Joe Calzaghes win over Hopkins

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Yes Calzaghe's win over Hopkins has got better over time due to Hopkins previous and continued success, Hopkins went into the fight having beaten Tarver and Wright and then after losing to Calzaghe Hopkins went onto beat Pavlik, Jones and Pascal .

Calzaghe was closer to retirement than Hopkins when they fought, neither was young when they fought, Hopkins was the older man in age but Calzaghe was more shop worn and nearer the end than Hopkins was as Calzaghe had had an active amateur career and had been the one to beat from a very young age, a young schoolboy infact.

Hopkins had everything in his favour, home advantage, American judges, an American ref, Calzaghe fighting in the States for the first time, Calzaghe making his debut at the weight, but all the same Calzaghe won a clear decision 116-111 and 115-112 on two of the judges scorecards, infact not only did Calzaghe throw more punches than Hopkins in the fight, Calzaghe threw more punches and landed more punches in every single round of the entire fight, considering Calzaghe was lacking motivation for the first time in his career and his hands problems werent getting any better, it underlines that Hopkins would never have beaten Calzaghe at any stage of their careers, in fact Calzaghe would have won by beatdown or stoppage earlier in their careers if they had fought.

Since the win by Calzaghe over Hopkins was so clear in the circumstances {fighting away, near retirement, new weight etc}, and Hopkins career has continued succesfully, this has added to Calzaghe's legacy and of course we dont know if Kessler is totally finished yet, Kessler did regain his super middleweight title after losing to Calzaghe, Kessler defended it a couple of times then lost it away to Ward some people thought that Ward had repeatedly fouled him and Kessler then won another version of the world title by beating Froch, so although Calzaghe has retired two of his better wins {and clear wins imo} are still active and in the main are still winning titles, so Calzaghe's resume is still improving, as an early poster said you cant really judge a boxers career until years after he has retired, i think i mentioned on here in the past that you cant really evaluate a boxer until 10 years after he has retired, Joe hasnt fought for 3 years to date.