BoxRec

Roy Jones Jr: I'm Addicted To Boxing, No Retirement Right Now

http://www.BS.com/roy-jones-jr ... ow--110026?

Roy Jones Jr., who turns 48-years-old in January, is not looking to call time on his career just yet.

Back in August in Pensacola, Florida , Jones suffered a serious injury during his lopsided ten round unanimous decision win over journeyman Rodney Moore. After the fight, Jones revealed that he suffered a right bicep tear in the fifth round and basically fought the rest of the way with one hand.

Jones is just about fully recovered from his injury and sees no reason to hang up the gloves just yet. Jones says he wants to challenge himself against some of the best fighters out there.

"I'm addicted to boxing. I don't think that it's difficult for me to retire, but right now I don't want to. It's something I really enjoy and that I'm still capable of doing," Jones said,

"I want to see myself with opponents who require a real effort from me. If I don't have a challenge, I don't feel good. I don't want to mislead my fans."

Anybody in the Top 80 should present a fairly stiff challenge for Roy right about now. The difficulty would be finding a guy who could challenge him without actually beating him.

Oh dear. The man has a serious problem

Oh dear. Maybe he's fighting Danny Williams.

Since the Lebedev fight (May 2011), Roy only fought two legit opponents Glazewski (2012) and Enzo (2015),
and they are as middle of the pack as it gets.

If Roy wants to continue fighting house show opponents, who cares?
He actually likes the sport.

At least he's honest about it and says he's addicted to boxing. The first step to recovery is acceptance.

Well, first of all, I'd like to say that journeyman is not a very precise label for Rodney Moore. He had a boxrec rating of 0, so tomato can would be more fitting. Or journeycorpse. Considering RJJ's loss to Enzo, and the fact that he hasn't beat anyone as good as Pawel Glazewski since 2012, I think RJJ should be aiming to fight someone in the #75-100 range. "Challenging himself against the best," is an absolute joke. That'd be like throwing someone who can't swim into the middle of the pacific ocean. He should be challenging himself against Brian Holstein or Travis Reeves.

BAD INTENTIONS wrote:Since the Lebedev fight (May 2011), Roy only fought two legit opponents Glazewski (2012) and Enzo (2015),
and they are as middle of the pack as it gets.

If Roy wants to continue fighting house show opponents, who cares?
He actually likes the sport.

If it was tennis, golf or any other sport that didn't involve getting repeatedly hit in the head I'd be all for it.

The reality is he is fast approaching 50, continuing to play Russian Roulette with his health and his future and running out of luck.

Who cares? I do, his family and friends should, and the boxing industry as a whole should.

It's time for the alphabet organisations to step in. He needs a physical and psychological assessment prior to being cleared to fight. I'm betting he has some degree of brain damage.
As for psychological, hes said it himself, hes addicted, that doesn't sound like a mentally healthy individual.

lazboy wrote:It's time for the alphabet organisations to step in. He needs a physical and psychological assessment prior to being cleared to fight. I'm betting he has some degree of brain damage.
As for psychological, hes said it himself, hes addicted, that doesn't sound like a mentally healthy individual.

Roy was being treated for dizziness and poor balance years ago. He admitted as much, and said at the time he was seeking treatment to prolong his career in the ring.

Many boxers suffer later in life regardless of what the medical tests show during their careers. Humans simply aren't designed to get repeatedly hit in the head day after day, year after year, and the more of it you cop the more chance it will damage you.

I wonder if anyone has studied the addiction aspect of boxing.

Does it have more to do with the physical elements, or with the performance (getting
up in front of an audience, approval, etc.)?

Cutman Scabbers wrote:I wonder if anyone has studied the addiction aspect of boxing.

Does it have more to do with the physical elements, or with the performance (getting
up in front of an audience, approval, etc.)?

I would image it is very much like football. Every season players who claim they still have a season left in them are cut from teams.

Thankfully in the case of football there is someone in place with the authority to tell them enough is enough. Not so in boxing, where you can literally fight on until you are damaged. Medical tests showing you are already damaged are often the only way anyone can force you to hang the gloves up.

Very rarely do you see anyone question Bernard Hopkins fighting on. Yet he's 4 years older at 51 and has lost 3 fights in last 5 years (since 2011) while Jones has only lost once in the same timescale.

Hopkins was unified world champ going into his last fight and has never been brutally knocked out, as has been the case with Roy several times. Roy is no longer even a fringe-contender and his durability is long gone, which doesn't reflect well on what's happened to his brain. If he could take a shot like Hopkins, defend himself like Hopkins, and in general box like Hopkins still can (or at least could back in 2014), I doubt you'd see nearly as many calls for him to retire.

Wales wrote:Very rarely do you see anyone question Bernard Hopkins fighting on. Yet he's 4 years older at 51 and has lost 3 fights in last 5 years (since 2011) while Jones has only lost once in the same timescale.

Bernard has never been knocked the f*ck out in his entire career. He's a defensive wizard and he doesn't get hurt, ever. Even Sergey Kovalev couldn't stop Hopkins. RJJ is no good at protecting himself anymore and he's been put to sleep 5 times since his prime ended. RJJ was more past his prime 12 years ago than Hopkins is right now.

crusader wrote:Hopkins was unified world champ going into his last fight and has never been brutally knocked out, as has been the case with Roy several times. Roy is no longer even a fringe-contender and his durability is long gone, which doesn't reflect well on what's happened to his brain. If he could take a shot like Hopkins, defend himself like Hopkins, and in general box like Hopkins still can (or at least could back in 2014), I doubt you'd see nearly as many calls for him to retire.

I agree here with Lackeos -- important point is not that Hopkins can "take a shot," but that he doesn't take many shots.

These days the only thing Jones and Hopkins have in common is their advanced ages.

Hopkins has probably seen better days. Roy has never seen worse.

Cutman Scabbers wrote:

crusader wrote:Hopkins was unified world champ going into his last fight and has never been brutally knocked out, as has been the case with Roy several times. Roy is no longer even a fringe-contender and his durability is long gone, which doesn't reflect well on what's happened to his brain. If he could take a shot like Hopkins, defend himself like Hopkins, and in general box like Hopkins still can (or at least could back in 2014), I doubt you'd see nearly as many calls for him to retire.

I agree here with Lackeos -- important point is not that Hopkins can "take a shot," but that he doesn't take many shots.

Nothing I posted is at odds with Lackeos's point, which I agree with and included in my initially post.

Of course Hopkins's defense is important, but I find it very hard to believe that more people (the post we responded to is about public perception) wouldn't be calling for his retirement if he took shots as poorly as Roy does. Unlike Hopkins, who still gets hit by the way, Roy can't take a shot at all, which contributes to brutal losses that trigger calls for him to pack it in.

Like a Boss wrote:Roy Jones Jr: I'm Addicted To Boxing, No Retirement Right Now

"I'm addicted to boxing. I don't think that it's difficult for me to retire, but right now I don't want to. It's something I really enjoy and that I'm still capable of doing,"

" I don't want to mislead my fans."

How about misleading himself?

Boxing ain't tennis.

*sigh* Another one fights on until he leaves the ring in a body bag. I'd be all for regulation if you could enforce it but, problem is, even if he gets banned in the US he can just go somewhere where there is less or no regulation. That's the thing about boxing. I also agree with the earlier posters about Jones vs Hopkins careers. Hopkins doesn't get hit and he defends himself through strategy as opposed to Jones' use of athleticism. It's almost cruel fate for Jones in that he is "addicted" as he says but had to rely on the trait that always goes first. Personally I'm surprised he fought as well as he did for as long as he did, considering that athletic fighters have very short primes. To think, a guy who fought in the Seoul '88 games is still fighting. That's ancient.

Was just reading that brain damage caused by boxing, football etc doesn't show up for 10 years. Retire Roy !

crow wrote:

Like a Boss wrote:Roy Jones Jr: I'm Addicted To Boxing, No Retirement Right Now

"I'm addicted to boxing. I don't think that it's difficult for me to retire, but right now I don't want to. It's something I really enjoy and that I'm still capable of doing,"

" I don't want to mislead my fans."

How about misleading himself?

Boxing ain't tennis.

As Tex Cobb once said..."The difference between boxing and tennis is in tennis if you lose, it's 30-love. In boxing, it's your ass darling".

Tony1244 wrote:Was just reading that brain damage caused by boxing, football etc doesn't show up for 10 years. Retire Roy !

More and more retired footballers are suffering chronic headaches, memory loss and worse. Most suffered concussions during their playing careers but no sign of the long-term ramifications became evident until years later.

I loved this guy growing up. Why couldn't he have retired 15 years ago ffs

Tony1244 wrote:Was just reading that brain damage caused by boxing, football etc doesn't show up for 10 years. Retire Roy !

Damn, that sh*t's gonna hit him like a ton of bricks.