Calzaghe or Hamed - who has the better legacy?

Can you really say Joe's win over Kessler is better than Naz's wins over Johnson (had 10 defenses, Kelley, Soto, Vasquez, or Bungu who had 14 defences of his IBF title, Paul Ingle.

All of these guys were belt holders and Bungu and Johnson had over 24 defenses between them

 

Joe's best wins- Kessler, B-hop(old), Lacy, Reid, Woodhall (old), Eubank (old)

Naz's best wins- Tom Johnson, Bungu, Vasquez(old), Kelley, McCullough, Ingle, Medina

I think Naz's just edges Joe's TBH

 

hopkins was never a PPV fighter in his prime but he was clearly the best fighter at middle and he brought notoriety to the table - which is why tito and oscar - the two most marketable non-heavies at that time came to him.

the only difference - THE ONLY DIFFERENCE - between what hopkins had achieved at middle and what calzaghe had achieved at super at that time (within any amount of reason that counted) .......


..is that hopkins held his title on the world stage and calzaghe didn't.

it's irrelevant - irrelevant - from the perspective of a fighter's promoter if a fighter has a 'title' or if he's 'undefeated'.

those two words can cheapen boxing way too often to be given credibility simply based on 'numbers'.

you won't even find many 'beercan fans' outside the US who knew who bernard hopkins was prior to the tito and oscar fights.

my point being...

hopkins DIDNT NEED TO leave his division for any reason - because he was **** of the walk on the biggest stage of all.

like i said in another post - big fights come to fighters who hold all the marbles.

calzaghe didn't do anything wrong during his supermiddle reign - except one thing.

both he and warren KNEW how the game was played and they still didn't take (example) 2 PPV undercard fights to get the attention of 2 shoe-in HOF fighters in their prime.

i wish people would stop using examples of what jones or hopkins didn't do at a certain time to playdown their careers when they were clearly the best fighters in the world in their divisions - and anyone who wanted to prove them wrong was free to cross the atlantic and prove it.

damn i enjoy posting on here, but i might just cut my wrists in the next week if i keep having to spell this out for people.

 

the barrera loss is the biggest feather in naz's cap if people are genuinely going to make this comparison.

careers aren't about 'titles' and being 'undefeated' in boxing - it's who you fought and when.

 

BI2, Not gonna quote you coz it's massive, but i think i must of misunderstood youre first paragraph in the quote i responded too, sorry.


i dont disagree with anything you said in the massive one, as we've been over before.

 

i think you're going too far...

calzaghe's an excellent fighter.

it's mainly the fact that hamed fought barrera that says something for me over calzaghe.

but thats a legacy issue - i think you've downplayed calzaghe's win over kessler - which (imo) was significantly better than bungu.

 

But why is Kessler's win so much better than Bungu ? when Kessler defends his belt for 14 straight fights then we can compare

 

bottom line for me, as i've said before, is that naseem fought barrera and calzaghe didn't with his contemporaries.

but then again calzaghe and warren have always had the mentality thats been more 'play the numbers' - and hamed really thought he was the second coming.

i think hamed could have gone a lot further if he had discipline and hard work to back up his ego (nothing wrong with ego in this game if its balanced), and i think calzaghe could have silenced his critics, even if he didn't win, by fighting hopkins and jones when it mattered.

i understand both mentalities, but i guess the irony is that if their personalities were moulded together we wouldnt be having this debate about either of them.

 

the belts are irrelevant. its who you beat and when you beat them.

kessler beat a whos who of SMW contenders leading up to the calzaghe fight and was EASILY the top contender to calzaghe's throne.

kessler losing to calzaghe was a plus for him rather than a negative - i dont mean a win wouldn't have been better...but he got solid props across the board for his performance

 

holding a world title is a negotiating tool.

its how much respect you have on the world stqage that determines what you can and cant do.