A boxing article for boxing day. Felt appropriate. Have a look if you got time to kill.
Roy Jones Jr. is a popular high-light reel fighter. The speed and sheer decisiveness with which he ends fights has made him into something of a living legend. Make no mistake though, the Roy Jones Jr. that boxes today is a shadow of his former self. He still boxes into the twilight of his career, as many fighters are wont to do, but this shouldn't take away from his dominant and explosive years earlier in his career.
His rise to the top was meteoric. After leaving as a jilted Olympian from the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, he quickly tore through the middleweight division (winning 26 bouts), then the super-middleweight division (winning seven bouts), and then the light-heavyweight division (winning fifteen bouts). Other than the hiccup that was the disqualification loss to Montel Griffin, Roy Jones was undefeated, and certainly looked to be quite untouchable. Continuing to find new career milestones, he peeled away John Ruiz's WBA heavyweight title with relative ease in 2003. Who could beat this - essentially - undefeated middleweight, super-middleweight, light-heavyweight and heavyweight champion? Roy Jones Jr. was riding the crest of a wave that lasted from May 6th, 1989 to May 15th, 2003. That's fourteen years of being in control.
And yet, beaten he was when he lost his rematch to Antonio Tarver in 2004. His decline was as abrupt and unanticipated as his knockout wins, yet it was bound to happen sooner or later. 2003 was the year he won his WBA heavyweight title, and ironically, the same year that the seeds of his deterioration were sown. Some fighters are as dominant in their later career as they are in their 'prime' physical years. When interviewed after his victory over Mike Tyson in 2002, Lennox Lewis said his style was "like a fine wine", implying that he got better with age. However, this can't be true for every boxer; certainly not those that rely on their athletic faculties as much as a boxer like Jones.
Jones was a fighter that was great at a lot of things, but at the very centre - holding all of his success together - was his speed. Moving to heavyweight had the predictable effect of making him slow like a heavyweight (even if he could easily outmaneuver the ponderous Ruiz). Moving back down to light-heavyweight at the age of 34 and expecting to still have his speed was unrealistic. Narrowly beating Tarver the first time in 2003 took all of his accumulated know-how and technical ability; losing the second time - at that time - seemed profoundly sudden.
Following this loss, fans of Jones saw him absorb two more losses (to Glen Johnson and Tarver) before establishing a checkered pattern of wins and losses that has persisted to this day. At his peak, I am confident that he could take on any of the top fighters in his weight class(ses) of any era and made it competitive. At face value, his clowning, antics, braggadocio and speed are self-evident but his boxing persona is more than showmanship - it is subterfuge. He carefully undermines his opponents, and pot shots at their vulnerabilities. Amongst this, and perhaps at the very forefront, was his knack for humiliating his opponents with a brash displays of contempt.
The truth is that Jones' posturing was never as risky as people thought. Whenever he did emasculate his opponent in the ring, the psychological edge wasn't the only advantage he was taking. He also trying to make them throw caution to the wind, to exploit technical deficiencies or to determine their patterns of behaviour. Sloppy fighters have more openings in their defense that can be pried open and taken advantage of.
Beneath the posturing and showboating, Jones had a very clear understanding of the fundamentals of the game. If he didn't calculate what he was doing, he would have been destroyed much, much sooner. In reviewing Jones' technique, we must pay close attention to his stance, mastery of distance and angles, and lastly, the method behind the madness that was his posturing.
Stance
Jones has typically fought in a style that blends speed with anticipation. When you observe him in the following stance there should be a few things that are readily obvious.
His right arm is tucked close to his side and his right glove is in front of his chin. This lets him parry what their jab without much effort and let's him counter back easily with a right.. If they try to reach around his right glove to land a left hook, he almost always replies with a straight right or a left hook of his own. Again, speed is essential to victory. In his prime he could out-quick anyone.
If you also observe his left hand hanging by his side you will notice that it confers several advantages to him as well. First of all, simply by being there it protects him from body shots. Secondly, when he attacks with a left hook, it comes from a blind angle which his opponents have a hard time dealing with. Lastly, he will also on occasion 'mill' his left hand. Milling the hand means drawing it in and out from the body in a circular pattern. Doing so varies its distance from his opponent and also the angle at which the punch will land. If a fighter is used to timing a jab or a left hook due to its established distance and speed, then milling the hand basically confuses the opponent's reaction speed and makes the punch more difficult to time. For example, when his hand is drawn back and low, it's loaded for a left hook. Conversely, when it is outstretched then it can deflect an incoming punch or become a short jab with a starting point much closer to the opponent than they may realize.
Punching Style
Jones' flamboyant punching was predicated on working smarter, not harder than his opponents. Rather than stay busy and punch often - which can tire out a boxer and lead to defensive lapses - Jones patiently processed what his opponent did, and sought to use it against them.
His jab was utilitarian, sizing up range and the habits of his opponents, but also blinded them to other punches. It was nothing extraordinary or superhuman like that of Larry Holmes or Muhammad Ali, but functional. Between that and his left hook, as discussed above with the milling of his lead hand, Jones could usually find different angles to land, or at least preoccupy his opponents when he did combination punch.
For example:
In this case - a fourth round KO win over Virgil Hill which I earlier discussed in my article "The Art of the Knockout Punch" - Jones uses a shallow left lead to set up his opponent for a body blow.
Typically though, Jones is mostly recognized as a sniper, landing one devastating punch and then either finishing them with a flurry of beckoning his opponent to come back for more.
Accurate Counters
Counter punching really depends on one's speed, timing and sense of distance. Of course, anticipation is at the forefront of this ability since you need to be able to respond to a particular punch with the right movement. Slipping to the right of what you think is a jab, but is in fact a left hook, can be pretty hazardous to your health. Knowing is indeed half the battle.
Jones' big win over the bigger John Ruiz was in many ways a foreordained affair. A big, slow guy that doesn't punch or move well is pretty much tailor made for a blown-up Jones to pick apart. Nevertheless, Jones could have been a victim of Ruiz's relentless grind if he didn't do his homework and use the right strategy (a smaller but impressive fighter moving up in weight doesn't always look as impressive - De La Hoya moving to middleweight, and Yuriorkis Gamboa moving to featherweight come to mind). Floating about the edges of the ring and waiting for the bigger opponent to get carried away or reckless is a pretty standard procedure for a smaller fighter. When Ruiz would try and throw when they stood at the centre of the ring, Jones just needed to pull him out of position and counter. In the sequence above, Jones pulled back as Ruiz jabbed and slipped in a sharp left hook counter before Ruiz could land his right hand. The fact that Ruiz is reaching as Jones gives ground makes the counter even more effective.
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