James Toney

[Kev]

I think a few too many of you are jumping on the James To is S*** bandwagon.

He had one poor performance against Rahamn, thats all. And evn then he was by far the slicker of the two.How many of you honestly would not pick a fit Toney to have beaten Rahman?

Toney lost to Rahman because of his conditioning no other reason. He was a much better boxer and wasn't hurt at all in the slightest by Rahman.

And to those of you who say he's done nothing in a decade, well was the Ring Fighter of the Year in 2003 following his UD of Jirov. He stopped Holyfield when nobody thought he could, he beat Ruiz with a shoulder injury. Come on on he's done alright. A poor performance against Rahman but he still wasn't beat.

If Toney gets himself fit and lays of the cigars I'd still pick him to beat anyone else at heavy.

Only Wlad has him beat I think and even there I think Toney would do ok. Wlad wouldnt stop him.

Why do we always need to add if Toney did this and that, then he might blah blah blah blah? That is equal to say that if Wlad had moved his head against The Sniper then he would blah blah blah blah, or if Jeff Lacy had better boxing skills then he would had bashed Calzaghe.

Well give me one example of a heavyweight right now that you don't need IF's for? Wlad is the best out there IF he can overcome his weak chin. Brewster can win a title again IF he can get in a big punch. Valuev can hold on to his title for a year IF he decides not to defend it.

Lets move on to other weights, Joe Calzaghe can win a title at light heavy IF his hands hold up.

ODH can beat Mayorga IF he can overcome 2 years of ring rust and IF he has not gotten too old.

Coralles can beat Castillo IF he can resist fighting inside where he is going to get killed.

In fact can you give a single example of a fight where IF does not play a big factor.

Moron!

Moron!, thanks friend.

Well, Wlad is NOT rated if he can get over his week chin, he beat S. Peter and Byrd to get his ranking, so NO if he did.....cause he actually did!

Brewster and Valuev are able to do gret in the future if blah blah, yep you are right - but you try to judge Toney in the past like if he had been in form against Rahman, then he would have won.....

Why dont you take Toney's actually results and ranking him by them insted of talking about what he could have done IF he had done perfectly?

Apologies for the moron comment I get a little gassed up at times.

Anyway the point I am trying to make is that up until the Rahman fight Toney had done everything right. He's beaten everbody in front of him and looked good in doing so. He beat Ruiz comfortably, he beat Guinn comfortably (which seeing as SL is now world champ and Guinn beat Harrison makes it look like a very good win for Toney) and prior to the Rahman fight he was the most highly rated fighter in the division.

If you watched the Rahman Toney fight you would have seen that most experts and boxing pundits considered Toney to have the best chance of coming through as undisputed chance followed by Wlad.

I agree Toney let himself down against Rahman but ONLY because his conditioning was so poor. He still looked better then Rahman and landed by far the more accurate shots. A draw isn't a defeat so don't act like Toney got exposed against Rahman because he didn't

He got a lesson that if he wants to win a world title he needs to actually do more than sparring in preparation but apart from that it was positive for Toney. He was in one of the biggest punchers and was clearly comfortable with him. He looked better than Rahman and I'm sure even you would agree that if (yes that if word again) he was fitter he would have beaten Rahman easily.

Rahman got a draw with Toney on his worst day, a fit Toney is capable of beating anybody in the division.

And there is still a big IF surround Wladimir. He looked great against Byrd but Byrd is not a puncher at all so it was pretty meaningless as far as establishing how resiliant Wladimir is now.

Yes he beat Peter, BUT he was floored 3 times, hardly the kind of performance to inspire confidence.

Wlad is the best bet to be the future of the heavies but it is by no means guarenteed. There are just as many if's surrounding Wladimir than Toney or anybody else out there right now.