Hopkins Overated?

Pascal kicked Dawson's ass and put Hopkins on the canvas a couple of times. Give the guy some respect.

 

And you're from Montreal. I give him credit but it doesnt boost Hopkins legacy into some new galaxy of greatness thats all Im saying. I also know Dawson was having some personal issues around the time they fought not to make excuses for him. Pascal is a good fighter, not great but good.

 

lol don't hide his lose with some personal issues. When Cus D'Amato died, Tyson destroyed the champ Trevor Berbick in 2 rounds + sexual infection + 3 of his girlfriends sitting ring side

 

Wouldn´t call him overrated, especially here in Classic he isn´t......

 

Hopkins could hang in well in any era.

 

Always thought Hopkins was overrated. Think guys like Emile Griffith and Dick Tiger take him to school. His longevity is amazing, but beating a bunch of lousy fighters does not make you an all time great

 

There's not much footage of many of these fighters, so it's hard to say for certain. But neither Zale or Graziano impresses me much from their fights, and I think he would beat both easily. He also has no problems with the LaMotta of the last Robinson fight. Both Zale and LaMotta were past their primes in these fights, though. Cerdan of the Zale fight gives him a tougher fight, I think. But still, I can't really see any advantages Cerdan has here.

But Hopkins never came in at 160 on fight night as far as I know, so these match-ups aren't really fair.

Of the LHWs I've seen, I think he beats Maxim, but Moore and Charles are different propositions altogether. Haven't seen Charles at LHW, though. But not greatly impressed by him as a HW. HW Charles resembles LHW Hopkins in the way that most of his fights seem to be about clinching.

The MWs I mentioned above are much less impressive than the generation of MWs just preceding Hopkins, so those are a more interesting comparison in my eys. We also have much more footage of them.

 

put him in that era and i reckon he becomes another murderers row member, making him harder to know about, and with no belt. = lower rated

 

Must admit reading this thread makes me feel less crazy. People have enough sense not to put Hopkins near the LHW top 10 but the sheer amount of people who have Hopkins in their top 5 MW's fills me with disbelief. Billy Soose, Georgie Abrams, Joey Giardello, Cocoa Kid all could have accomplished what Hopkins did if they fought in the same era.

These post are from another thread but say everything

Seriously look at the resumes of guys like Steele, Apostoli, Overlin, Yarosz which are on par, arguably better, than SRR's MW resume yet guys like this arent even mentioned when discussion the top 10 yet people have Hopkins in at 3 and 4 :fire Everyone of those fighters above belong ahead of Hopkins and comparing what he did at MW to them is embarrassing.

 

If you look through the physical measurements/statistics of Trinidad (5'11", 72 1/2" reach, weighed in at 158 1/2lbs) and Hopkins (6'1", 75" reach, weighed in at 157lbs) on the night they fought, there is only slight advantage to Hopkins - no more than a standard size disparity between any two fighters from the same weight class, and probably less than the size advantage enjoyed by guys who use the early weigh-ins to make weights that they are noticeably big at, guys like Pavlik at mw, Paul Williams at ww, Antonio Margarito at ww, De La Hoya at sfw and lw, etc etc. By those stats, Trinidad is actually a good solid size for a mw. Definitely not undersized.

Trinidad had KTFO a noticeably big (and possibly roided) Vargas for the lmw titles and annihilated Joppy, who spent his career between 160 and 168, in his last 2 fights before Hopkins.

Hopkins was a 6ft 1in guy who spent the vast vast majority of his career at 160lbs.

Pavlik was a 6ft 2 1/2in guy who spent the vast majority of his career of his career at 160lbs. Hopkins was his 2nd big fight above 160, he had won his only 1 against top opposition at the same weight he fought Hopkins at.

Antonio Tarver is 6ft 2in and has never fought lower than 175lbs in his entire career, he didn't even start at smw as a novice, he has been a fully-sized natural lhw from day one. Hopkins's world title career from 1995-2006 was spent at 160lbs. At aged 40 and coming off 2 losses, he jumped not one but two weight divisions and schooled the linear lhw champ who had comfortably UD'd Jones and Johnson in his last two.

Add to this that Hopkins also beat in his career: 6ft 2in Segundo Mercado, future lhw champ and long-time lhw fighter Glen Johnson, 5ft 11in Antwun Echols who fought for a world title at 168, 6ft 2in Keith Holmes who fought for a world title at 168, 5ft 11in Howard Eastman who also took Arthur Abraham to points.

The perception that Hopkins preyed on smaller men is false. He fought a range of the fighters available, many of whom were the same size and some who were bigger. He was a tall middleweight, that's all.

 

Hopkins did the work year round, and NEVER weighed in over 165 till the day he decided to be a 175er.

People who dismiss his wins on claims of size annoy me. The dude weighed in at 157 and 156 for some of those fights, for chrissakes. Name a single 175er alive today who could get down that low.

Hopkins lived the kind of 8% body fat life that gave him the ability to fight at middleweight comfortable. Natural middleweight, period.

 

This is such a boring theory. :dead

The guy was comfortably weighing in under the middleweight limit in his mid-late 30s, pushing 40, yet for some reason people have just decided he was actually a lightheavyweight who was forcing his body down to middle to hold some massive advantages over people.

Why WAS he always a lightheavyweight? Because he was 6ft 1in (there have been so many top mw's over the last decade as tall or taller than this)?

Or because he fought there once or twice when he was a green semi-professional fighting in small hall shows, trying to find his way in the sport?

I mean, this theory would hold some sort of credence if...

- Hopkins had been burning down to 168lbs for his whole career
or
- Hopkins had had a career of difficulty making 160lbs, killing himself to do it, missing weight, struggling, fighting while weight-drained often
or
- He had fought consistently at a decent level for a number of years at 175 after he'd become a fully-committed professional, and then burned down to 160 later after finding the lhw division tough going


But... none of these are true. Hopkins was 39 years old when he fought Oscar at a 158lbs catchweight, and he came in at 156!! For 9 fights between 1998 and 2003, when he was between 33 and 38, he never came in more than 159lbs, often in the 157-158 range...

It's a bit of a joke that this guy can be considered to have actually been a 175lbs fighter. It's harder to make weight when you're over 30, and he was making it easily pushing 40, more than ONE STONE/TWO DIVISIONS under what you're saying was natural to him!

There is no logic to this theory man! There is no evidence to suggest this! :nut

 

He would be a light heavyweight in any other era IMO, at least for most of his career.