ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. When Roy Jones jnr and Bernard Hopkins held titles and were in their prime they felt fighting Joe Calzaghe was high risk for low reward. Calzaghe was eager to step up and fight the big money fights, but Jones and Hopkins denied Calzaghe that chance. I do not blame a prime Jones and Hopkins one bit, if they had fought a prime Calzaghe they would have been taking a big risk ?, instead they choose to fight lesser boxers for possibly more money, thats good boxing busuiness. I must say that a lot of people think that a prime Jones and Hopkins would have beaten a prime Calzaghe ? { i personally think Calzaghe would have won because he has an x-factor, he is a champion performer in every sense, who will always find a way to win} Eventually Jones and Hopkins started to lose, Calzaghe continued winning, cleaning up a division and remaining unbeaten, all of a sudden Jones and Hopkins needed Calzaghe, Calzaghe was only to happy to take both fights. Its ironic that Jones and Hopkiins refused to fight Calzaghe in their hayday when they may have won, and then chased him/gladly agreed to fight him at the end of their careers only to lose, doing nothing for their legacy and greatly boosting Calzaghes legacy ? Jones and Hopkins only have themselves to blame !
no matter how you put it Calzaghe fought both past their prime, Roy way past his prime, When Jones was 35 and Hopkins 36 they were at their best Roy moving up to heavy and beating Ruis, Hopkins beat Trinidad, Now Clazaghe is 36 the same age they were back then, and he beats them after both are coming off 3 losses in their last 5 fights. Come on dude, seriously ! Its all to clear for people to be having so many arguements.
Good point from the original poster. Far too many so called 'fans' on here do NOT understand the business of boxing. As an aside, I would say that Calzaghe's peak was around the Mitchell fight, which was years ago
It's a good point, Hopkins was offered a fight with JC and decdided against it as he was happy in his comfort zone at 160. RJJ was quite content fighting a bunch of stiffs at 175 for years too. Calzaghe could have done more to force that fight by moving up a lot sooner and getting himself an eliminator for one of Jones' belts, but i think that all this nonsense from some about Calzaghe being the one doing the avoiding completely misunderstands what actually went on.
I agre with one thing in this thread. All three had their primes around 35 year old. There was an article recently saying that boxing fan's concept of prime lacks behind the reality in life expectancy and health. We live much longer na dwe remain younger much longer these days and 35 fits well with what the article said.
I didn't say it was Roy's fault at all, and i also said that Calzaghe should have moved up a lot sooner in order to try and force the fight. But i agree, i think it suited all three of them to dominate comparatively weak divisions for a long time without taking too many risks.
cal could have always fought other people to make a name for himself in america and everyone would have to take notice. I have always heard about him but never saw him until the kessler fight. so it's ok to clean up robotic europe and then come to the states after the fact and say i beat legends even if they are old and past there time. not cool
Who could he have fought? There was hardly a long list of top US fighters just waiting for him to come over and fight.
Slappy cherrypicked his entire career, outside of Lacy and Kessler, his other wins were easily predictable. Calslappy= ATG CHERRY PICKER....:rofl :-(