The problem with Calzaghe's career was, because he was tied to FW, he didn't get the big fights until near the end of his career. Even he admits this. By the time he finally realised and got away from FW it was too late in the day. The whole reason he wouldn't fight Froch was because Carl wasn't a big name at the time and Joe, knowing time was against him, only wanted the biggest fights possible against famous opponents after missing out on them for so long before quitting. The fact he didn't go to America for so long only hampered him and his legacy also. Even though he fought mostly bums for the majority of his title reign, he was still an awesome fighter who could beat the best. The way he destroyed Lacy, outclassed a prime Kessler, unravelled Hopkins and out-fought an in-form again Roy Jones proved this. It would have been great had he got the big fights earlier but that's just the way it went unfortunately. I don't care how much people may want to slate him, Calzaghe was brilliant and in my opinion is still the best 168lbs fighter who's ever lived.
Sorry can't fix the formatting but provided link just in case Total Punches Hopkins Calzaghe Landed 127 232 Thrown 468 707 Pct. 27% 33% Jabs Hopkins Calzaghe Landed 11 45 Thrown 93 224 Pct. 12% 20% Power Punches Hopkins Calzaghe Landed 116 187 Thrown 375 483 Pct. 31% 39% http://boxrec.com/media/index.php/Bernard_Hopkins_vs._Joe_Calzaghe Don't embarrass yourself further talking about Calzaghe missing more when he landed 8% more than Hopkins in power punches and overall. Say what you want but Calzaghe won and the stats back it up. He also didn't have to resort to faking low blows deal:deal
The fact is Calzaghe had a great career and is probably the best SMW of all time currently. Imho he lacked the confidence to chase the big fights. I've read his book and for all his bravado he seemed to lack the true confidence and seemed to terrified of losing his unbeaten record which he admits was very important to him. He had only lost as a 12 year old amateur and he cried his eyes out by his own admission. He'll be remembered as a great that could have probably beaten anyone if he had actually fought them. His attitude was always "let them come to me" when talking about the american fighters, and everyone knows you only get the recognition if you go over there and beat them. Hardly a wasted talent but a shame that people will ask these questions of him when he could know the answer.
I've read those stats and watched the fight a dozen times. If you can watch that fight and tell me where all those power shots Calzaghe supposedly landed are you have better eye sight than me. Punch stats don't mean that much anyway, the cleaner, harder, important shots were all Hopkins and I still maintain that those stats are heavily manipulated. I've already said it's hard to make a case for Hopkins winning anyway and I have no agenda against Calzaghe at all I am a fan of his, I just don't see how he won the fight when he seemed so incapable of landing a solid punch throughout the 12 rounds. I don't feel that I've particularly embarrassed myself by saying this at all as I have watched the fight so many times and come to the same conclusion but if those little numbers make it legit to you than obviously Calzaghe totally dominated the fight.
Punch stats, or computerbox are worthless to me, Im not about to trust a man pushing a button over what I see with my own eyes.
The Hopkins vs Calzaghe is VERY hard one to score. I think it's quite similar to the Froch vs Dirrell fight. I've watched Hopkins - Calzaghe quite a few times since it happened and every time I do I always end up with the exact same scorecard, 115 - 112 to Calzaghe. In the first half of the fight you'd think Hopkins was going to run away with it, decked Joe and was making him miss wildly. However, after about round 5 Hopkins just completely switches off in my opinion and doesn't do **** all. This allowed Calzaghe back into the fight and he nicks the rest of the rounds mostly by work-rate and by pressing the action. Although he was still making Joe miss a lot, Hopkins was barely landing anything and wasn't coming forward. Hopkins in my opinion threw the fight away. He was much cleverer and slicker than Calzaghe but didn't keep his foot on the gas for long enough. That's why he's been so pissed about it all these years and demanded a rematch, he's still kicking himself for letting Calzaghe nick it.
Unless you've counted up all the punches and have better eyesight and a memory than a computer then fair enough you're a level of superhuman that the rest of us need to catch up to. More likely though is that Calzaghe was landing and you didn't register it as a power punch or landing at all. Who manipulates these stats and for what reason. They can't change the outcome of the fight and most people agree that Joe won. Joe did the better work not Bhop and if you can't see that then we're not going to be able to agree on much since we can't watch the fight together and analyse it. I don't think those numbers make the victory legit I think that you have been generous and given more rounds that were close to Hopkins when Joe did the better work even after being KD'd. The numbers are just proof that I have that Joe fought better, you have nothing to back up your argument. These numbers just support my opinion on who won the fight
He left it very late to really start mixing with the divisions elite so his record will always suffer for that in my eyes.
It really doesn't matter in any case as the records show that Calzaghe won the fight and I'm quite happy with that being the case. However I don't give him any credit for the victory because in my eyes he was made to look poor by Hopkins and Hopkins let him get a decision instead of Calzaghe taking it. He was knocked down, made to look ineffective, got hit with the cleaner shots, and landed hardly anything. Yes Calzaghe won it but I don't give him kudos for it when I think back on his career because of how he won it, the same as I don't give Froch much credit for his "victory" over Dirrell, because of the nature of the fight.
Calzaghe's only problem was he scared away big names and his talent made all those he did face look as though they were all from the lower end of world class. Best boxer ever ultimately, which is what matters.
Before Lacy and Kessler, he beat Eubank, Reid, Woodhall, Brewer, Veit, Mitchell who had all held a SMW title at some point
This content is protected . I understand that Hopkins is an American legend that people want to see as an iconic figure. America love a reformist and Hopkins as a former armed robber turned world champ is just the story that wins Americas hearts but... This content is protected 1. Calzaghe landed more than 100 punches than Hopkins throughout the fight. 2. Contrary to what people want to believe, Calzaghe also made Hopkins miss more 3. All round punch percentages, Calzaghe finished ahead of Hopkins 4. Calzaghe outlanded Hopkins in every round 5. A Byrd who scored for Hopkins it appears has a history for bad scorecards. Type in Adalaide Byrd in Google and see what comes up for yourself, still here are some little things for you to look at a. A Byrd was the only judge out of the 3 scoring judges that had Mack ahead against Cloud b. The K Pavlik - A Lopez fight was scored 98-92, 99-91 by the other 2 judges, A Byrd scored it 95-95 c. A Byrd was one of the judges that had Morales a 4 point loser against Maidana d. In the S Aydin vs S Ouali fight, the other 2 judges scored clearly for Aydin. Byrd scored for Ouali e. The J Almaraz/C Tyler fight was scored a Maj-Dec all because of one judge, guess which? A Byrd f. The A DeMarco/J Reyes fight was a SD. Guess who the odd judge out was? A Byrd. g. The R Torres - M Arnaoutis fight was a close fight, a point either way to 2 judges but a wide result scored by Byrd h. In the A Pryor Jr/D Stanislavjevic SD, guess who the odd judge out was? You guessed it... A Byrd i. The W Ferguson/J Lopez SD, guess who the odd judge out was? You guessed it... A Byrd I think thats enough for you to get the picture with Byrd. Remember the other 2 judges scored clearly for Calzaghe 6. Calzaghe beat Hopkins in America, at a new weight with 3 American judges and Cortez as ref. 7. Calzaghe scored the single highest score card against Hopkins ever 116-111. 8. The 2 judges that scored for Calzaghe agreed on 9 of the rounds 9. Calzaghe landed more on Hopkins than anyone ever. Now I know there will be a flood of people coming on here noting Hopkins scoring a flash KD in the first round, and I agree that Hopkins did win a few rounds even when he didnt land as often, but people are mad if they think Calzaghe won on workrate, Calzaghe won because he was able to land his left more often than Hopkins could land his right. Calzaghe finished the stronger and took away the moments Hopkins likes down the stretch. Other thoughts, If Hopkins thought he was winning, do you think he would have been looking for time out and would bother trying to get points deducted off of Calzaghe, of course he wouldnt, Hopkins knew he was losing. What I do note is that nobody seems to mind Hopkins lost to Taylor. In the first Hopkins/Taylor fight, Jermaine was badly hurt and Hopkins looked the stronger at the end, yet it seems to upset alot of these people that Calzaghe beat Hopkins. Appears very biased.