The title is adapted from George Foreman’s commentary during the March 1, 2003 HBO broadcast of Jones versus Ruiz.

I was listening to Jason Vanveldhuysen’s podcast on his YouTube channel yesterday when I spotted a video in the bottom right of the screen. Coincidentally Jason was discussing our current pound-for-pound champion, Floyd Mayweather and the video was of a past pound-for-pound champion challenging a much bigger man for his title. Novelists call that serendipity and we tend to over use it in our work.

In 2003 pound-for-pound great and light heavyweight champion Roy Jones Junior challenged John Ruiz for his WBA title. I had really missed missing this fight and clicked on the video. The fight is recorded on YouTube in four parts, and the serendipitous thing about it was that everything Jason was saying about Floyd not doubting himself at all and finding a way to win was being put on display by Roy. It made me wonder if YouTube had matched the video with the podcast.

I will not recount this fight as it is not news, but encourage you to view it, whoever you are. Before you check it out let me make some observations.

Roy was so gifted compared to the men in his class that he, like Ali, did not have to box according to the rules of biomechanics. He could drop his hands and stand in front of good pros and not get hit. The most bizarre thing about Roy was that he didn’t jab, hardly at all. Now, this eventually caught up with him when age slowed him a notch. What was special about this fight was that it had Roy giving away a lot of weight and probably five pounds of head-weight. No way was he knocking out Ruiz. Hence he was faced with the ultimate test, and we, got to see Roy jab!

If you are a fighter I would like you to look for three things: Roy’s Muay Thai-style clinch control; how Roy pivoted out of the pocket with his shovel hooks; and how, when either man jabbed to the chest, they dominated the fight. By all means listen to George Forman’s technical commentary. George knows the big man/little man quandary like no one else.

If you love boxing enjoy the color commentary of George Foreman, who once held the spot on the HBO broadcasts that Roy now holds. Roy is currently paired with Max Kellerman who respects fighters and they have a productive back-and-fourth. George was paired with Larry Merchant who always came off as if he resented the fighters. Merchant invariably put down any fighter that was not the single best man in his division. To Merchant, a social critic and belittler of athletes in the tradition of lineal jerk predecessor Howard Cossell [who was once voted the third most hated man in America, right behind Richard Nixon and The Devil!], the looser was always a bum. And you have to love Big George for always sticking up for those fighters who committed the crime of being second-best on the planet while Merchant waxed negatively poetic at ringside.

If you like characters, mafia movies and noir films, check out poor John Ruiz’s corner. Ruiz, who did a reasonable job trying to hunt down the most elusive boxer of his generation, was saddled with the kind of criminal corner men that critics of boxing have always railed against. Chief among the ‘goodfella goons’ that yelled at John in his corner was scumbag extraordinaire Norman Stone, who even went after the referee! If that guy is still alive he should get his own reality TV show, training soccer moms to harass the little league officials.