Jones-Lebedev: This is going to end badly for Roy on Saturday night

By Boxing News - 05/20/2011 - Comments

Image: Jones-Lebedev: This is going to end badly for Roy on Saturday nightBy Dan Ambrose: It’s unknown what 42-year-old Roy Jones (54-7, 40 KO’s) was thinking when he signed up to fight southpaw cruiserweight contender Denis Lebedev (21-1, 16 KO’s) on May 21st at the Sport Complex Krylatskoe, in Moscow, Russia. Jones doesn’t have the power, the chin or the ability to defend against the hard shots that Lebedev is going to be unleashing on him this Saturday night in Russia.

I see this fight going really badly Jones with almost a guaranteed knockout loss for Jones. All I can say is that Jones must have received a ton of money to take this fight because that’s really the only thing that I can think of for him taking on a dangerous like Lebedev. You would think that with two losses in his last two fights, Jones would choose to ease into the cruiserweight division slowly to test the waters before jumping in the deep end against a shark like Lebedev. But Jones is skipping a tune-up and going straight at arguably the most dangerous fighter in the cruiserweight division.

Some people think Marcos Huck is the best fighter in the division, but after I saw how well Lebedev did against Huck in their fight last December, I think Lebedev is the best fighter in the division right now. Maybe Jones feels that if he’s going to lose to someone, he wants it to be against the perceived best fighter in the division so that it gives him a form of cover by giving him a built in excuse if things don’t go his way. After all, there’s no shame in losing to a quality fighter like Lebedev. In contrast, if Jones were to take on a fringe cruiserweight contender or even a second tier guy, I could still see Jones losing and he’d really take a lot of criticism then.

I don’t really know what Jones could do to be competitive with Lebedev. I wouldn’t recommend Jones hanging on the ropes and just letting Lebedev tee off on him. That’s what Jones has been doing in his fights in the past four years. However, he can’t afford to do that with a big puncher like Lebedev if he wants to have any chance at winning the fight and getting out of it whole and in one piece. Jones has got to move around from side to side and look to land quick flurries and then run. If he gets hit with Lebdev’s left hand full force, I can’t see Jones being able to take the shot unless Lebedev is going to carry him out of sympathy for 12 rounds. I could see that happening.



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