweight in the WBC.
What he looked like was a fading star, someone that had lost much of his once great ability and was only capable of fighting hard for 30 seconds of every round. In fact, it was Oqeundo who looked impressive, showing that at 35, he’s still a heavyweight to be reckoned with.
It’s sad, though, because only three years ago, Toney would have probably made Oqeundo look bad and easily have beaten him. That’s not to say that Oquendo wouldn’t get his licks in, because he fights well on the outside with his jabs and chopping right hands, but back then, Toney had the ability to walk his opponents down, outworking them and pot shotting them into submission.
That’s not the case now. I had hopes that somehow Toney could lose a little of the extra weight that he’s put on since making his first appearance in the heavyweight division in a fight against Evander Holyfield in October 2003. At that time, Toney weighed a light and in shape 217, a weight that seemed to suit him quite well.
He didn’t look good compared to trim heavyweights like Wladimir and Vitali Klitschko, but he looked good compared to the way he looks now. In his last fight, he weighed 230, which is slightly below the weights he came into his fights with Samuel Peter and Hasim Rahman.
The weight was far too much for him due to his short 5’9” frame, preventing him from moving well with his feet and upper body. It’s unclear what the sticking point is for him, because he has to see what I see in watching him fight in the past three years. The 17 or so pounds that Toney has gained over these years has taken a lot out of his game, making him much more beatable than he would otherwise be.
Even in the best of shape, however, Toney with his lack of size would be at a tremendous disadvantage against a super heavyweight like the Klitschko brothers or Alexander Dimitrenko. Quite positively, he could never even hope to beat any of those guys due to his size limitations.
But at this point, I don’t think that Toney has the ability to even beat the smaller heavyweights in the top tier. His ability seems to have declined dramatically in the past three years beyond a mere weight issue. I think it’s just age now more than the weight.