Calzaghe got dropped by an almost 50 year old RJJ?

Thanks. Excuse the long ass reply. lol.

Let me put it this way. I think Joe had the talent, natural ability, and style suited to the amateur system to beat everyone in his weight division at those games. The Cuban is the only POSSIBLE exception, and I only say that because he had seven years on Joe and was a lot more experienced than him. I've watched Lemus and whilst I think he was good and would've made things tricky and difficult (he was a dirty ****er), I think Joe would've brought more than enough to the table to cause him serious problems too.

I think you and many others underestimate Joe greatly (especially from a pure talent viewpoint), and if we could roll back the clock to 1992, I would genuinely be shocked if he came back home with anything less than a silver medal (and I'd be quietly confident of him nabbing the gold too).

The Romanian (Adrian Opreda) who won an extremely controversial decision over him in the European Junior championships went onto with the gold in that event by the way and he also bagged a silver in the World Junior Championships too.

I don't really know anything about that to be honest. But with the benefit of hindsight, it certainly seems like a good idea and one that they probably should've explored. I doubt it even occurred to them at the time to do so though.

Yes, Enzo was born in Italy (Sardinia to be exact). I know Enzo's father lives over there. Joe did box over there a few times as an amateur though. He bashed up one of the stars of their national team, a guy called Paolo DiMasso (in 1992 I think), who'd won the national championships numerous times and was also good enough to bring back a bronze medal from the World Junior Championships too. Calzaghe said his performance in that fight was one of his best displays in the amateurs, that he totally embarrassed the guy and had him on the verge of tears by the end it was so one-sided. He said he couldn't get another fight over there after that performance.

Depends what your definition of ''great'' is? One thing's for sure. I KNOW you underrate him. He's one of the best fighters of his generation. Period. I don't care if people think he's the first, second, or twentieth best fighter of his era that still means he was an excellent fighter in my eyes.

Look, if he is an ATG he's a lower end one. His resume prevents him from being higher up the list, although he certainly had the talent to achieve even more than he did, which in itself says a lot, especially when you factor in:

A. The amount/and the severity of injury troubles he suffered from throughout his career (particularly with his hands), stemming right back from his early teens up until he retired (a specialist told him his left hand had deteriorated so much that he wouldn't even be able to use it let alone punch with it if he didn't pack it in).

B. That he was trained by a ****ing musician for the vast majority of his career, who had absolutely ZERO boxing experience and ZERO experience training fighters.

C. Wasn't a ****ing drug CHEAT.

D. And trained in what was basically a run-down, rickety oversized shed (which didn't even have a proper ring) from his schoolboy days right up until he's made the tenth defence of his title against Charles Brewer. The place was an absolute dive.


''My old gym was a shack, there is just no other way to describe it. People used to come inside and ask, ''how the hell can a world champion train in a place like this?' Honestly, it was the mangiest little building you could possibly imagine. The ring wasn't even a proper ring, just a carpeted area on the floor, and it was tiny.''

''I was never able to move around the heavy bag, so my footwork had to evolve naturally. It wasn't something I was able to develop in training. I'd clatter into the wall and it's no wonder I picked up elbow injuries and all sorts from tripping over the buckets that had been left to catch the rain that leaked in. The gym I'm in now feels like a palace because I have a proper ring and I'm able to move inside it. I can even move around the bags. But I won a world title training out of that old gym and, for all its faults, there was definitely something about the place.''

You don't achieve all of what he did throughout his career, both amateur and pro, unless there's something a bit special about you, even if he hadn't had to contend with all those disadvantages and obstacles, you'd still have to be a bit special.

 

Thanks mate.

 

I really don't want to get into any of this with anyone but I think all this talk of him protecting his zero is a bit overblown by many to be honest. I don't give a **** what the haters say, Joe had CLEARLY wanted to fight Hopkins for a long time and he was willing to go over to the US to do it too.

Steve Collins pulled out of fighting him on two or three occasions too. He cited a brain injury the second time (I think), which was obviously a legitimate reason to pull out, although I think his MRI scan came back clean when he had one done. However, his reason for pulling out the first time IIRC (when he vacated his title and Eubank stepped in) was because ''he couldn't get up for Calzaghe''. In an interview he gave to Boxing Monthly some years later he claimed he didn't know anything about Joe at the time and that he'd never even seen him fight before, which was odd considering Joe was a multiple winning ABA champion at three different weights, all of his fights had been broadcast on TV (either terrestrial, Sky, Eurosport etc.), had beaten the crap out of one of Collins' main sparring partners (Mark Delaney). Collins even came up to congratulate Joe at the post-fight party for that fight, telling him he'd ''beaten a good fighter''. lol. I'm also a Collins' fan too by the way.


Taylor priced himself and Echols among others either turned him down or pulled out of fights with him as well.

He also wanted to fight the likes of Reid, Brewer, Woodhall and Mitchell when they were champs too. But like I said, I'm not interested in getting into any of that with anyone.

I'm going to address this in greater detail in my next post. Seems like you need a little more convincing as to the reasons why Joe was below par that night. lol

At least you're honest about that.:good

Joe definitely won that fight though.

And Warr-en always had great belief in Joe's ability, IMO (when he wasn't riddled with injuries that is)
Quote:

That's low. I think you know full well that Joe was clean, just like you know a certain fighter was dirty (and let's not go there either lol). Joe had great genetics, a fantastic work ethic, lived in an area which has very long and winding steep hills where he was able to develop his stamina from an early age, had been trained by his father to fight with a high volume style since childhood, and by that stage of his career, due to the deterioration of his hands, he mainly relied on throwing lots of lighter flurries and certainly wasn't throwing many full power shots by then either.

Here's Joe's views on drug cheats.

''In athletics drug cheats get banned automatically for two years, and if steroids can make athletes run faster, they can surely help a boxer to hit harder and to hit for longer and this will enable them to inflict more punishment, which I think is repulsive. During our pre-fight medicals we get tested for drugs and it's never crossed my mind to take anything performance-enhancing. I don't have a big pot of pills that I dip into all hours of the day. In fact, I have a job just to remind myself to take vitamins.

''I would be angry if someone I fought took something that gave him an unfair advantage because this is a dangerous sport, it's not like running. In athletics it now seems almost part of the culture, just like cycling, and the who idea is to stay one step ahead of testing. I sat alongside Justi-n Gatlin, at the time the reigning Olympic 100m champion, on the BBC's Question of Sport about a year ago and spoke to him afterwards. We talked about the Jeff Lacy fight because he's from Florida as well and he seemed like a really nice guy and I was genuinely shocked and disappointed when he failed a drugs test last summer. Whenever I watch athletics or cycling now I have my suspicions. Some get caught and some don't but I like to think that fighters are clean. Boxing's a warrior sport and, to me, there have always been values that go along with that.

''It's cheating there's no other word for it.'' - Joe Calzaghe

Again, apologies for the excessively log reply.

 

Regarding Calzaghe's injury problems around the time he fought Reid:

We have video footage of his post-fight interview from the Gimenez fight where he talks about how he hadn't been able to do any sparring in preparation for the fight due to problems with his wrist.

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Joe didn't even want that fight, he actually wanted a unification match against Charles Brewer, but the WBO would've stripped him had he not gone through with it.

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Gim+wo...oe.-a060707719


Then directly after that fight he's out of action for a full ten months, having to undergo surgery on his wrist, and then suffering yet another injury (to his elbow) during preparation for Reid, which had to be rescheduled to a later date. Other than an injury induced eight month sabbatical in 1996, Joe had been fighting very regularly prior to facing Reid. Fighting three or four times a year had always been the plan once he'd won his title (he needed to back then if only for financial reasons as he wasn't earning big purses at that stage of his career), but once his body started giving out on him he wasn't able to do that. He was back to fighting once every four months for his next three fights after returning from injury, and he also looked a lot better too.


Like I said, the commentary team even mention during the Reid fight that there had been rumours leaked from Wales that he'd had to curtail his sparring sessions early due to injury and I remember reading about his injury problems in the boxing press back then too.

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Reid certainly seemed to be aware he was still having problems with his elbow as he locked Joe's arms up on a couple of occasions in the first round and violently twisted them.

Here's the first round.

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Reid was always a dirty ****er and he fought a VERY dirty fight against Joe too (you can see exactly what his intentions were just from the amount of flagrant fouls he commits in the opening round). The referee had to pull him aside on numerous occasions during the fight to sternly reprimand him for his flagrant fouling (and it was very flagrant too). He deducted one point off him for it and the only reason I don't think he didn't deduct more (which he should have done) is because Reid was the home fighter and he had the bulk of the crowd behind him.

Just to give you a taste of how dirty Reid was in that fight, here's a selection of some of his fouling from the 2:00 mark of the fifth round onwards (he committed plenty more before that too but I've already gone to more than enough effort as it is and I can't be bothered to go through the whole fight lol).

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Regarding him injuring his hand during the fight, well you only have to watch it to realize he wasn't throwing it with anywhere near the same regularity or force as he did against Eubank and some of his earlier fights. He was really leaning into it and putting his full weight behind it in that one, throwing it with abandon from first bell to last, whereas again Reid he was throwing it much more sparingly and not with the same bad intentions for the most part.

Also, a journalist who attended the post-fight presser said this about Joe's hand:

''At the post-fight news conference Calzaghe's hand had swollen horribly around the knuckles''

Here's where I think he might have hurt it. He catches Reid with a hard left hand on the hip. I'm not saying that this is where he DID injure it by the way (the fourth was one of his best rounds and he threw quite a lot of lefts during it after landing that punch), just that it may have been the initial punch that MIGHT have started the rot.

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Here's what Joe had to say about the problems he was having with his wrist and elbow around that time too.

''Worryingly, I began to have problems with my right wrist during training for my next title defence against mandatory challenger Juan Carlos Gimenez, who had been the distance with both Eubank and Benn. It was recurrence of the injury that jeopardised my career as a teenager and affected my preparations a lot in sparring and general bag work. I went to see a specialist but there wasn't much I could do except protect the hand as much as I could.

''I underwent another operation on the problematic wrist, which didn't seem to do much except keep me out of the ring for the next ten months, which was terribly frustrating at a time when I was hoping to build some momentum in my career. Over the years I've tried loads of different methods to try to make the wrist better, even soaking the bandages in vinegar before I wrapped my hands.

''The operation itself left me unable to throw a punch for three months, and then I injured my left elbow in an innocuous sparring session with Gary Lockett. I was only throwing a few jabs when I jarred the elbow but it was enough to extend my stay on the sidelines. A bout that been planned for the Autumn had to be scrapped, so I set my sights on having a better 1999.''

"I saw a specialist on Thursday and he says I have got golfer's elbow and should rest for at least six months. I can't be doing that, though, because I need my career to get back on track after a lot of time out already through injury.

"I will be seeing him again this week to make a final decision, but it is not looking good.

"It is inflammation of a muscle attached to the inside of my elbow, which I jarred fully 10 months ago. I twisted it in sparring and although it is not connected to an old wrist injury, it had affected my preparation badly. I could not spar for the last fight and it's still painful."

And here's a video of him talking about that too.

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Knackered now will come back to this at a later date.