there was a documentary called "no average Joe" which was the story of jope calzaghe with some celebs. eubank and benn were on it (did you know they are pretty good friends now:blood ) eubank said some stuff about he does slap but has steel on the palm of his hands. best quote from eubank was when the interviewer said "what was your first recolections of calzaghe" eubanks response "it was the first round and i was on my back" anyways they went to benn and they talked about who would of one if allt he brit middlewiegths were put together in a round robin. now nigel didnt say calzaghe would beat him but..."possibly so" that was his answer "possibly so" he does have him in high regard, especially how nigel laughes at how it ..."took me years to put chris on his behind...and it takes joe 30 seconds in the first time out" but never said "joe would beat me" i think the super middlewieght nigel benn was far more skilled and technically effeienct. at middelwieght he was a bomber/destroyer but at super middlewieght he totally changed his fight plan, using shoudler rolls and a nice jab and counters. i have always felt benn beat eubank pretty easily. eubank was on th eoutside but benn ocountered the counterpuncher...great performance sadly it was a dud of a fight. michael nunn was gettign promoted in england so he could have a shot at beatign the unified champion. a reaosn why he fougth little in london and lost!!!! tyson ko 1
I agree, i was just pointing out that the reason Joe responed how he did was that - He was sick and tired of listening to people going on about eubank being shot ect... I actually think joe would beat all of them
Yeah it was great that was'nt it? I ****in love Nigel Benn. Total monster and responsible for one the greatest fights OF ALL TIME, when he fought G man. True warrior.
Interesting. I give him a chance of a stoppage of course, but it's not that sizeable of a chance (I'm a 'Nige fan, by the way). Calzaghe holds most of the aces here and is a better fighter than the Eubank Benn faced. Over 12 rounds probably something like 7-4-1.
Benn came from a generation where SMW was mainly of British interest. It was a new division and did not yet have a lot of international interest. Today the competition is totally different and comes from all corners of the globe. Calzaghe is on an entirely dofferent class than Benn.
That simply is not true, saying Benns level of competition was poor compaired to Joe. Benn fought superior fighters to joe! By all means state that Calzaghe has a stylistic advantage or even a better boxer but he certainly didn't face better opposition, and that Benns opposition relative to that was weak. In Mccllellan Benn beat a prime P4P top ten guy something Calzaghe has never done. Benn went to the states to take on some of the top men in there prime.
for some comparison imagine benn vs kessler&calzaghe vs mclellan although both those guys pose different stylistic problems to nigel&joe than they do to each other,it could be a good gauge of how they'd do against each other
Calzaghe by UD. If Benn could drag Calzaghe into his type of fight (and Benn was a master at this) like Duran did to Leonard in the Brawl In Montreal, then Benn would definitely have a good chance of a KO win. But I think Calzaghe would be very aware that Benn would outgun him in a brawl, and so would fight intelligently, on the move and at pace. Benn would find Calzaghe's handspeed difficult to defend against and would be marked up by the end. Benn would probably hurt Calzaghe a couple of times when they got close, which would force Calzaghe to box and move even more, if he got tempted to go toe-to-toe at any stage. I think it'd be a great fight, with Calzaghe the deserving winner on points- but only if he makes sure he never gets drawn in by Benn's macho demands for a scrap and boxes intelligently.
my thoughts are similar,i just think the deciding factor would be how joe copes with nigels speed¬ the other way round,benn was deceivingly fast,he just exploded.
Yep, that seems like a fair assessment. As pointed out above though, Benn did have a bit of speed himself. Joes increasing adopted cuffing style, later in his career, scores him a lot of points. I think that version, an older one of Calzaghe, perhaps fairs better; then a younger "prime" one, and gets a UD. Doing so by outboxing Benn in a more intelligent manner rather then getting drawn in to Benns game.
Prime for Prime Calzaghe would outbox Benn and stop him late on. Benn has admitted this himself. Benn was great but his only chance would be to stop Calzaghe early but Joe would be too clever for him I'm sure.