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Did Roy really rule the division once or was he lucky to have reigned in an era of low competition? Would Tarver’s formula have always been too much for him or would a peak Roy of a few years ago been able to handle him?
We’ll never really know now. Tonight’s show was just an encore, a vaudeville concoction of tongues, leaping, dancing and smoke and mirrors. Roy was satisfied with playing performing clown in Tarver’s circus roadshow, a last hurrah from the man who had once ruled the division effortlessly.
Gone was the Roy of old, even against a Tarver who was surprisingly cautious and ran out of air at least three minutes before the end of the bout. There was very little boxing on show tonight, just a hyper display of routine tics and gimmickry, there to please the crowd and give a final farewell. This wasn’t Roy claiming his title. It was Roy’s goodbye, only this time not being carried out.
If that was indeed Roy’s objective then he succeeded admirably. The notion that a man who was p4p the world’s best fighter for most of a decade should go out a performing second-best is hard to take, but an ambition Roy had had eleven months to come to terms with.
There were flashes of brilliance – he took punches better than expected in the eleventh, though remember when he wasn’t expected to take them at all? Yet for me the favourite round had to be the fifth. ****y, posturing, Roy squatted in front of a man who had knocked him senseless with a single punch and rubbed his socks, made jive faces and dodged a multitude of punches on reflexes alone. Then he backed Tarver up, and even managed to solve the problem of being pinned on the ropes – for a couple of occasions, at least – by using the uppercut.
Sadly it was all too brief, and what I imagine will be the final appearance of Roy in a boxing ring was even sadder than his last two appearances at such a venue. Not laid out cold, but play acting and running, desperate not to take that one last chance. What a waste.
We’ll never really know now. Tonight’s show was just an encore, a vaudeville concoction of tongues, leaping, dancing and smoke and mirrors. Roy was satisfied with playing performing clown in Tarver’s circus roadshow, a last hurrah from the man who had once ruled the division effortlessly.
Gone was the Roy of old, even against a Tarver who was surprisingly cautious and ran out of air at least three minutes before the end of the bout. There was very little boxing on show tonight, just a hyper display of routine tics and gimmickry, there to please the crowd and give a final farewell. This wasn’t Roy claiming his title. It was Roy’s goodbye, only this time not being carried out.
If that was indeed Roy’s objective then he succeeded admirably. The notion that a man who was p4p the world’s best fighter for most of a decade should go out a performing second-best is hard to take, but an ambition Roy had had eleven months to come to terms with.
There were flashes of brilliance – he took punches better than expected in the eleventh, though remember when he wasn’t expected to take them at all? Yet for me the favourite round had to be the fifth. ****y, posturing, Roy squatted in front of a man who had knocked him senseless with a single punch and rubbed his socks, made jive faces and dodged a multitude of punches on reflexes alone. Then he backed Tarver up, and even managed to solve the problem of being pinned on the ropes – for a couple of occasions, at least – by using the uppercut.
Sadly it was all too brief, and what I imagine will be the final appearance of Roy in a boxing ring was even sadder than his last two appearances at such a venue. Not laid out cold, but play acting and running, desperate not to take that one last chance. What a waste.
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