FLASH: Roy Jones Jr. is now on a two-bout winning streak. He scored a split 10-round decision on Saturday in Poland over local boy Pawel Glazewski. That victory should pave the way for a chance to win a cruiserweight title, the division he skipped while gathering up a slew of middleweight, super-middleweight, light-heavyweight and heavyweight belts, right?
Wrong. The 43-year-old Jones did not magically regain the amazing speed and skills that made him boxing?s pound-for-pound best during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Most observers believe that Glazewski was ripped off in his own country. He had Jones down in the sixth frame, and had no trouble hitting the Floridian throughout the fight. But Jones is tentatively slated to meet a much more talented Pole named Krzysztof Wlodarczyk this fall. Under that scenario, as long as Jones was on his feet when the bell ending the final round rang, he was going to be the winner. Even though he was the better fighter Saturday night, Glazewski stood only a puncher?s chance. And with only four knockouts in 18 fights, that wasn?t much of a chance.
In his previous fight, which occurred last December, Jones won a unanimous 10-round verdict over one Max Alexander, who is not a household name even in his own household (who was the first to use that line? Bert Randolph Sugar? Groucho Marx?). Before that, Jones was battered and stopped in 10 by top cruiserweight contender Denis Lebedev; decisioned in 12 ugly rounds by Bernard Hopkins, who avenged a loss to Jones that occurred 17 years earlier; and knocked out in one by Danny Green, another highly-rated cruiserweight.
The Green debacle did not prevent the long-anticipated Hopkins rematch from occurring. But if Glazewski had managed to stop Jones on Saturday, that might have also kayoed the Wlodarczyk contest. Then again, maybe not.
Apparently, Jones is determined to keep adding ?L?s? and ?KO by?s? to his Hall of Fame record. And it doesn?t seem to matter to him that he is also losing brain cells. He is barely a shadow of the once-in-a-generation fighter he was in his prime, and that shadow grows dimmer with each fight.
The twilight of Jones?s career is similar to that of Muhammad Ali. Both men relied on near-supernatural speed and reflexes to prevent punches from reaching their chins in their primes, and they lost that special ability as the years passed. In the end, both men?s chins betrayed them ? Ali?s because it was too strong, and enabled him to absorb tons of hard punches; and Jones?s because it is too weak, and causes him to suffer frightening knockout losses.
How many more pastings will Jones subject himself to before he finally puts his health ahead of his hubris? Too many, it appears.
