Why didn't Roy Jones make the sort of money that Tyson or Mayweather made?

[billeau2]

First off, I know Roy's time was before the age of social media, so he didn't have the advantage that Floyd had. But Tyson was BEFORE Roy and he made hundreds of millions of dollars. After Mike, Roy became THE fighter... The most athletic, flashiest fighters who knocked people out in dramatic fashion (not every fight but when he did it was typically in spectacular fashion).

Roy was also a GREATER athlete than both Mike and Floyd. Yet despite his superiority in the ring, his P4P unquestioned status, his next level miracle speed he never made the crazy money that Mike or Floyd did....

How was Roy not considered as great of an attraction as Floyd or MIke so as to demand similar purses?.... It doesn't make sense... You can say, "Well, he didn't have the competition"... But look at the padding of Mike and Floyd in their early career...

Jones for most of his career was mismanaged by his father. Roy is similar to Mayweather in that he became a bit of a heal... the guy everyone wanted a piece of. Mayweather was going down the same street, so to speak, but two things happened: 1) He told Arum to go fck himself (more fighters should do the same) and he fought a fighter with massive appeal, that being De La Hoya. Only after De La Hoya did Mayweather start to become financially succesful.

Tyson was the heavyweight champ of the world... And it was fairly obvious he reigned supreme... end of story!

[darius45]

People don't understand how special Floyd was as an entertainer. All sports are ENTERTAINMENT and Floyd transcended BOXING and became a headline ENTERTAINER.

Floyd did the WWE thing, did the rap thing earlier in his career (believe it was called Philthy rich records or something like that), was arrested a few times (appealed to MSM because Floyd fit the "stereotype" for black AA's), Floyd gracefully played the villain role, Floyd did Dancing with the Stars...Floyd literally INVENTED/MADE HBO's 24/7 TV show. And, of course, Floyd kept winning.

Floyd was a FAR more interesting character than RJJ and perhaps most importantly Floyd had a nemesis who was his equal opposite. Pacman was a poor immigrant who was a Holy man and trained under a white man with disability. Pacman was humble in victory and defeat and spoke "cute English". Pacman was also blitzkrieging and KTFO opponents.

Floyd will never admit this but his income benefited GREATLY from the mere existence of Manny Pacquiao...it wasnt just Manny that benefited.

People originally tuned in to watch Floyd because he was exciting to watch... Fast, explosive, technical... an impressive athlete... like a lite version of Roy... As Floyd's career progressed and he turned into Money May, people were tuning in (buying PPVs) JUST to see Floyd lose... Because he became less exciting as an athlete... less aggressive, more calculating, more cautious... doing enough to win convincingly on points.... As a fighter Roy was FAR more exciting to watch, both in the beginning and end of his career...At the end of the day, isn't how a fighter actually performs in the ring the most "entertaining" thing about boxing.... It's like, who actually wants to watch Jake Paul get in the ring and box... What's the point of all the build up and drama to one of his fights, when the fighter who steps in the ring is barely an amateur?

[GrandpaBernard]

People originally tuned in to watch Floyd because he was exciting to watch... Fast, explosive, technical... an impressive athlete... like a lite version of Roy... As Floyd's career progressed and he turned into Money May, people were tuning in (buying PPVs) JUST to see Floyd lose... Because he became less exciting as an athlete... less aggressive, more calculating, more cautious... doing enough to win convincingly on points.... As a fighter Roy was FAR more exciting to watch, both in the beginning and end of his career...At the end of the day, isn't how a fighter actually performs in the ring the most "entertaining" thing about boxing.... It's like, who actually wants to watch Jake Paul get in the ring and box... What's the point of all the build up and drama to one of his fights, when the fighter who steps in the ring is barely an amateur?

Outside the ring helps as much as performing in the ring

oscar had his cute Olympics story

manny has his story that average joes & h03s love

Floyd was seen as a thug

Tyson was a thug

[GrandpaBernard]

Jones for most of his career was mismanaged by his father. Roy is similar to Mayweather in that he became a bit of a heal... the guy everyone wanted a piece of. Mayweather was going down the same street, so to speak, but two things happened: 1) He told Arum to go fck himself (more fighters should do the same) and he fought a fighter with massive appeal, that being De La Hoya. Only after De La Hoya did Mayweather start to become financially succesful.

Tyson was the heavyweight champ of the world... And it was fairly obvious he reigned supreme... end of story!

Roy didn’t cross the chasm to become a mainstream name

he had plenty of personality best boxing rapper of all time

But didn’t get a strong reaction out of people the way Floyd and Mike do

[low blows]

I read Holys book. Jones wanted 100 million for an Evander Holyfield fight. Of course it was turned down man, too much to ask for. Woulda been a sweet fight though.

No it was 50 million to fight Lennox and that would have left nothing for Lennox. Of course Lennox would have separated his head eventually from his body at some point in the fight.

[buddyr]

De La Hoya was the first mainstream non heavyweight PPV star. Before him it was mostly heavyweights that were getting those big dollars.
Plus in his prime the middleweight division was pretty weak so there wasn’t anyone on his level that would be a compelling matchup and he didn’t move up until he was past his prime.
By the time he was in a position to have any fight on PPV he wasn’t as good and started losing.

As much as I hated DLH, he took on the big fights as Roy ran away from them.

[Dosser]

First off, I know Roy's time was before the age of social media, so he didn't have the advantage that Floyd had. But Tyson was BEFORE Roy and he made hundreds of millions of dollars. After Mike, Roy became THE fighter... The most athletic, flashiest fighters who knocked people out in dramatic fashion (not every fight but when he did it was typically in spectacular fashion).

Roy was also a GREATER athlete than both Mike and Floyd. Yet despite his superiority in the ring, his P4P unquestioned status, his next level miracle speed he never made the crazy money that Mike or Floyd did....

How was Roy not considered as great of an attraction as Floyd or MIke so as to demand similar purses?.... It doesn't make sense... You can say, "Well, he didn't have the competition"... But look at the padding of Mike and Floyd in their early career...

Oscar took all the limelight.

Roy didn't have a promoter to spend the big bucks to create the brand. He did his own thing out of the gate and couldn't cut the mustard. Also HW's was the big bread back then and Oscar was still building the smaller weights and the mian attraction, but Jones did indeeed fight a lot of bums in dead divisions which didn't help him.

[Rockybigblower]

Probably because he was black.

[djtmal]

Roy didn't have the outside the ring drama that Mike did, or the theatrics of Floyd... But he was a spectacular once in a century type of talent... it's just sort of amazing that an athlete of Roy's caliber wasn't making hundreds of millions of dollars... In any other sport it would be unheard of... It's like how can an athlete who can perform like that not be a huge attraction? People tuned in to watch Jordan because he performed so well, not because of his personality or off the court drama.

You're right though, Roy seems like a humble guy relatively.... Still lives on his farm in Pensacola and loves his animals and just being a part of boxing... It's like he was content with having 10's of millions of dollars...but not hundreds of millions... Seems like Roy has a lot of pride in that regard

I think MJ had a bigger stage than Roy to perform on, and in the early stages he had some great rivalries, peers to build his brand off of, Magic Bird The Bad Boy Pistons, etc., and don't forget the atg shoe.

I think Roy was what you see is what you get. Maybe getting Lennox/Holy/Iron Mike in the ring and beating them would have put him over the top. But at the end of the day look at Mike now. He morphed into a regular schmuck trying to eke out a living, and Floyd still schucking and jiving trying to keep up the coon act. Must not be easy work.

[HOF Hater]

People originally tuned in to watch Floyd because he was exciting to watch... Fast, explosive, technical... an impressive athlete... like a lite version of Roy... As Floyd's career progressed and he turned into Money May, people were tuning in (buying PPVs) JUST to see Floyd lose... Because he became less exciting as an athlete... less aggressive, more calculating, more cautious... doing enough to win convincingly on points.... As a fighter Roy was FAR more exciting to watch, both in the beginning and end of his career...At the end of the day, isn't how a fighter actually performs in the ring the most "entertaining" thing about boxing.... It's like, who actually wants to watch Jake Paul get in the ring and box... What's the point of all the build up and drama to one of his fights, when the fighter who steps in the ring is barely an amateur?

I'll tell what is real though and that's Jake Paul's bank account. They call it "prizefighting" for a reason and the prize is...money. That's why fighters boast and brag about PPV buys because those buys equate to MONEY.

So while the Jake Paul and celebrity boxing is truly a joke its also unbelievably successful considering these guys are complete novices. It is a fad though and won't last long so don't get too worked up about it.

Roy was more entertaining INSIDE the ring while Floyd was more entertaining OUTSIDE the ring and fights themselves only last 36 minutes so its more important to be entertaining OUTSIDE the ring as it pertains to MONEY. And this was something Floyd intimately understood and that is one of the reasons he was so financially successful.