Roy Jones Jr., Miguel Cotto, Holly Holm 2022 International Boxing Hall of Fame

On Tuesday, the International Boxing Hall of Fame announced its 2022 class nominees and is packed with big names. Leading the class are Roy Jones Jr., Miguel Cotto and James Toney in the male category, Holly Holm and Regina Halmich in the female category. The class will be joined by classes in 2021 and 2020, both of whom have seen their ceremonies delayed in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Hall of Fame nominees are voted on by members of the Boxing Writers Association of America and a panel of boxing historians. The opening ceremony will take place at the Canastota (New York) Hall of Fame Museum.

Let’s take a quick look at the biggest names in the 2022 class.

Roy Jones Jr.

In the 1990s, the Boxing Writers Association of America voted the fighter of the decade as Jones won the world championships in four weights while spending much of his career as a freestyle wrestler in the sport. He won his first Jones championship in May 1993, winning the IBF middleweight title at Bernard Hopkins. In November 1994, Jones rose to the top weight against James Toney to win the IBF title. Jones was also a reigning lightweight champion and lost only one fight in his first 50 contests, which was a disqualification loss against Montell Griffin, and Jones retaliated in a lesser round of rematch. Surprisingly, Jones also climbed to the heavyweight division, where he defeated John Ruiz to become the WBA champion. Jones holds a 66-9 career record with 47 wins to the knockout stages.

Miguel Cotto

Cotto held titles at four levels in his career and fought in the biggest and most important fights of his time. Cotto won the WBO junior welterweight title in 2004, having successfully defended the welterweight six times in 2006 to win the WBA belt. He would defend that title against Zab Judah and Shane Mosley before losing his belt against Antonio Margarito. The bloody war that many are questioning after Margarito found out that he had illegally loaded handguns against Mosley. Cotto would win titles in middleweight and middleweight. During his career, he fought extensively against other big names, including Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather Jr.

James Toney

Toney won the championships in three weights, middleweight, superweight and cruising. Toney went undefeated in the first 46 fights of his career. This included six defenses in the IBF middleweight tournament and three defenses in the IBF middleweight tournament. After losing his super-heavyweight title in 1994, Toney did not win another world title until 2003, when he won a major victory over Vassiliy Jirov. Toney made two offers for heavyweight championships, tying with Hasim Rahman after defeating John. Ruiz, Toney canceled his victory after failing a drug test.

Holly Holm

Although Holm found more attention in the UFC, where she won Ronda Rousey’s women’s weightlifting championship now in an iconic event, she first used her gifts in the boxing ring. Holm won the junior welterweight, welterweight and junior middleweight championships. He defended his tournament 18 times and lost only one fight when he reached the championship level. That loss in 2011 was a savage knockout at the hands of Anne Sophie Mathis, although Holm lost in his rematch after fighting twice more before moving on to mixed martial arts.

Regina Halmich

Halmich moved from a successful kickboxing career to a boxing ring in 1994. In her ninth fight, she lost by only one time in her career, against Yvonne Trevino, who did not win the IBF women’s flying weight title. He would win the belt in the next outing, a belt he would successfully defend 15 times. During his tenure with the flyweight title, Halmich also added the super fly title and junior flying weight title. He successfully defended his titles 40 times in his career and retired in an unbeaten streak of 46 fights.