Doing a Jeff Lacey

He wasn’t very popular which most boxers aren’t in America....however, he was highly touted as a top fighter in the sport by most in the boxing establishment. Just like Gamboa and David Reed. All 3 of them got hype that they failed to live up to

 

Joe merely exposed the hype of Lacy who was never really tested against top tier guys. It was hard because he was fighting in a very weak division and knocking out the crop of opposition that was available. Joe was the only elite boxer operating in the weight class at the time but the US boxing fans were high on Left hook because we didn’t have anyone to get excited about at 168 at that time

 

That is a very problematic statement considering that America has more popular fighters at the time than all of the planet combine. This was 2006 we are talking here. America had:
Roy Jones Jr.
Oscar De La Hoya
Shane Mosley
Fernando Vargas
Zab Judah
Winky Wright
Jermaine Taylor
Bernard Hopkins
James Toney
Floyd Mayweather Jr.
Rocky Juarez

I'm not trying to turn this into a nationalistic thing but these are some of the biggest names in the business and you would be hard pressed to name some English counterparts to rival this list for that year alone. So in this mix WHO IS JEFF LACY TO ANYONE BUT THE BRITS?!!!

 

I coined this term first but someone else lays claim to it: he as "Lacyfied" . Similar to being knocked into Bolivian, but worse.

 

Agree with the sentiment of this thread. Lacy is a creation of the Brits and their media.

he looked the part of a good villain for them - a mountain of muscle, shocking power in his left hook, hardened murderous looking face....perfect foil for Joe Calzaghe in front of 70k rabid fans.

In truth, Lacey was merely a solid prospect. Outstanding left hook but no other elite physical or skillful traits. Too short and stocky to have amounted to much at 168lbs. Just the wrong build entirely.

But, of course, the english have built up his legend to a first ballot hall of famer.

 

Lemiuex has been managed/trained worse than I can recall.
Allowed by his mgmt to fight an iron chinned power house top 10 with huge experience, then allowed to go pitbull on him by his trainer.
Sent in with another top veteran and held back from punching.

Rebuilt well, then fed to GGG as a sacrifice to keep Golovkin from goading GBP and Alvarez for cowardice.

Again, rebuilt well, then sent in against a style he couldn't possibly be expected to beat, even without the injury.

I suppose he'll be rebuilt vs Lee, Khyrtov and Murata, then fed to Spence at some point

 

And calzaghe kicked those gates down

 

Recall he even lost to shot to **** Jermaine Taylor. Yet Slappy Calsacky fans tout the Lacy win as something huge. A Lacy with a shredded shoulder, so he could no longer even be called Left Hook, isn't a very prestigious scalp, but White Rhino Joe, definitely slapped the **** out of him for 12 rounds. Not sure I've ever seen somebody look slap drunk.

 

Don`t remember many Americans calling Lacy a "gatekeeper" before the Calzaghe fight. Virtually all of them were saying he was the next boxing superstar. About 90% of this board was predicting Calzaghe`s destruction. The day after the fight they were all MIA! Suddenly Lacy was "green" "never really taht good" etc It was hysterical. lol

 

Out of all those names, Oscar was the only big cross over star. He was the only boxer who was well known in America outside of just the sport of boxing. Even guys like Manny Pacquiao, Roy Jones, Miguel Cotto and Mayweather at that time were not big names outside of the sport.

If we talk about popularity amongst the world of Boxing which has been a niche sport for the last 25+ years, the list you provided has validity if we are keeping the context of the very small world of Boxing.

In 2003, 2004 and 2005 Lacy was considered one of boxing's most promising fighters and built a very strong reputation as a young American IBF super middleweight champion who was going to be the next big thing....before he met Joe of course.

There weren’t many top English boxers in 2004, 2005 or 2006. America was still the dominant force at that time. There wasn’t a shift seeing more top boxers from Eastern Europe or the UK like we see now. But Joe C was the main English boxer who was considered the best across the pond and the best at 168. Jeff was supposed to be the one to take his title although I didn’t believe Lacy’s hype. I thought Joe was the better boxer and thought he’d win but not in that way. I thought Jeff was going to make it a competitive fight.

 

No one was calling Lacy a gatekeeper at that time. By all accounts, Lacy was positioned as the American 168 world champion that would beat Joe and hand him his first defeat. He wasn’t considered a gatekeeper until after he lost to Taylor and didn’t look as ferocious in his fights after his one sided loss to Calzaghe.

 

And fighting Tsypko with a torn rotator cuff next fight completely ruined him.

 

He lost to Jermaine almost 3 years after being completely dominated and outclassed by Joe. And he was never the same after that one sided beat down. He did win 3 fights in a row after losing to Joe and then Jermaine handed him his 2nd loss. But in those 3 wins, Lacy didn’t look like the beast that had racked up 20 wins, 18 by knockout immediately before his fight with Calzaghe. In retrospect, Lacy was extremely overhyped and not as good as most in Boxing thought. But at the time....he was considered a top young word champion who was supposed to be the next big name and Joe was supposed to take him to that next level.

 

It was the whole media build up that gave the outcome of the fight more limelight than it would have normally.

The US media simply expected that a B grade US fighter would be too much to handle for any British fighter......Clearly they were wrong.

The bias still exists these days, everytime a UK fighter, tipped to do well on the world scene, loses, he's labelled a 'British Hype job'.....When in reality, his nationality is completely irrelevant, as demonstrated by Lacey.