Photo courtesy of Pavel Terekhov – By Eric Thomas: According to the latest boxing news gossip, light heavyweight contender Roy Jones Jr. is reportedly interested in facing one of the Klitschko brothers in the near future. Jones, 40, has a fight against Jeff Lacy next month on August 15th, but after that it’s anyone’s guess that Jones might fight next. Jones has mentioned a number of top fighters that he’d like to fight, such as Danny Green, Bernard Hopkins and now the Klitschko brothers.
Frankly, it’s hard to keep up with the opponents that Jones is contemplating fights with because there’s so many of them and their names constantly chance. But, given that Jones has looked less than impressive last five years, losing four out of his last eight fights, my guess is that a fight against either Vitali or Wladimir Klitschko would be next to impossible.
It’s not that Jones couldn’t pump up his weight and get to near 200, because Jones proved that he could do this before when he bulked up to 193 to easily defeat then WBA heavyweight champion John Ruiz by a one-sided 12 round decision in March 2003.
That was a long time ago, though, when Jones was still fighting effectively. In fighting Ruiz, Jones selected a smaller heavyweight without a lot of power. I doubt that Jones feels that he can beat either of the Klitschko brothers, and a fight against either of them would probably be for money and for the attention that Jones would get in facing them.
However, unless Jones looked incredibly good in his next fight against Lacy next month, it won’t really matter much. Even if Jones looks good in beating Lacy, I still doubt that the fan interest would be strong enough to lure either of the Klitschko brothers into taking the fight.
After all, Jones is past 40 and a win over a fighter that age, which hasn’t looked good in ages, would seem almost unsporting to many boxing fans. It would already be a huge mismatch for the Klitschko brothers because of their 6’7” height which compared to the short 5’11” Jones, would make them seem like giants in comparison.
Jones could probably get near 200 if he went on a weight gaining regimen, but he wouldn’t be able to do anything about his lack reach. He’d be giving up six to eight inches in reach against either of the Klitschkos and much more in power.
As a result, I just can’t see the fight happening. The Klitschko brothers have normally made it a practice to turn down fights against fighters past the age of 40, with the exception being Wladimir facing a 41-year-old Ray Mercer seven years ago.
I can’t see Wladimir or Vitali showing any interested in facing a faded Roy Jones Jr. now that he’s at the end of his career. Joe Calzaghe, a super middleweight, gave Jones a terrible beating last year in November in a one-sided fight. Jones’ reflexes looked shot in that fight and he couldn’t pull the trigger even with Calzaghe standing directly in front of him with his arms by his sides.
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