Roy Jones didn't make history! Bob Fitsimmonz record remains unbroken!

[Dirt E Gomez]

You take into account the types of fights decades ago. There wasn't nearly the set up we have today with people trying to have top contenders always fighting. It was a sport so everybody fought non-stop, regardless of how good the opponents were. People aren't fighting less because there are less opponents, they're fighting less because they don't have to fight as often.

[Yogi]

You take into account the types of fights decades ago. There wasn't nearly the set up we have today with people trying to have top contenders always fighting. It was a sport so everybody fought non-stop, regardless of how good the opponents were. People aren't fighting less because there are less opponents, they're fighting less because they don't have to fight as often.

Ah, but we don't have top contenders fighting each other all that often nowadays, especially when compared to the fighters of 50+ years ago (when a fighter basically had to defeat all of the other top contenders to become a world title challenger). And if you're trying to say that the top fighters of yesteryear had easier competition, I'd liked to see a modern fighter do what Sam Langford did (Langford's only one example, but there's plenty of others), and fight four fights against HOF'ers in a span of only one short month...Actually nevermind four tough fights against fellow greats during a single month, I'd like to see a modern day great have two fights in a year against a fighter of near equal caliber to him (besides a couple of willing fighters like Morales and such, that is a definate rarity nowadays).

Anyways, I gotta run, dude. My wife's giving me the boot off of the computer, so I have to end my side of this abbreviated conversation with this post. But I do thank you for the discussion, my friend.

[ROY JONES II]

It's a good accomplishment, but it's a discgrace to compare that to Bob Fitsimmonz..

Bob Fitsimmonz defeated the #1 heavyweight champion in the world...

Jones could've fought the best in Lennox Lewis...but he chose John Ruiz...

It was obvious that Lennox Lewis was the #1 heavyweight in the world..
I mean come on...

If people had this kind of chances, this record would have been broken SO long ago...

HERE WE GO AGAIN TRYING TO DISCREDIT THE ACCOMPLISHMENT. AS I REMEMBER WHEN ROY WAS MOVING UP TO FIGHT RUIZ MOSTLY EVERYONE SAID ROY WOULD LOSE THAT FIGHT. MANY PICKED HIM TO GET KNOCKED OUT. THE REASON ROY MOVED UP TO FIGHT RUIZ IS BECAUSE SOME FIGHTS HE WAS TRYING TO GET FELL THROUGH LIKE HOPKINS. SO TO TRY TO DISCREDIT HIS ACCOMPLISHMENT IS FUNNY TO ME. ALL OF THE SAME PEOPLE THAT ARE SAYING THAT RUIZ WASNT THE REAL CHAMPION ARE THE SAME ONES THAT PROBABLY SAID ROY WOULD LOSE TO HIM. ROY WAS OUTWEIGHED BY 30 LBS. NOT ONLY DID HE BEAT RUIZ IT WASNT EVEN A CONTEST. SO IF ROY WOULD HAVE FOUGHT LL THEN SOMEONE WOULD OF FOUND AN EXCUSE THEN TOO. WHAT ROY DID SHOULD GO DOWN IN HISTORY AS A GREAT ALL TIME MOMENT IN BOXING. MORE IS EXPECTED FROM ROY THAN ANY OTHER BOXING IN THE HISTORY OF THE SPORT. THAT TELLS ME ONE THING AND THAT IS THAT HE IS AN ALL TIME GREAT.

[Easy-E]

Didn't you say earlier that you thought an older fighter by the name of Joe Louis was "much more talented" than the modern fighter by the name Lennox Lewis?

joe lewis, in the prime of his career was fighting at 200-205 pounds.
lennox lewis was fighting at 345-350.
how would the more talented hopkins or talylor or wright do against a big guy like macormack or braithewright...that what were comparing here

[Briman15]

Jim Corbett whom Fitzsimmons defeated was a mear 184 pounds compared with Fitzsimmons's 167. Today corbett would be a small cruiserweight. In short, for jones to challenge Lewis or Klitschko or any of the other Super Heavyweights would have been completely unrealistic. For that matter, no responsible state athletic commision would have sanctioned such a bout. There is a reason weight classes exist, to see a fight with a huge weight disparity such as Jones-Lewis is simply not a sporting contest unless the bigger man is incompetent, ala Ruiz. There were plenty of legitimate fights to be made around the 175 weight when Jones fought Ruiz. He should have just stuck to building his legacy as a great light heavy. Beating Ruiz proved only that too many sanctioning bodies exist, not that roy jones was any greater than we had believed

[Yogi]

joe lewis, in the prime of his career was fighting at 200-205 pounds.
lennox lewis was fighting at 345-350.
how would the more talented hopkins or talylor or wright do against a big guy like macormack or braithewright...that what were comparing here

Lewis weighed 345-350, did he? I'm assuming that's merely a typo on your part or at least I hope it was.

I don't know how Hopkins would do against Braithwaite or Mormeck.

But I do know how guys like a former welterweight by the name of Mickey Walker did against heavyweights, and he defeated a few of the ranked contenders of his time (Johnny Risko, Paulino Uzcudan, King Levinsky and Bearcat Wright). I also know that in the very first round Mickey Walker knocked out a former heavyweight contender of the late 20's by the name of Arthur De Kuh, who outweighed Walker by about 50 lbs, and who had also gone the distance with the murderous punching Max Baer just the year previous. I also know that Walker fought Jack Sharkey to a 15 round draw in a fight that many thought Walker won, which was in Sharkey's prime of his career and just before he defeated Schmeling for the heavyweight championship (after facing Walker, Sharkey beat the **** out of the much larger, Primo Carnera, over 15 rounds).

And I know how another former welterweight by the name of Sam Langford also beat more than his share of heavyweight contenders during his career, including a few that are members of the prestigious IBHOF.

I could go on with plenty of examples where the more talented smaller man defeated the much bigger man, including some examples of recent times where we see guys jumping up and winning alphabet titles in multiple weight classes. But all I really wanted to say in this post, is that this modern fan's thinking that bigger is automatically better is exceptionally flawed...History proves otherwise and if "bigger is better" was automatically the case, then Louis certainly wouldn't have beaten the **** out of guys like Abe Simon, Primo Carnera, and Buddy Baer (all very comparable in size to Lennox Lewis).

You can say Lennox Lewis could've/would've beaten Joe Louis all you want and if you can make a decent case for that happening, odds are you're not going to get too many heated arguments to the contrary (although some would beg to differ with that opinion, I'm sure). But it's got to be something more substantiated than simply stating Lennox would win because he was much bigger, because Joe Louis himself proved that theory 100% false against few of his much larger opponents.