Hall of fame fighter turned trainer, Roy Jones Jr, has bemoaned the state of boxing and its matchmaking.
Widely considered to be one of the greatest of all time, Jones spoke at a recent press conference and criticised today’s generation for being scared to lose.
“You can’t win if you’re scared to lose. If you don’t fight the best opponent out there, then what you doing? You wasting time, you understand me? That’s why we don’t like what we’re seeing in boxing now. The best don’t wanna fight the best.”
What happened to the days or Roy Jones on the throne? What happened to those days – nobody cares about being the best? I don’t understand that.
Anybody might get beat. Anybody can land one punch and do anything at anytime. That’s a part of what we go through. But the face of the matter is, if you wanna be the best, you willing to go take that test.
You don’t take that test, you can never claim or profess to be the best, you feel me? Thank you.”
Jone Jr’s impassioned speech comes after negotiations for the undisputed heavyweight championship of the world fell apart, and follows a year in which, for example, a four-belt welterweight clash between Errol Spence Jr and Terence Crawford was failed to be made yet again.
‘RJJ’ had – or has, considering he boxed this past weekend – 66 wins from 76 in his professional career.
He’s the only man in the history of the sport to start his career at super welterweight and move up to win a heavyweight title. He collected belts in three other divisions on the way. When he’s talking about tests, he knows them better than most.
One stark exception to the rule he sets out, though, is Gervonta Davis versus Ryan Garcia. Fans hope that the two young, undefeated stars going head-to-head on April 22 in Las Vegas will be a catalyst for other big fights to be made.