All-time great and future Hall of Famer Roy Jones Junior is still not yet ready to call it quits and walk away from the perils of the ring. However, the living legend who will turn 49 next month (January 16) IS ready to have the final fight in his home town of Pensacola. Jones, 65-9(47) will fight TBA, at cruiserweight, on February 8, it has been announced on Jones’ twitter page.
Dubbed “My Last Day At The Bay,” Jones’ 75th pro bout will take place at the Pensacola Bay Centre. The evening will feature boxing and MMA bouts, with Jones’ cruiserweight fight being the headliner. Jones has not said that the February bout will be his career finale, only that this one will be the final bout to be staged, as he says, “where it all began.”
“It’s my last one for the bayfront – Civic Centre, Pensacola, Bayfront Arena, whatever you want to call it,” Jones said to Pensacola News Journal. “So if you want to come to see my last day in Pensacola, be there February 8. That’s my last one there.”
Jones, who still harbours serious ideas of facing MMA star Anderson Silva, won his last fight in February of this year when he stopped tough guy Bobby Gunn at cruiser. Before that, Jones won two in a row following his disastrous and incredibly hard to watch KO loss to Welshman Enzo Maccarinelli in Russia in December of 2015.
We can only guess who Jones’ February 2018 opponent will be, but it’s a pretty safe bet that the former middleweight/super-middleweight/light-heavyweight/heavyweight ruler will not be matched too tough. Jones, a far cry from the once utterly untouchable boxing master he once was, has said many times how he doesn’t care what the critics say about him still fighting. Jones will likely go out a winner in Pensacola, but what then? Will that crossover fight with Silva take place some time in 2018?
Just when will the millions of Roy Jones Jr. fans be able to breath one big sigh of relief as he at last, finally, walks away from boxing, the most addictive and all-consuming of sports?
