Joe Calzaghe "The International Untouchable"

reid was a quality operator olympic medalist and world champion not the best but certainly not the worst

 

I agree, but we are talking about legacy enhancing fights and Reid & Woodhall aint in that bracket

 

agreed

 

the trouble with the reid fight is that, although reid was a quality opponent for a world title defence, it wasn't a great win over him at all, more a lucky draw than anything.

but I wont take anything away from joe regarding that, since its one of his few really sincere defences.

 

Look Calzaghe won one of the main 4 belts at 25 end of. This was already a highly regarded belt fought for by Eubank, Collins, Benn etc. As for Eubank being shot give me a break, he said himself that he was in great shape and he was very unlucky not to win a belt in his next 2 fights. He was no more shot than Kessler was in the rematch with Froch.

 

Wait so Reid and Woodhall aren't great wins but Dirrell and Abraham are? Also I have seen you saying Bika isn't a great win because he had only had 1 supermiddle fight well what about the shot Taylor Froch fought he'd only had 1 at the weight. You're Herol Gee's alt anyway sad act.

 

sorry mate, it was hot in the british isles because of british tv showing this trios fights (plus Watson), but it didn't go much beyond that. wbo was then the wbu of the last few years (and hell I only just heard of the wbu).


Eubank was clearly not interested in rewinning the wbo title when he faced joe. joe was pretty much a dead cert to win that fight, which can never be a great win. But nevertheless he was a game and willing to get stuck in, so its a fair win.

 

no one is denying dirrell is a close win that could have gone either way and Abraham isn't elite. but its superfluous to suggest that woodhall wasn't planning his retirement when he got an offer from joe for their fight, neither dirrell nor Abraham are close to retirement even years later today.

its a pretty good win IMHO, whih I've said on many occasion including here - which puts a sock in your alt theory. sorry mate.

 

calzaghe was a superb boxer but in my opinion not the greatest ever, don't get me wrong I loved watching him his workrate was insane and he had a great style but I don't think he would of beaten the eubank that stopped benn or the benn that beat mccellan. superb without doubt but not the greatest

 

It was the main 3 (WBA, WBC and IBF) when Calzaghe won his title, you didn't need the WBO back then to become lineal champion.

 

WBO is one of the main 4 belts simple as that. These 4 sanctioning bodies WBO, WBC, IBF, WBA are all recignized by each other, if you hold one of these you cannot bd rated by the rest. Calzaghe held all 4 of these at one point or another and this is proper versions unlike the WBA regular.

 

:rofl if i say i am an alt will it make you feel better :-(
and as for bika other than bayer who the f u c k had he fought how did he get the shot at joe with one fight at the weight , never owning a title and coming off a draw in just his second fight :think
show bika to be a great at the time and i will give you the benefit of doubt problem is you cant take a look , bika abraham is very close imo only difference is one is a two weight champ the other is not
and i must of missed the wbo belt around most who unified divisions in the 90's i remember tyson , lennox to name a few , f u c k even jones did not want that shi t untill he became shot abit like now as he as the wbu all classed as unified with out the f w a n k organisation it did not become mainstream early 00

 

Yes, it is now, but it wasn't then, you didn't need the WBO to become lineal Champion, this is a fact.

 

Joes mothers welsh ,his dad's Italian he was just born in hammer smith hospital when his mother was working in London ,spent all his life living in Wales representing Wales in every level .So how does that make him English nobhead!

 

you seem to be having trouble differentiating the past from today.

it was a good effort by joe towards the end to very briefly partially unify - though he never held them together, it was wbo plus ibf for one fight, then wbo plus wbc/wba but for no actual fights. all else were wbo defences.

you cant knock it though, even partially unifying is a sterling effort for someone unknown in the boxing world at large.