ok i'll take your guys word for it and it's apparent he wasn't at his best. my olnly point is that reid was a good fighter and it would be no shame for a champ to have a close fight with him especially with the rivalry that probably focused reid a lot more than usual. calzaghe's apparently always has bad hands nowadays so maybe the swelling didn't have to much effect on the fact that it was a close fight. and if the hand didn't really effect the outcome, i don't see how a close win over reid is a knock on someone's resume. reid was very good back then and every champ has tough fights
Hopkins - Eastman Hopkins - Mercado That verision of Reid would have likely been robbed against Hopkins at that point in time, if they had met and he was motivated.
I think the China hand excuse fighters give is a usual excuse from a guy who doesnt get rid of a guy he beleives he should have. If Joes hand was bad why didnt he rematch REID and KO him? Like JOE said " I don't do rematches" (unless your called MArio VEIT) lol
Ignore that BBC report, Calzaghe did break his hand in the Reid fight, you cans see that just watching it. Team Calzaghe released reports that his hand was fine, as they were aggressively pursing Hopkins and Jones at this time, and knew these fearful American fighters would use the hand injury as a excuse not to face Calzaghe. Calzaghe was just that detirmined to face these legends in their prime, he was ready to go in against them partially-injured or not.
Calzaghe was never determined to face those two in their PRime. If he was he would have dumped the worthless WBO gong and moved to light heavy in search of a title eliminator!!!! or made a name for himself fighting some entity at light HEAVY!!! He had no no interest, why would he when he could make a buck fighting MArio VEIT twice! and make a buck. Its no coincidence those fights happened when Calzgahe got more credible unifying and getting HBO exposure. Did you see Jones Bhop running then??? NO, because JOE only just became CREDIBLE! his own fault. He was not like Hatton, he was happy to stay in his comfort zone till all the cards were in his favour.
This is about the hand mate, and it is a well known off-record fact that his hand was broken amongst many fans of the sport.
Jones fought Toney and Hopkins with 1 hand.....difference was he didnt bring it out in the public. Joe faced robin Reid a bit different to fighting Bhop and Toney
Dont know if i fall into the usual suspects group, im guessing yes seeing as i didnt get a reply. I never said owt about broken bones, I wanted to know whether you consider Calzaghe prime in the Reid fight and if you thought he wasnt, then how saying Prime Hop and Roy would never struggle with someone of the calibre of Reid was relevant in determining how a fight between Prime Calzaghe and Prime Roy and Hop would pan out. If Toffejack or any of the usual suspects suggested that on the performance given by Hop against Mercado(A far less calibre fighter than Reid) was a foundation for their belief that Hop couldnt live with Calzaghe you would be one of the first to chew him up and spit him out.
He'd made 15 defenses of his title before he gave Veit the re-match. Veit had won the interim title and Calzaghe had to ight him to keep his title and run of consecutive deenses going. WTF was he meant to do then? **** off and say "hey I could have had my name in the record books but I don't do rematches" FFS.
I spoke to Calzaghe a couple of weeks or so after the Reid fight and asked him about his hand, and he told me it was ligamnet damage and didn't mention anything about a break.
Ligament damage is usually worse than a brake, a footballer is likely to be out of the game for a longer period of time.
Welcome to the JC Realists Club. You are Number 6. In this group we are each Number 6. We are still hoping to get 6 members. Finding 6 sane Calzaghe fans may take 6 years.