GGG is - at the very least - the Greatest middleweight since Hagler

Respect to the last paragraph. You are super fanboy in the first three paragraph responses, though.

 

Lol what advantage does Hagler have over Hopkins? Hopkins is bigger, faster, stronger and smarter

 

How's it going mate?


This thread's bound to cause a lot of controversy.

GG's a great MW. There's no doubt about that. I'm a big fan.

Personally, I would say he's the best/most dominant MW since Bernard. I guess it depends on your criteria though.

I think there's been better MW's than GG over the past 30 years, but they didn't match his numbers. Although I believe they could have done, had they have followed GG's exact timeline.

 

The Kentucky Cobra,

Hopefully, he'll be able to get a clear victory over Canelo in the rematch.

His dominance is pretty much even with Bernard's.

I think a number of past MW's could have successfully followed GG's timeline.

It's tricky one.

Bernard beat some good fighters, but GG is naturally smaller than he was. So I think that has to be taken into account.

No, Marvin didn't have the excuse of being 35. But he'd fought significantly more fights, so he had more miles on the clock. His fight against Ray was his 67th fight. Whereas GG has fought 38 times. So Marvin had almost 30 extra fights, and most of them were scheduled for 15 rounds. Despite having many amateur fights, I think GG is fresher than what Marvin was. Also, has GG fought anybody who were better than those versions of Ray and Duran?

His record has to be respected. His dominance has to be respected. But you also have to note that many great MW's of the past, just passed through the division as opposed to remaining there for most of their careers. Many of them also fough better competition. Which meant that it was much harder for them to be as dominant as GG currently is.

 

You are changing the goal posts. This was your comment:

"It doesn't legitimatize the fact he was a paper title holder who fought bums"

Brook was rated as the #1 Welter Weight and a bottom tier P4P by RING, so he is a top 10 fighter and hardly a bum.
Canelo is usually rated as lineal and P4P by RING, so he is top 10 and hardly a bum.

So Golovkin has defended his belt against the same amount as non-top 10 fighters as Hopkins. So your claim and your method of argument to support it...holds no water.

If we are being strict and only counting wins of fighters that were rated by RING before the fights in question.

Hopkins has 12 official top 10 wins as MW Champion to Golovkin's 9. So your double claim is off.

No, the WBA Interim title is a different belt. It was held by N'Jikam.

Sturm defended the Super WBA title against the following top 10 fighters: Macklin, Zbik, Murray, Geale.
Golovkin defended the Regular WBA title against following top 10 fighters: Proksa, Macklin, Stevens.

So I don't see a huge difference. Other than Sturm point blank said he would not fight Golovkin and the WBA split the belts instead of stripping Sturm as they should have.

Canelo moved down to fight Golovkin.

 

What do you disagree with?

"He took an unnecessarily prolonged beating that could have cost him his life"
-Opinion. And a reasonable one. Ouma was taking punch after punch for 3 rounds and often needed the ropes to stay on his feet, the fight effected his long term health.

"He was hospitalized for brain bleed and lost over two years of his career."
-Fact.

"He was up 5 rounds to 4 on two scorecards in a fight that was competitive for it's first half. However, it became a one sided beat down as I pointed out and he didn't make it out of the 10th."
-Fact.

"The fight was scheduled for 12 rounds and he didn't make it out of the 10th."
-Fact.

"I wouldn't call that "almost lasting the distance", that's one hell of a stretch."
-Opinion. And a damn reasonable one. You can't say the guy almost lasted the distance when there was a full minute left in round 10, and two full rounds after that. You sound like a twat saying something so stupid.

 

Statistically, that is true.

I don't think so. Sustained dominance in MW has proven to be elusive. It's not about matching some individual wins, it's about doing it over and over like this, and in the matter that Golovkin has.

My comments need to be understood within context. It was in response to this claim: "He(Golovkin) needed to blow Canelo away in order to claim he's the best since Hagler. "

The point was that Hagler struggled with 3 opponents he was expected to blow away as well, and he was only really declined in one of these fights and he lost. So to go about criticizing Golovkin in such a way is flawed.

Depends on the individual fighter: Jones was never tested at MW. Toney looked vulnerable too many times at MW. Sugar Ray was declined at MW. Charles was a teenager at MW. Moore had a stomach condition at MW. P4P higher fighters than Golovkin but hard to conclude they are actually greater at MW.

 

Hopkins beat 14 top 10 MWs. GGG beat 8. Brook was not a MW , held no ranking at 160.

 

Prime Sergio Martinez would have made Golovkin look silly.

Michael Nunn and Mike McCallum would both beat Golovkin.

 

Thats the same belt Golovkin held until he picked up the real thing EIGHT fights ago. Not 19 fights ago , EIGHT fights ago.
Counting defenses of that intrim fake belt is like saying Povetkin has more HW title defenses than Antony Joshua. More most people agree that Povetkin was never once HW Champion of the world.

 

Your argument was that Golovkin has only defended against bums.

Hopkins defended against 10 RING rated opponents in 12 fights total.

Golovkin defended against 10 RING rated opponents in 10 fights total and is not done yet.

Golovkin and Hopkins both successfully defended their title against 9 fighters not rated in RING top 10.

Hopkins' opponents: Mercado, Lipsey, Allen x2, Echols x2, Holmes, Trinidad, Joppy, Oscar, JDJ, Eastman. That's 10 fighters, 12 times.

Even if you don't want to count Brook, it's still close, and your argument and method has been shown to hold no water.

 

Factually INCORRECT.

Golovkin has one defense of the interim belt against Nunez. The rest are officially noted as the WBA World title defenses.

This is just desperate straw grasping.

Both Golovkin and Hopkins were not recognized as the man in MW and won their title in not a very glamorous fashion. They both brought prestige to their belts by the way they conducted themselves as Champions.

 

My argument is Hopkins had a greater reign than GGG. That has already been proven in this thread and you are willingly going around in circles because you can't accept the truth.
14 top 10 rated opponents is better than 8. Actually Pavlik was the lineal MW Champ when Hopkins beat him so that makes it 15/8.
And 2 of those 15 guys were ranked top 5 on the P4P list.
So Hopkins beat an undefeated lineal MW Champion , more top 5 rated opponents and two top P4P ranked fighters.
Hopkins >> GGG. Its not even an argument , but its clear you're a GGG nuthugger who argues what you want to believe over what is the truth.

 

Its the same thing unless it says super. He didn't get the Super (real) WBA belt until he beat Geale.

Hopkins was the man at MW from 2001 - 2005. Why would you say he wasn't?

 

Look, unless we are dealing with hard facts there is no "truth" either one of us going to be accepting.

I'm just pointing out the inconsistency in your logic.

Hell, I miscounted myself. If we are talking title defenses....

Hopkins' opponents: Lipsey, Allen x2, Echols x2, Holmes, Trinidad, Joppy, Oscar, JDJ, Eastman. Hopkins only faced 9 top 10 opponents in 11 fights as a MW Champion.

Golovkin has defended against 10 top 10 opponents as a MW Champion in as many fights.

And I would disagree with this reasoning. For me, it's not the sheer number of magazine rated opponents that determines who had the better title reign. Hopkins third fight with Allen and Echols rematch really don't add much to his resume. If Golovkin was ordered to rematch Murray instead of Monroe Jr and knocked him out again, it would add another top 10 name to his resume but in a very superficial sense.

We are discussing MW title reigns. Pavlik is a LHW achievement for Hopkins. But funny you won't count Brook, but will count this. And you claim I'm being circular...you are making it up as you go, adapting whatever logic suits your bias in the moment.