Joe Calzaghe cheesed his way to "greatness"

Super flyweight? He really would be the goat if he'd started from there lol

 

You got me. I meant super featherweight.

 

SMW shouldn't exist from a competitive standpoint, didn't exist prior to the 1980s and most guys don't spend much time there before moving up. So not a lot of competition there

 

And yet it's given us Calzaghe, Andre Ward, Steve Collins, Chris Eubank, Nigel Benn, Gerald Mclellan, Sven Ottke (I said it!), Carl Froch, Mikkel Kessler, Lucian Butte, Robin Reid, Lindell Homes...with any number or Roy Jones, Terrance Crawford, Sugar Ray Leonard, James Toney, and Canelo Alvarez types stopping in to join the fun.

Pretty cracking division, on the balance.

 

This forum is as it was when we joined. And there is something comforting to that, Slyk. The more different they are the more the same they have remained.

 

It's true.
The Kessler win was impressive. Every other big name seems old.
I think Froch may have walked through him like Bute, who had more power, and got the TKO.
But Kovalev absolutely destroys him, slaps versus laser-guided bombs, I don't see how that's going to work out for the Italian.
I think what also annoys people about 'Joe' is the ego, pretending he'd just have beaten everyone

 

Most of these guys owe their reputations to proliferation of belts and added divisions that make it easier to avoid fighting the best.
With one belt rather than 4 and no super middleweight division its much harder to rack up championships and title defenses without actually facing the best.

A Calzaghe fighting at light heavyweight in a one belt era is not going to rack up 19 title defenses and might not ever become champ to begin with.

 

Another butthurt RJJ fan who is salty about the spanking Joe gave him.

 

According to this forum Jeff Lacy was going to obliterate Calzaghe. Instead, Lacy lost every second of every round and Calzaghe literally ended his career. Calzaghe could fight and let’s not forget he wasn’t trained by an experienced trainer he was trained by his father who was a boxing novice when he started. 99.5% of fighters don’t accomplish anything close to what Calzaghe did and certainly not under his circumstances.

 

I was not a fan of the sport when this fight happened, but in hindsight its crazy how much people favored Lacy, and I am not saying this because of the outcome of the fight. I guess people simply ignored Lacy´s fight with Omar Sheika.

And you are right about Calzaghe and his accomplishments. IMO, his WBO title reign is BS because the WBO did not matter at the time, however, its not really any different from holding the EBU title in comparison. Regardless, most guys couldn't even hold onto the WBO for as long as Calzaghe did. And of course Calzaghe did cement his position as the best at 168, eventually, and the cherry on top were his two fights at 175.

Oh, and Calzaghe´s BS title reign did start off against a few world class opponents, so there is also that. Its not like he beat bums to get that belt.

 

Calzaghe beat 10 world champions.

 

You miss spelled Andre Ward.

 

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Both Wilder and Ortiz admitted to ducking AJ tho, lol. And Fury's fight was signed but Wilder won the arbitration. Also, AJ beat guys who were better than Ortiz, so he doesn't fit the bill here.

 

Problem with bashing Calzaghe is so many miss the earlier part of his career.
Beats a tough if faded Eubank for title in a grueling fight. Joe is 22-0 at this point.
Faced Robin Reid won a close one against a stylish powerfuk opponent.
Some filler follows.
Beats a good technical fighter in Woodhall
Destroys Mario Veit. He's rarely given any credit for this. Veits problem was a very European upright style but he was an excellent fighter. 30-0 when Joe beat him and would go on to hand Brahmer - himself a very good boxer his first defeat.
Then to be fair this is where it goes a bit wrong there a real dearth of quality in his list of wins. So people criticize, correctly to a point that he was over rated.
BUT Lacy unbeaten and heavily backed and Joe delivers one of the biggest schoolings you've ever seen. A pro of 21 fights with nearly as many KO's was predicted to hammer Calzaghe. It was a complete beatdown from minute 1.
Then an easy win VS a TV guy and then the Kessler epic. Another unbeaten inform fighter 39-0 and Calazghe rallies late hurts Kessler and takes the win.
Beats Hopkins and ATG a scruffy ugly fight but Joe's volume carrys the day. An excellent win against someone who yeah he was older but he beaten excellent fights for years after this. He just couldn't live with the pace Joe set.
Then RJJ both past their best. Joe up out of his regular division is starting to hit the canvas but too much speed and stamina and he batter Jones around the ring.

Did he miss out of some big fights - sure I would have liked to have seen in him with Sven Ottke (Joe stops him) and Jones and Toney would have been fun. For what it's worth I think he always gives RJJ problems. I think he would have ripped Pavlik a new one as well.

Calzaghe was an excellent fighter, sure there was a bit too much filler in the middle part of his career but plenty of quality at the beginning and end. After 46 fights he'd been in numerous title fights, unifications fights, come of the deck to win. KO'd 32 guys won some fights he wasn't meant to. So yeah other than fighting everyone which few boxers do. Not a lot more he could add to become great.