What happened to Welterweight Contender Mike Jones?

Randall Bailey, man. That's a name I aint heard in a while. I don't think I've seen a puncher like him around that weight class in a long time. He had Hawk Jackson type power.

you guys are forgetting the majority decision win against jesus soto karass that he probably should have lost if memory serves me correct. he did better in the rematch but the writing was on the wall that he wasn't going to live up to the hype

His tweets stop shortly after the bailey loss, his last few tweets i think show he was in a bit of turmoil over that loss as u would expect https://twitter.com/boxermikejones

He was a promising contender back than. Highly ranked at all rankings that existed, top 10 or even top 5. Something like Ennis now. He was signed by Top rank, expected to face Pacquiao in career pay day. Well, Bailey finished his career by one punch.

History in a nutshell: - Mike Jones was being pushed by Bob Arum for a "superfight" ('eye test') with Manny Pacquiao. - Randall Bailey late replaced someone, got outboxed damn near all fight, then near the end, the power showed up and Jones was toast. - Bailey called Arum expecting that now that he won the belt, he would get the Pacquiao fight. - Arum basically told him that not only would he NOT get a Pacquiao fight, he would never get another fight against a Top Rank fighter. (BTW, this is the undercard for Pac/Bradley 1, and we saw how that went.) - Mike Jones would then completely disappear from the public. Even his old training grounds and trainer have not heard from him in years. - Randall Bailey retired shortly after, then went to be a truck driver in FL. He was supposed to do a one-time BKFC match but backed out because of who he'd have to deal with (he didn't name them). SO basically, two careers were destroyed on the same event - instead of a winner and a loser, both "lost" because of Arum. Source: I tried to get him on the show, because the rise of 'Boots' draws close parallels for me and I wanted to get his thoughts on everything. Awesome thanks for the explaination!

He was hyped up by top rank to be mannys next in house opponent. Got knocked out bad by Randall Bailey. Then also lost his tune up fight against Jamie Herrera. Called it quits after that. Shows where his heart was all along.

The man looked like a middleweight magically making the welterweight limit. It would've been interesting to see how his career could have panned out had he managed comeback after his loss to Bailey. Perhaps he would have been more comfortable at 154lbs.

Just never got over that loss I’m guessing, he was actually winning the fight too if I remember correctly, think it was on the Pacquiao-Bradley 1 undercard.

- - Promising start, but got beat up, knocked out, and wisely retired. What else you need to know?

I've always wondered if the knockout knocked all of the gas out of Jones' tank.