Two-weight world champion Andre Ward famously retired undefeated.
Ward announced he was hanging up the gloves back in 2017 having gone through the entire duration of his professional career without suffering defeat, reigning as a unified world champion at super-middleweight and light-heavyweight.
The California-native enjoyed an impressive campaign at 168lbs where he racked up victories over the likes of Carl Froch, Mikkel Kessler and Arthur Abraham to name just a few.
He eventually made the move up to light-heavyweight, where scored back-to-back victories over Russian rival Sergey Kovalev, defeating ‘Krusher’ via controversial unanimous decision in their first encounter in November 2016 before going on to stop him in their rematch 7 months later.
Speaking to ESPN, Ward summed up his chances in a fantasy showdown against countryman Roy Jones Jr, as he admits it would have been ‘tough’ to defeat the Hall of Famer.
“Roy Jones was different. When I think about how would I fight Roy? That’s a hard, hard situation that I would’ve had to deal with. If I ever had to face Roy Jones in his prime at 168 or 175, like, that would’ve been tough because he was so fast, so explosive, so unorthodox, the IQ was off the charts, punching power. Like, whatever you feel is the ideal fighter, he was that.
“The only thing Roy didn’t do from a technical standpoint was use his jab a lot and have like, strong fundamentals but that’s what also drew me to him, the fact that he didn’t have those things, or didn’t use them, because he could if he wanted to, and got away with it. It’s like Ali, he was ahead of his time. You didn’t see no guys dropping his hand and dancing and sticking his chin out and making you miss and counter. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Ali was ahead of his time and so was Roy Jones.”
Jones is widely considered to be one of the greatest fighters to have ever graced the sport, winning world titles in four weight classes throughout the course of his decorated professional career where he racked up victories over the likes of James Toney, Antonio Tarver and Bernard Hopkins. He famously made the jump to heavyweight to beat John Ruiz and become champion. Ward has named him his favourite fighter.
