Personally I was very wrong about Canelo. I used to debate with Mrkoolkevin about him, but I was wrong. Canelo is a great fighter. But, so is Calzaghe. I don't like either one personally so my judgment isn't biased. I honestly believe JC is better at 168 and would win a convincing decision as Cal is all wrong for Canelo
gotta disagree with you there. avoiding the US during jones' and hopkins' prime (one division above and one below him),and therefore having kessler as the best prime fighter calzaghe ever fought, doesn't make him "great" or even close in my book. great SMW sure, but you can't be a great fighter by consciously avoiding the best fighters of your era when it mattered the most.
Joe was very injury prone and had glass hands which scuppered several fights. I don't believe he deliberately or consciously wanted to avoid the US. And as you say, Jones and Hopkins were different divisions and Joe was a very natural 168. He only really moved up to fight Hopkins because there was nothing doing at SMW. Also, I know that in hindsight everyone thinks Lacy was overrated, but at the time literally everyone had him down as a SMW Tyson who was going to destroy Calzaghe. Joe nearly pulled out of that fight due to injury - he had to have injections in his hands and his dad convinced him that if he pulled out, he'd get no more big fights. I honestly think that Calzaghe was great - he could find out the level and style of his opponent on the fly - he famously did next to no sparring - which is a difficult thing to do unless you are a top level fighter.
Then how come he didnt ever get glass hands when lining up the replacement bum after he had turned down a good fighter? Must have done that about 15 times in his reign. Joey Calzaghe actually claimed, quite deliberately and consciously, that he was afraid of flying. Luckily he got cured of his ailment when the best in the USA were old fogies getting beat regularly. Or whenever he was flying his family to the Maldives for decades, which he tried not to mention.
Were they **** lol Hopkins dethroned tarver who was number one at the weight after flattening Roy Pascal was at supermiddle
Joe would be too much activity and work rate for Canelo who gasses as a fight goes on and the pace joe would set would be way too much for canelo to keep up. I’d go with Joe by way of UD
allowing frank warren to run his career had everything to with with it, and calzaghe consciously allowed this to happen. warren was notorious for getting his fighters 'a belt', and that's usually where their careers started to regress, because being a 'world champion' and having a great record (against anyone) was a guaranteed money maker with minimal risks, so long as they stayed away from the US (just ask the germans, it was their blueprint). ricky hatton left warren, went to the US, and fought prime floyd and pac. amir khan left warren, went to the US, and fought prime canelo. calzaghe was better than both of them, and only fought jones and hopkins when they were dethroned and past prime. what did he do that made these fights happen? he left frank warren and went to the US. remember floyd mayweather also had a career plagued by broken hands, and his reaction to this was to change the way he fought as he moved up the weights and fought bigger men, beating them all.
that's like saying roy jones dodged darius michaelewski because he put that ad in a newspaper. if you don't become established in the US, the casual fan stateside doesn't know who you are, you don't garner the interest of the networks, and fights don't get made. calzaghe was high risk, low reward, and you can't blame the guy who was the bigger name and established on the biggest stage of all.