By chris Williams: Boxing legend Roy Jones Jr. (54-6, 40 KO’s) says that he may retire if he can knock out Bernard Hopkins (50-5-1, 32 KO’s) when the two 40ish former champions got at it on April 3rd at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, in Las Vegas, Nevada. In an article at Boxing Fanhouse, the 41-year-old Jones says “I could knock out Bernard Hopkins and call it a day. Or I could knockout Hopkins and then knockout Glen Johnson, too, and call it a day. Or I could knockout Hopkins, go knock out Glen Johnson and go and beat Danny Green, and call it a day.”

Obviously, Jones sounds more than a little confused about exactly he wants to do. However, if he can beat Hopkins by a knock out on April 3rd, that would be enough for a lot of boxing fans to seal Jones’ great legacy. He already really doesn’t need to beat anyone for him to be considered one of the greatest fighters of all time, but a win over Hopkins at this point in Jones career would be like icing on the cake.

Jones is clearly going downhill as a fighter, having lost to Antonio Tarver, Johnson, Joe Calzaghe and Danny Green in the past six years. Indeed, Jones was stopped in the 1st round in his last fight against Green on December 2nd, 2009. That was an ill-advised tune-up fight for Jones to get in a nice payday before the Hopkins fight.

Instead, Jones got jumped on immediately by a bigger, more energized Green, who was fighting in front of a large home audience at the Acer Arena, in Sydney, Australia. In hindsight, it was a really bad idea for Jones to agree to take a dangerous fight like this in Green’s home country. Jones walked into a hostile arena, and looked none too comfortable.

Green quickly dropped Jones with a clubbing right hand early in the bout, and after Jones got up, Green flurried on him until the referee stepped in to stop the fight. Jones may or may not have been able to make it out of the ring, but one thing is for sure, he was hurt by Green. Hopkins doesn’t punch as hard as Green, and doesn’t tend to try to jump on his opponents the way that Green did with Jones. However, you can expect that Hopkins has studied the Jones-Green fight and he may try to test Jones’ chin early to see if he can get him out of there fast.

The chances of Jones knocking Hopkins out or pretty much slim and none. If Jones couldn’t take Hopkins out in his prime 17 years ago last time they fought, it’s highly unlikely that Jones will be able to trouble Hopkins with any of his punches now that Jones has slowed somewhat. Roy doesn’t think that he’s declined, and says that if anything he’s a better puncher than he was last time out against Hopkins. That’s hard to believe, because back then Jones was blinding fast and knockout out a lot of his opponents. Jones isn’t as fast, and isn’t knocking every one out like he used to.