There’s not much buzz about the biggest current story in sports. On Saturday, quite possibly the most dominant athlete of the past two decades was shockingly knocked out, and not much is even being said about it.

To say that Roy Jones, Jr. was knocked out in the ninth round of his Saturday night fight with Glencoffe Johnson is putting it very mildly. Jones record stands at 49-3, and he was known for years as the “pound-for-pound best fighter in the world.” But Jones was thoroughly embarrassed this weekend, losing almost every round until Johnson’s final, thunderous blow.

The worst part of it all was that, while one would usually expect the favorite to eventually get it together and stage a comeback, the feeling never came about Jones. He seemed like a defeated man from the opening bell.

Jones’s dominance in the ring was legendary among followers of the sport. Prior to his last two matches, both defeats – the previous loss being to Antonio Tarver in May – he boasted a 49-1 record in his career, with his only loss coming by disqualification, after he punched an already falling opponent. He won the rematch via a first round knockout.

Jones was virtually undefeated in his first 50 fights, which spanned more than 15 years. In fact, until he fought Tarver for the first time, it could be said that Jones had never even been in a competitive fight, let alone ever been in danger of losing.

Seventeen of the men he defeated are current or former world champions. Two of them – Bernard Hopkins and James Toney – rank among the elite today. He even decided that he wanted to shed his “pound-for-pound best” label, bulked up and moved to the heavyweight class. Jones captured a share of the world heavyweight title in his first fight, becoming the first natural middleweight in over a century to accomplish that feat.

Through it all, many times it didn’t even seem like Jones was actually fighting someone. Between his showboating, taunting and pandering to the crowd before his formal win, it seemed he was simply playing with his food before he ate it.

It’s a shame that more people haven’t been exposed to his career. Boxing has lost any and all luster it used to have, and because of that we don’t hear Jones name spoken of in the same revered tones as Michael Jordan and Joe Montana.

It didn’t stop him from trying, though. Jones’s flashy, even arrogant style supplied onlookers with quite a spectacle throughout his career. Having been so dominant in his previous fights, Jones decided he could get away with using his pre-match introduction for an impromptu rap concert, and still had the stamina to defeat his opponent. In the same vein, he played in a pro basketball game on the day of a fight, and again came away victorious.

To challenge himself, he’d often “shut out” his opponents on a whim, not even allowing them to land a single punch during a given round. Jones would also often land his trademark “windmill” punch, which was exactly as it sounds – he’d wind up his arm like a windmill and knock out his overmatched opponent. He’d carry on conversations with ringside observers, as he was being worked over by the opposition in a corner.

In one fight, Jones even decided to place his hands behind his back during a fight, leaned his head forward and challenged his opponent to knock him out with a clean shot. When the opponent moved in, attempting to oblige, Jones instead hit him with a two-punch combination in the blink of an eye and knocked his opponent out.

Jones once even dominated an opponent fighting mostly with one hand.

Disrespectful? Arrogant?

Undoubtedly, and yet it shows what a scary kind of talent he possessed. Jones’s attitude was that he knew he was the best by far, and that nobody could touch him.

He was right.

Jordan, Gretsky and Rice were all great athletes in their day. But none can lay sole claim as the most dominant athlete of its era. That title must be shared with Roy Jones, Jr. And that, perhaps, is only if Jones is feeling generous.