Nobody can take credit away from Roy Jones Jr
Looking very much like the champion of old, Roy Jones Jr despite getting on in years still proved he is a fighter to be reckoned with as he toyed with former world champion Jeff "Left Hook" Lacy in a one-sided showcase of Jones' talent and his ability to clown with the fans at the MS Coast Coliseum in his hometown if Biloxi, Mississippi.
Jones used his own vaunted left hook and lightning-fast combinations to batter Lacy and effectively provide a clinic before Lacy's corner decided their fighter had taken enough and asked the referee to call it off with both eyes of Lacy almost shut. With the win Jones Jr improved to 54-5 with 40 knockouts while Lacy fell to 25-3 with 17 knockouts.
A disagreement over the gloves delayed the fight for some thirty minutes but that hardly made a difference as both fighters wore Everlast gloves and Jones looked like he is unlikely to last forever as a fighter but still has some good years left in him.
Chances that Roy Jones Jr will fight two-time champion Aussie Danny "Green Machine" Green (27-3, 24 KO's) after he won the vacant IBO cruiserweight title with a 5th round knockout over Julio Cesar "La Furia" Dominguez (20-5-1, 14 KO's).
Green dropped Dominguez in the fifth round and then took him for good a short while later. The time was 2:53 of the fifth round. Jones has many years of fighting left. Roy Jones has proved that despite turning forty one he is still a great fighter and can defeat leading MMA fighters in their early thirties. The way he used his brain and punches to defeat thirty-one year old Lacy past week shows he is still has several years of fighting left.
He is a man who defies definition. A five-time world champion boxer in four different weight classes, a world-class boxing promoter, a superb athlete in all arenas, a hit music performer and manager, and a television and motion picture actor. In short, Roy Jones, Jr. is a renaissance man for his era and a legend for eras to come.
Against a backdrop of battle-scarred mountains and Far East mysticism, Roy Jones, Jr. first burst upon the world following a shockingly controversial defeat in the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Until then, he was just the best amateur junior middleweight in the world, a 156-pound kid from Pensacola, Florida with a great deal of promise but a limited recognition factor.
Jones returned home to begin a brilliant professional campaign that would carry him to six world championships, including the most radiant of them all, the heavyweight title. Jones spent the better part of a decade regarded as the premier pound-for-pound fighter in the world.
A recent Sky Sports report had this to say about Roy Jones, "He came back from that fight with a win over Omar Sheika in March which set him up for this fight with Lacy. Jones may not be the fighter he once was but his brain seems to work very well when it comes to promoting himself…Lacy, meanwhile, has a lot of thinking to do following this defeat."
An AP report about Jeff Lacy and Roy Jones Jr fight says, "Jones (54-5, 39 KOs) used a left hook to cut Lacy's right eye in the third round, and both of Lacy's eyes were swelling by the seventh. Lacy didn't answer the bell for the 11th round and the referee stopped the bout…Jones joked when asked when he thought the bout was in his hands…."When they gave me the gloves," Jones said. "My hands are still as fast as ever. I've got the quickest speed in the game."
Another report says, "It was early in the fight when Roy started to impose his will, and he didn't look back. Each round was pretty much the same thing, Roy beating Lacy to the punch, and Lacy coming forward eating leather. Roy Jones still has very fast hands, and although he had the perfect opponent in front of him, he still showed signs of complete greatness." In his professional debut in May 1989, fighting before a hometown crowd in Pensacola, Jones stopped one Ricky Randall in the second round. This time, when he stepped from the ring, instead of a trophy, they handed him a check. "I loved fighting," he remembers with a grin. "I just figured it was time I started to get paid to do it."
Quickly his record grew with four wins in 1989, seven in 1990, four more in 1991, and another five in 1992. Only one of his 20 victories went the distance. All but four of the wins came in Pensacola, a fact hammered by a small army of critics. Ignoring the cries for him to fight tougher opponents in larger arenas, Jones steadily honed the skills that would make him the most feared fighter in the world.
In March 2003, Roy Jones, Jr. left his mark firmly in boxing history by becoming the first middleweight to win the heavyweight championship since Bob Fitzsimmons turned the trick in 1897. Giving away almost 30 pounds to John Ruiz, Jones earned $10 million to score a remarkable easy 12-round decision. He won eight rounds on one scorecard, nine on a second and an amazing ten on the third.
"I know what people are going to say, but there is nothing wrong with John Ruiz," said Jones. "Like a lot of other guys I fought, he was just slower than me. And I kind of out thought him."
"What's next?" a visitor asked the 34-year old ruler of all the WBA heavyweights. "I'll think of something," said Jones with a wide grin.