do you still consider Calzaghe vs Lacy an upset?

I dont think any fighter has a grand design to manipulate his stature using a lesser belt as a vehicle to execute a big fish small pond scenario. The politics dictates what happens. In these situations each champion has mandatory demands and without being a Las vegas/ ppv draw there is not the demand for unifications.

You can't put weight in the lesser belt argument as proving Calzaghe less significant either. Check the time line! As soon as a rival champion lost his belt he fought another Champion. They each fought the same kind of guys.

Byron Mitchell was WBA champion at the same time Calzaghe was WBO champion, soon as he lost the belt Calzaghe was the next guy to beat him. Same with WBC champion Ritchie Woodhall he had been their champion the same time as Joe yet as ex champ he challenged Calzaghe and lost. Charles Brewer was also IBF champion within the same years Calzaghe was a WBO champion yet he too wound up losing to him.Robin Reid was WBC champion for two months of Calzaghes reign also and he ALSO lost to Joe.

All these wins were before Lacy came along to land a vacant title fight for the IBF strap. What made this worth more than Calzghes resume as it then stood?

This is not Mike Tyson taking on former champions who had not been title holders since BEFORE Tyson had turned pro, this was Calzaghe beating his Rival champions (albeit not in unifications) who had reigned during his time as a title holder.

So if the WBO strap was so rubbish, why was their champion beating recent WBC, WBA and IBF champions?

Sven Otke retired as IBF claimant in 2004 his reign ran parallel with Joe's WBO run. His promotional outfit was happy to sell out in Germany without unifications because he could barely beat Charles Brewer, Robbin Reid and Byran Mitchell but always got the decisions.

It was the Otkke retirement that enabled Lacy to become champion.

 

it doesnt do calzaghe any favours to compare him to king of cheats Ottke.

Mitchell would have been a good win for joe had joe not asked his ref to stop the fight after he panicked after getting floored easily seconds earlier. Woodhall was fighting with a crippling back injury, he should not have been anywhere near a ring. Credit to Joe for arguably scraping past Reid, but theres not really any credit due for beating the mediocre Brewer.

Joes obviously a pretty good fighter, noones denying hes able to even unify very briefly. The question he didnt answer was could he defend non-wbo wassen-managed titles, and he never really answered it more than once - you gotta wonder if he knew his limitations very well. Credit for making about 3 or 4 good defences in his 11 year minor title reign - but thats a really poor sell in itself, the worst SMW sell of any long term smw titlist.

yup.

 

I wasn't comparing him to Ottke, I was demonstrating their reigns ran simultaneously with no real option to face each other. the German kept getting hometown decisions and would not leave Germany. At least four of his title fights were disputed. Sven was less impressive against all the common opponents he had with Calzaghe, are you trying to say because he had the IBF belt was worth more it is something more than Calzaghe?

This guy was a WBA champion who had a split decision with Sven Ottke. Joe's only competition at this time. Yet joe knocked him out.

I have met Woodhall, he always gives Joe credit and says that with Roy Jones, Calzaghe was the best he faced.

These two were WBC and IBF champions simultaneous with Joe's reign. Reid and Brewer both beat Ottke (the other rival champion with parallel reign with Joe) but did not get the decision. Joe beat champions that held each of the rival belts within his WBO reign. ...There's no getting out of that one.

could he defend non Warren managed titles? Didn't he just beat IBF, WBC, and WBA champions who defended those belts? If he beat the guys who did defend those belts surely he can hold them and defend them too? he beat guys who did that!

Joe's rival champions were champions like Brewer, Reid, Mitchell, Woodhall, Lacy, Kessler, He beat them. Other rival champions that ran simultaneously with that period that he missed out were Sven Ottke, Marcus Beyer, Bruno Gerard, Glen Catley, Eric Lucas, Anthony Mundane and not a single one of these belt holders proved to have any edge over Joe Calzaghe.

so in the period between 1997 and 2008 you would consider the reign of Glen Catley as superior to Calzaghe because his WBC belt was more legitimate?

 

why would I claim that when I believe the opposite.

you've not read his bio then. fine, primary source trumps half minute chat

apart from him not really beating Reid.

he didn't do show he could do it, period. The difference between doing and not doing.

fair claim to Brewer and lacy, that's it. The others were way too contentious, again always coinciding with joe stepping up.

 

So in the absence of unifications Joe Calzaghe beats recent IBF, WBC,WBA champions. Isn't that enough? Then he beats Lacy and Kessler.

Ottke was the only world level Super Middleweight winning fights and half of them were disputed split decisions to guys Calzaghe knocked out.

It took a long while for Joe to catch on. Granted. I agree he did not look a super talent..But even before facing Lacy, Calzaghe was the last man standing from an uninteresting bunch of belt holders, whom, as it happened, never turned out to be as good as Joe. Calzaghe was just as uninteresting as the rest of them but he was without doubt, even by then, quietly, the most consistent among them and with the best credentials.

Don't be fooled by the lesser belt.

 

no one takes the lacy win from joe, and he gets credit for marginally beating injured Kessler in Cardiff with the welsh mafia on his side even if he did run in fear from the division to avoid rematching fully fit Kessler.

just an outright lie, joe barely knocked out one guy his whole title career.

no, he had held the least attractive belt for longest that's all, a belt no one was interested in for most of his reign, which was why he landing defences against a crippled Woodhall et al.

I'm not. joe is pretty good.