Yes and a split decision was a ridiculous verdict and who scored it in favour of Hopkins ... Adalaide Byrd. Says it ****ing all.
and while I'm on this, Joe Calzaghe was quite prepared to be respectful towards Hopkins after the fight (he called him "a great fighter") until Hopkins had to be a ***** and a sore loser with all his "the fans know the truth" bull****, I don't remember many people claiming Hopkins won that fight on the night and now a few months down the line, a lot of you seem to have hazy recollections of the thing. Go watch and score it again if you think B-Hop won it, it wasn't even that close. This was no Pac vs JMM.
Many people at ringside had Hopkins winning a close fight. He did land the harder shots, scored a knockdown and the more effective punches overall. He controlled the pace for most of the fight as well. I had him winning the fight as you don't score fights based only on landing more punches, this isn't amateur boxing folks, as most of Calzaghe's punches were of the slapping or shoe-shining variety. That being said, it was a close fight that could have gone either way, and it was a SD win for the much younger Calzaghe. It was a much more impressive fight from Hopkins considering he was 43 years old. Realistically, since Calzaghe is much closer to his prime than Hopkins and only one weight class above his natural weight (compared to two for Hopkins), it speaks volumes on how good of a fighter a Hopkins. Hopkins at 41 or even 42 would have most likely won a clear UD and the Hopkins that fought Trinidad would have stopped Calzaghe. A final note, at least Hopkins had the balls to challenge a guy like Calzaghe, who was still in his prime, naturally bigger (a career SMW), 7 years younger, wheras Calzaghe would rather take the path of least resistance by not fighting Pavlik, Tarver (a better fighter than RJJ at this point), Dawson or giving Kessler a rematch (on neutral ground) and instead opts to fight a well past it RJJ. That speaks volumes of Calzaghe.
**** yeah! I agree! Joe is a cherry picking opportunist moron who needs to retire sooner rather than leater and leave boxing to real sportsmen I've had enough of this fraud - go fight Jones then **** of Joe.....Oh and I hope you lose!
While the Calzaghes do sometimes talk like a soap opera ( especially Enzo) Hopkins isnt exactly Nobel Prize worthy and opens his trap enough to get some back at him