Calzaghe or Hamed - who has the better legacy?

'Comparable' is an interesting choice of words, you can twist logic anyway you want to make things comparable.

Calzaghe has the bigger legacy.

 

I wouldn't expect you to pick Calzaghe because you hate the guy but come on this is ridiculous.

There is absolutely no comparison here it's Calzaghe by a country mile.

Hamed could have been a legend but history will remember him losing to the only top 10 pound for pound fighter he fought and then quit.

Calzaghe's record and legacy on the other hand speaks for itself.

Resume, accomplishments, longetivity all favour Calzaghe over Hamed strongly here.

 

when did he reject the fight with JMM? What were the reasons behind it?
Was Augie Sanchez seem as an elite fighter at that time?

 

.....on the wrong side of the road whilst going over a humpback bridge and then fled the scene, leaving the driver (of the car he crashed into) for dead.


But, this thread is about accomplishments in the ring....not what happened out of it.

 

who cares? Both held the WBO aka Warren Boxing organisation for way too long.

 

Yeah, they're definitely similar. It's just that the way Hamed's career finished that leaves his achievements a little hollow and forgetful.

Oh, what could have been?

 

First off, I have Joe Calzaghe as the 6th or 7th best British fighter of all-time (behind Fitzsimmons, Wilde, Kid Lewis, Lennox Lewis, Ken Buchanan, and on a par with Benny Lynch).

Secondly, I would like to once again commend Hoya for producing another interesting and well-written piece. I do not share your feelings for Hamed, but when you write about him it never smacks of fanboy bias, your opinions are always grounded in reality and articulately expressed. A welcome addition to this site.

Lastly, from an objective standpoint I have to say I think Joe Calzaghe has a substantially greater legacy than Naz (though I don't believe either man has forged a particularly great or impressive legacy in their poorly managed careers).

It irks me to answer Calzaghe to this question, as Hamed has the balls to take on a prime ATG (Barrera) and Calzaghe never did, but the facts are strongly in the Welshman's favour all things considered.

Calzaghe has a better resume. Hamed never beat anyone as good as past-prime Hopkins or Kessler. Calzaghe has held The Ring titles at 2 weights. Not that I place much importance on it considering his level of competition, but Calzaghe does have a zero - a minor point in his favour.

At their respective peaks, was Calzaghe a better supermiddleweight than Hamed was a featherweight? I think he was. As I have always said, I think Calzaghe's abilities are wildly overrated, the general perception of his skills is all smoke and mirrors built up by beating mediocre opponents. The one time Calzaghe has faced an elite level fighter (the version of Jones that Calzaghe fought was shot to pieces and utterly incapable of performing to elite level even sporadically), he was clearly outskilled and won only on workrate versus a 43-year-old man with stamina issues. IMO, Calzaghe is nowhere near as skilled as people seem to think, he basically relies overly heavily on handspeed and workrate, he does not have much defensive skills nor does he punch with much accuracy or power. Put him in with 1994-96 Jones or 2001-4 Hopkins and he would have been soundly beaten.

However, one thing that Calzaghe has in his favour over the Prince is that Joe has obviously proven very hard to beat (I think peak Jones and Hopkins would have done it pretty convincingly, but IMO they are two of the top 35 fighters in history). Calzaghe has a more well-rounded, strong all-round game that means he has never had a sloppy loss (for instance, a Williams-Quintana where the better fighter loses) and always makes life very tough for his opponent. From this generation, I think only Jones, Hopkins, and 1994 Toney would beat Calzaghe. I think more featherweights would have beaten Hamed (Barrera,Morales,Marquez,Pacquiao for starters).

For me, Hamed is a more limited fighter. He was born with great punching power, speed and reflexes, but he never worked hard enough on his all-round game to ever become a great fighter. All this stuff about how he was the second coming of Robinson under Brendan Ingle then slid rapidly downhill after he left is utter bollocks. Hamed looked so good in his early world title career because the opposition he was facing was feeble (Robinson is often cited as an ATG performance - ). Ingle was with him for a performance where the flaws he always had were exposed (Kelley) and Ingle was not with him for the best all-round performance of his career taking opposition into consideration (Bungu). The truth is Hamed never had enough to his game to be considered a great fighter, and whoever got to him first between the top guys in and around the division at the time (MAB,Morales,Marquez,Norwood,Espinosa) was always going to expose his dire defence and lack of fluency.

I do not think the same criticisms can be levelled at Calzaghe, who has a strong all-round game and is tough to beat. Although I strongly believe Hopkins won his fight with Joe, that Joe made it so close is great credit to him in my eyes as we saw v Pavlik what Hopkins can still do to a mere mortal.

In conclusion, for me Calzaghe has the edge on resume, achievements, and ability. Not exactly a no contest, but definitely a clear winner.

IMO :bbb

 

Kessler was WBC champ aswel.

I think its his win over Hopkins as the major difference, when Hamed stepped up gaainst p4per, he got beat. Id also rank Shieka and Sakio Bika as notable wins. And wouldnt ignore Delaney off of the domestic honours part...

 

Nice piece Dinamita

 

This is true. Same with Ricky Hatton. Hatton could be 45-0 and filling out the MENA or the G-Mex every few months, but as soon as he won a lww title, he looked up and saw the world p4p#1 up at ww, and wanted to go for the biggest prize. When Calzaghe won his first world title, in the exact same way the world p4p#1 was reigning in the division above him. Did Calzaghe move up to lhw within a year or so and go to the US and win a belt to pressure Jones into fighting him the way Hatton did with Collazo? No. When did Joe fight him? 11 years later when Jones was shot to **** and had no belt and had been sparked a couple of times. That's the truth about Joe Calzaghe. Smoke and mirrors my friends, smoke and mirrors.

 

Maybe, who knows.

By the way if Hamed had lived up to his potential this would be a no contest in favour of Hamed with the potential fights that would have been made with Morales, Pacquiao and Marquez. Unfortunately for him he fell out of love with boxing at the time when it mattered most and hurt his legacy real bad. The Hamed that fought Barrera was a shadow of himself.

In my opinion Naseem Hamed is the biggest waste of talent that has ever come from the UK.