I'm taking RJ. He was unreal at middleweight, beat the best at super middleweight, cleaned out light heavyweight, and won a heavyweight belt, which would be the equivalent of Floyd winning a middleweight or super middleweight belt.
He was also the recognized best fighter in the world from like 1994 until 2004 when he came back down from heavyweight. Combine all that with his unreal skill and Roy Jones Jr. was the f*****g man.
2 different perspectives really
roy jones is/was a freak athlete with the natural gifts that could overcome the most talented technicians
mayweather has an incredible ring IQ that allows him too dominate fights more subtlely than roy jones does
both climbed the weights with little detrimental effect on their skills (apart from jones moving 2 HW then dropping back down)
jones is still good 2 watch at his ripe old age and has always been very entertaining so he's my pick
Roy Jones is easily the better boxer. People will forever argue about who had the better skills and fought the better opponents but I'll just stick to the facts.
- More of Roy Jones opponents went on to win championships after he beat them (Bernard Hopkins, James Toney, Clinton Woods, Julio Gonzalez, John Ruiz). Floyd's opponents were either way too green or were on the tail-end of their boxing careers
- Roy Jones has yet to show a single sign of ever getting hurt, or close to losing a fight until he was 35 when he barely beat Tarver and got knocked out in the rematch. Jones has a love and respect for the sport. Mayweather retired at 33 after massing up large amounts of cash. Mayweather has also came close to losing against a prime Castillo (a fight I think he clearly lost). Mayweather has also been stunned on several occasions.
- Roy won in a much more impressive and devastating fashion than Floyd and he did it against better opponents. Remember when he mimicked a chicken and knocked James Toney into the ropes? I'd love to see Floyd open up his guard for once and try that on another hall-of-famer. Roy left no doubt who won the fight. Floyd loves to bend the rules by using his forearms, turning away from his opponent, and dipping so low that his opponents accidentally hit him low or in the back of the head.
- Roy fought the better ranked opponents. Go to boxrec.com and you'll see that Mayweather didn't face the best of the welterweights. Zab Judah was a has-been who lost his title to Baldimir. He beat the best Junior Welterweight(Ricky Hatton) at Welterweight.
- Roy was also the first fighter and perhaps only fighter to go through an entire round without getting hit by a punch. So who's defense is better now?
- Roy never got hurt or close to losing a fight during his prime. So who's got the better boxing style after all or was Roy that much more athletic?
- Many observers have also considered Roy Jones to still have faster handspeed than mayweather. Mayweather's speed is mostly in his body.
In the end, Floyd won boring unimpressive fights against lackluster competition. Even against inferior fighters, he showed numerous flaws and got hit with big clean shots. Floyd may have won many fights but he did lose numerous rounds against Castillo, Judah, and De La Hoya where Roy hardly ever loses a clear round (in his prime).
Mayweather is a more naturally and technically gifted boxer, whereas Jones was a raw freak of nature that did everything off of his almost superhuman-like raw speed and power. It's why once he got old he dropped way off, and why Hopkins, and probably Mayweather, are able to fight at a higher level longer.
As great as his accomplishments are, I still think Mayweather, atm, is behind Jones. He could change all that though.
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