Athletes - Roy Jones Jr.

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	Athletes - Roy Jones Jr.

Roy Levesta Jones Jr. (born January 16, 1969) is a former Middleweight, Super Middleweight, Light Heavyweight and Heavyweight boxing champion from Pensacola, Florida. Jones was Ring Magazine's "Fighter of the Year" in 1994 and was voted the "Fighter of the Decade" in 1999 by the Boxing Writers Association of America. Between 1994 and 2003, Jones was considered one of the best pound for pound fighters in the world. Jones's advisor and sometime manager is Pensacola lawyer Fred Levin. His longtime trainer is Alton Merkerson.

Amateur career

Roy Jones Jr. had a very successful career as an amateur boxer - he won the 1984 United States National Junior Olympics in the 119 lb. weight division, he won the 1986 United States National Golden Gloves in the 139 lb. weight division and he won the 1987 United States National Golden Gloves in the 156 lb. weight division.

Jones represented the United States at the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games. His participation there proved to be controversial when he lost a highly disputed 3-2 decision in the final. Jones lost to South Korean fighter Park Si Hun, despite pummeling Park for three rounds, landing 86 punches to Park's 32. Allegedly, Park himself apologized to Jones afterwards. One judge shortly thereafter admitted the decision was a mistake, and all three judges voting against Jones were eventually suspended. Most observers still believe the judges were either bribed or otherwise coerced to vote for the local fighter by Korean officials. However, the official IOC investigation concluding in 1997 found no wrongdoing, and the IOC still officially stands by the decision. Ironically, Jones was still awarded the Val Barker trophy as the best boxer of the 1988 games. The incident, along with another highly disputed decision against American Michael Carbajal in the same games, led Olympic organizers to establish a new scoring system for Olympic boxing.

After the 2002 Winter Olympics scandal where the Olympic committee decided to award gold medals to both Russia's and Canada's figure skating teams after finding that the French judge had been bribed, Jones had hoped that the committee would re-open his case and award him a gold medal, but no such action was taken.

The Jones controversy still lingers for many sports fans. Some Korean fans claimed that USOC officials retaliated for the Jones decision at the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics by disqualifying Korean skater Kim Dong-Sung from the men's 1500 meter short-track speedskating for an infraction known in the sport as crosstracking (illegally cutting off a competitor). This disqualification handed the gold to American Apolo Anton Ohno. Similar allegations were raised at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens, when American gymnast Paul Hamm won the gold in the men's all around over Korean Yang Tae-Young, from whom the judges incorrectly docked one tenth of a point, which would have made Yang the champion. The three judges who made the scoring mistake against Yang, none of whom were American, were all suspended. Unlike the Jones incident, no evidence of official conspiracy on behalf of Hamm or Ohno was ever proven.

Professional career

Besides a stellar amateur career and a decade of diligent training, by the time he turned professional, Jones had already sparred with many professional boxers in the gyms including NABF champion Ronnie Essett, IBF world champion Lindell Holmes and all-time great Sugar Ray Leonard. Jones began as a professional on May 6, 1989, knocking out Ricky Randall in two rounds in Pensacola. For his next fight, he faced the more experienced Stephan Johnson in Atlantic City, and beat him by a knockout in round eight.

Jones built an impressive record of 15-0 with 15 knockouts before stepping up in class, when he met former world Welterweight champion Jorge Vaca in a Pay Per View fight on January 10, 1992. He knocked Vaca out in round one, to reach 16 knockout wins in a row. After one more knockout win, Jones went the distance for the first time, against former world champion Jorge Castro, who lost a 10-round decision to Jones in front of a USA Network national audience.

Three more knockouts in a row followed, after which Jones was given his first opportunity to fight for a world title: on May 22 of 1993, he beat future world champion Bernard Hopkins by a clear unanimous decision in Washington D.C., to capture the IBF's vacant World Middleweight Title. All three judges scored the fight 116-112. For his next fight, he chose to fight another future world champion, Thulane "Sugar Boy" Malinga, in a non-title affair. Jones beat Malinga by a knockout in six. Jones finished the year with another non-title fight, beating Fermin Chirino by decision.

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