During a June 17 appearance on the All The Smoke Fight podcast with Andre Ward, boxing legend Roy Jones Jr. made a strong claim that Sugar Ray Leonard would have beaten Floyd Mayweather if both fighters faced off in their respective primes.
"People always say, 'Floyd would have beat Sugar'. No, baby, Floyd is not nearly as mean as Sugar was. Sugar is a dog. Just because his name is Sugar don't mean nothing. Sugar is a dog. People don't give him enough credit for that," Jones Jr. said. "For me, I like Floyd, and Floyd was cool. But it's like, it's gonna be hard for me to go take it and beat Sugar. They'd have to do something different, that's for sure.
"If [Floyd] did something different, he probably has a chance. Just the way he's been doing with normal people, what I saw in his prime, that's not gonna work with Sugar. Sugar got a third element [heart] right there. We think Floyd got [heart], we don't know. We've never seen him challenged. We know Sugar's got one," he concluded.
These comments clearly irked Mayweather, which was proven by Floyd posting videos of him watching Roy Jones Jr. get knocked out in fights to his Instagram story on July 6, which has since gone viral on social media.
Floyd Mayweather getting back at Roy Jones Jr today. Roy stated last week that Sugar Ray Leonard would have beaten Floyd. pic.twitter.com/e1bSTqxzR7
— Boxing Kingdom (@BoxingKingdom14) July 7, 2025
Jake Paul was interviewed by FightHype on July 8 and was asked his opinion about what Mayweather did in response to Jones Jr.'s comments.
"Nah, Roy is the legend, bro. You can't come for Roy like that," Paul said of Mayweather.
When asked who he thought was better in their primes between Mayweather and Jones Jr., Paul added, "I would say Roy was better during [his] prime, but Floyd just stayed consistent his whole career. But Roy was something different in his prime, for sure."
It sounds like Paul would side with Roy Jones Jr. instead of Floyd Mayweather in this hypothetical fight.
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