But the decision that deprived Jones of his gold medal was so extreme that an amateur boxing comittee afterward recommended that the judges who awarded the fight to Jones's foe, Park Si Hun of South Korea, be suspended for life. Ordinarily, silver medalists do not merit the sort of attention that Jones has received since the Olympics. At the Olympics in Seoul, South Korea, when Jones let his flurries go, it was with a nonchalance - gloves low at his sides - that sometimes made him seem a swashbuckler in boxing shorts. Like Leonard and Davis, Jones, a junior middleweight from Pensacola, Fla., has quick hands and an ability to excite crowds when he uses those hands.

''At this stage of the game,'' said Nappi, who was head coach of the 1976 boxing squad, ''Jones is as good as they were.'' Not so long ago, Pat Nappi, a veteran amateur boxing coach, was comparing 19-year-old Roy Jones, a silver medalist at the 1988 Olympics, with two gold medalists from 1976, Sugar Ray Leonard and Howard Davis.

Go hard or go home roy jones