Hopkins getting better with age was/is a myth

Yep. He dropped him hard in the 7th and it looked like that was that, but Hopkins just didn't have it in him to finish the job off, Allen recovered and even arguably nicked the last couple of rounds. Then against Eatsman he looked terrible, every bit the 40 year-old he was and of course after that he lost twice to Taylor. Moving up to LHW helped him to some extent but the idea that he was anywhere near his prime is simply false.

 

I'm sorry but I disagree. For me he looks a lot better when he went through that phase when he fought Tarver, Wright, Calzaghe, Pavlick than he did when he first boxed Jones Jr and when he was around that age.

He definitely peaked late, I'd say his best wins came at light heavy weight.

 

Watch his first fight with Jones. I'm sorry but he was not in his prime there. If you look at Hopkins middleweight reign most of his wins came against fighters who were naturally smaller or not considered all time greats.

 

I don't know who is saying they think his prime was in '93. Most seem to agree that his prime was 97ish-03ish.

Again, to say that a pro boxer was entering his prime at 40 years old makes no sense.

 

i agree and disagree. he did not necessarily get better physically but he definitely used what he had a lot smarter as he got older. to some learning how to fight smarter is a sign of "getting better" despite not being at the physical peak you may have been at years prior.

and yes he made his bones at mw but for a large part of his mw run it is well documented that he ate like a bird and did a huge amount of roadwork to maintain that weight. when he got with mackie shilstone he went from 160 straight to 175 and beat the sweet jesus hell out of the champ. Even shilstone said it was crazy what he was doing to stay at 160. the point is that the combination of getting smarter with the use of your tools and fighting at a more comfortable weight does give the impression of "getting better."

also, i'm probably the biggest pavlik fan left on this board. and i'll say that this "dragging pavlik to 170" is a load of ****. pavlik was a huge middleweight and fighting at 170 was not a big deal at all for him. pavlik even said he was fine at the weight and it's well documented he was killing himself to keep making 160. hopkins would beat pavlik at any weight.

 

That's just plain ignorance and the first class stupidity that infests these boards and Boxing discussions as a whole. With all the great hidden advisers in the sport that came and went, you'd think we'll have a lot more fighters over 40 skillfully picking opponents and dominating fighters they were not expected to. But we obviously don't because it's beyond extraordinary what Hopkins was able to do. Simple minded idiots like you can't and will never fathom this.

 

lol Go change your pad, it's obviously saturated and causing you some discomfort. The tail end of Hopkins career was smoke and mirrors. Hopkins didn't want to fight Dawson and feasted on limited skill fighters like Pascal. All credit to Hopkins for fighting Kovalev. I didn't think he would do it but outside of Kovalev, Hopkins was very judicious in his choice of opponents.

 

So do you think Duran got better after Leonard stopped him first time, or think Jones got better after Tarver stopped him in 2?
With that example then consider Hopkins got dropped twice and drew with Pascal but when older again didnt get dropped and won. The point is not all fights are the same and if you went back to his first fight with Allen he got hurt and couldnt continue

 

I do agree that he was largely successful against certain types of opponents, but he did fight some guys that would seem to give him trouble at his advanced age. The guys who were fast of hand and foot. Dawson, Calzaghe, etc. He just didn't have the ability at that point to match those guys.

He was, however, able to beat the Cloud's and Murat's and Shumenov's relatively easily. Had a bit more trouble with a guy like Pascal, but the idea is still there. So, we can't say he really avoided anyone, as he fought the best guys in the division up until he was 49 years old. He just wasn't able to be as successful vs certain types.

 

I realise that, but it was only one example. I dont think the Hopkins of today would have looked like he did when he first fought Jones or R Allen first time

 

For Hopkins to have the stamina to what he did at his age is amazing to me. I am not a big Hopkins fan but I am not trying to put him down. Hopkins didn't want to fight Dawson and flat out told Ward that there was no way he was going to fight him. Hopkins knew what type of fighters gave his the best chance of winning and he went after them. I see nothing wrong with Hopkins being selective at his age, he earned it.

 

I agree fully. I just don't think we can even say he was all that selective considering who he DID fight after turning 40.

 

I believe I did say you're mentally ret@rded and possibly physically too and here you further prove my point. So Pascal is a limited joke while Dawson(who Hopkins didn't want to fight but somehow managed to fight twice) isn't a joke?. Do you even know that Pascal handed Dawson his first loss?.

Yeah, all his opponents were joke opponents that a proven ret@rd like you knew about it all along. Yet somehow we the Boxing world seriously required losers like you to come along and inform us when Hopkins was a massive underdog in almost all of his big fights. For some reason, you were busy delivering pizzas and lacked the time to come along and spread the knowledge.

 

I learned a long time ago not to get in a spraying contest with a skunk. You obviously have some issues, SCAR(lol) and I hope you can work through them.