If Roy stayed at HW.

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Originally Posted by Master

Ruiz was a difficult fight for Jones. Ruiz also held on to the title for quite a while so that victory by Roy is fantastic.

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Yeah it was a terrific thing still, I will not deny that.

The fact that a 198lb fighter that really didn't have the frame to ever become a HW stepped up anyway and captured any version of the HW title is extraordinary. Ruiz could be an awkward opponent for less powerful boxers.

All I am saying is that Ruiz was never a serious opponent despite holding the title he did for long for the harder punching, larger + skilled opponents of the HW division and neither would be Roy. Simply due to obvious constraints.

Roy is still among the greatest lb for lb boxers of all time!! :)

In hindsight it couldn't have been a worse move, naturally:p Say what you want about Ruiz but he was an effective HW in his prime, every good win in his career was just a year or two before and after losing to Roy. I don't see why Jones couldn't have done a similar job on an old and broken Holyfield, who was certainly not a level above Ruiz then.

Tua, Rahman, Sanders, even Tyson etc would have been wild card fights at that point imo, kind of depends how bad Roys chin actually would have been vs what any of those guys had left. If he would've been able to take the odd glancing shot, I could see him having beaten any of them by then. Could just as easily see him having his head taken off early or wobbled by the air at some point as well though, tough to say. He would have beaten Toney again exactly the same way he did the first time, Toney wouldn't land anything big on him at any weight.