By Jason Kim: This Saturday night Roy Jones Jr. (53-5, 39 KOs) and Jeff Lacy (25-2, 17 KOs) will be meeting in a bout that will mean little aside from the basic entertainment factor as these two aging former stars go at it in a 12 round bout at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum in Biloxi, Mississippi.

Both at one time possessed big left hooks. Age and injuries have slowed them down in recent years. They’ll still be throwing hooks, albeit with much less speed and power than in their prime years. The bout, unfortunately, is about five years too late for both of the fighters. Jones, now 40, has been on the slide since 2004, whereas Lacy’s once promising career started going downhill after a loss to Joe Calzaghe in 2006.

As such, this Saturday’s bout will be between two fighters that struggling to stay at the top now that younger fighters are starting to move up and crowd them out. Ideally, Lacy should be fighting a top light heavyweight on the way up instead of Jones.

Although Roy is ranked number #2 in the WBO, that must be some kind ranking based on popularity rather than what Jones has been achieving in the ring in the past five years because Jones has been beaten four out of his last eight fights. How the WBO could still rank Jones at number #2 after all those losses is beyond me.

Usually, a fighter that has been beaten that many times in the past five years wouldn’t even be ranked in the top 15, much less at the number #2 spot. If Lacy really wanted to help his career, he should go after top light heavyweight contenders Jurgen Brahmer, Adrian Diaconu, Hugo Hernan Garay or Clinton Woods.

At least by fighting one of them, Lacy will likely get more credit than if he beats the 40-year-old Jones, who is considered to be shot. However, Lacy will have his hands full with Jones and will be lucky if he can beat him. Jones may have lost a lot of his ability in the past five years, but at 75% of his former ability, that might still be enough to beat the likes of Lacy.

Jones is still hard to hit when he’s fighting in the center of the ring and if he can avoid retreating to the ropes, he has a good chance of beating the younger 32-year-old Lacy. The problem with Jones is that he tends to back up to the ropes and fight there for extended periods of time while he rests his weary legs.

That’s not a good thing for Jones to do against Lacy, because Jeff can still punch with a lot of power with his left hook and right hand. If he has a stationary target, Lacy can load up with some big enough shots to possibly get Jones out of there. Roy’s ability to take punishment is questionable at this point in his career. Jones was knocked completely out by both Antonio Tarver and Glen Johnson in 2004 and 2005, so there’s the question whether Jones will be able to stand up to Lacy’s big shots.