Most impressive run: Hopkins, RJJ or Wlad?

Of course he missed guys. Which is why he moved up to LHW. He found that he couldn't unify with Benn or Liles, due to politics. Bernard was in the same situation at MW. But the difference is, Bernard was willing to sit on his IBF title for 6 years, fighting whoever was put in front of him, whereas Roy moved up to take on another challenge. Roy could have stayed at SMW and defended his IBF title for years.

People like title reigns. They like it when guys make history. They like the statistics. But the truth is, Bernard's 'legendary' MW reign was through a lack of ambition. It was similar to Calzaghe's SMW reign. Roy may have missed lots of fights, but he was far more ambitious.

 

When I analyse a win, I take into account all of the factors.

Yes, size can also be a disadvantage depending on who your opponent is and how they match up with you stylistically. But in Wlad and Bernard's case, their size gave them big advantages. And that has to be factored in. Bernard was 6'1 with a 75" reach. He was naturally bigger than most of the guys he fought. And given that most of his opponents weren't elite fighters, it gave him significant advantages.

It's not really a case of holding it against someone.

 

Correct. And in my opinion it's not really that impressive. Racking up those defences at MW was obviously much easier than trying to fight the better guys at the above weights. Which is why he had no intentions of rematching Roy in 2002.

 

He couldn't fight anyone.

That's simply not true.

 

Vlad had the best run but to his advantage Vitali picked off a few sharing the title-Hopkins picked his spots and he had a very weak middleweight division when he ruled not at all like Hagler in the 80's or Robinson ever. Jones was also good but there were a few fighters like Darius M and Calzage and McCallum & Collins that I wish he would have fought prime but Jones is higher than Hopkins close with Vlad

 

I know they were obviously in the same weight class. But when I rate a win, I consider every possible factor. I mark guys up and down depending on the circumstances.

What I analyse is the degree of difficulty.

I'll give you an example using Wlad's win over Povetkin and Roy's win over Tarver.

In my honest opinion, I rate the Tarver win higher. And that's because beating Tarver was much harder for Roy, than what beating Povetkin was for Wlad. It was a bigger challenge.

Wlad had huge physical advantages over Povetkin, yet he fought in a very ugly and cautious manner, with lots of holding. So in my opinion, that isn't overly impressive to me. He just did the bare minimum to get by.

Roy took on the bigger challenge stylistically, as Tarver was a rangy southpaw. But more importantly, Roy had to burn muscle just to make the weight. He was physically depleted. He was absolutely exhausted in the last 3rd of the fight.

Now if Roy had beaten Tarver on points earlier in his career whilst being at his best, then I wouldn't rate the win as highly as what I do. It's the exceptional circumstances as to why I rate it as highly as I do.

I also rate the win over Hill highly. But I obviously would have rated it even higher if Roy had knocked out a prime version.

I hope I've made things clear for you.

 

Bokaj,

He'd got an easier ride at MW. He was facing naturally smaller guys in a pretty weak division. He also had the IBF title for 6 years due to politics. But many other guys in that situation would have moved up for another challenge. He didn't. Yes, he made the weight. But he doesn't get huge props for me for fighting the Allen's of the world, when there was Roy, Dariusz, Liles, Hill, Toney and Griffin etc all within his grasp.

Bernard was clearly to blame. His biggest purse was against Tito at $2.5m, and most of his pay days were in the region of $1m. Roy held a win over him and he was willing to drop back down to SMW for a fair C-W. HBO's execs and Roy's advisors met with Bernard on a few occasions. They proposed a deal where Roy would have made $8m, and Bernard would have made $6m. But Bernard refused to even entertain the idea unless he was paid $10m. And he wouldn't budge. He then had a year out before fighting Morrade Hakkar for $1.3m.

Bernard was no legend. He was very calculated.

Although he gets huge props for facing guys like Kovalev at an advanced age, he'd never have taken those types of challenges earlier on his career. He only left MW when there was nowhere else for him to go after successive defeats against Taylor. And at that point, he'd secured his legacy at MW. Which meant that he was in a position where he had nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Of course. But he didn't want to risk it.

 

No worries we will have to agree to disagree. I can't comprehend how someone fighting people in a weight division (certainly one below heavyweight) can have size and reach advantages factored in against them. Tens of thousands have overcome height and reach disadvantages. It comes back to how good you are. We may as well be holding power or speed advantages against someone e.g. Roy was super quick and most opponents far far slower so lets dial those wins way down. He also had big power, more than almost all his opponents so factor that in against him as well and his wins aren't impressive whatsoever.

 

I would say Roy #1 because his run saw him move up to HW to win a belt.
Popkins second because he beat guys rated on the P4P list.
Wlad last because of the constant cheating tactics used during his run against sub-par opponents. The best win he holds could easily be a DQ loss.

 

But he wasn't at 168 which is my point .. He was there for 2 years. He had plenty of time. I wouldn't describe him missing guys as being just "politics" .. His lucrative contract was there .. He got his guarantee plus % of the gate and % of ppv's… For example, I mean why does Vinny get paid well over a million and Nunn get low balled so bad , only $125,000, knowing that is impossible to take a fight for that.... This fight made perfect sense for Roy. And he probably wins it. It is a way bigger draw than the rest thus Roy makes a lot more money.. This is the fight we all wanted to see.. right? I just think if Roy was far more ambitious as you say, he would have taken on the better guys to prove he was the best … His resume just doesn't do that for me

 

Bokaj,

He made incredible sacrifices in order to fight in a weak division.

He won Roy's old belt against Mercado, yet due to politics he couldn't fight the other champs. Of course, that wasn't his fault. But again, many other guys who found themselves in that position moved up for new challenges.

Roy beat Toney for the IBF title at SMW, but he couldn't unify with Benn or Liles. So he was left with 2 choices:

1. Keep the belt until the landscape changed.

2. Relinquish the belt and move up.

He could have done what Bernard did and hung on to to his belt, fighting easy mandos, racking up numerous defences in what could have been a reign that went into double figures. There'd have been nobody to stop him. Because he couldn't make a fight with Liles and Calzaghe wouldn't have fought him. But he moved up and fought McCallum. He then fought Griffin who'd had 2 close fights with Toney, whilst also setting his sights on Hill. Fighting guys like Griffin and Hill, was much better than fighting IBF mandos at SMW. But what happens, is that people criticise Roy for only fighting at SMW for just 2 years, whilst at the same time, they praise Bernard for his supposedly great MW reign. It's absolutely bizarre.

No, I don't.

There was no SMW division back then, and Marvin was a 5'9 MW who used to weigh-in at 157 pounds back in the days of same day weigh-ins. Spinks was a monster. Whereas Bernard was naturally much bigger than Marvin, and he'd already had numerous fights above MW in the early part of his career. Also, a lot of the guys at LHW were other former MW's and SMW's who'd moved up. So the circumstances were completely different.

I agree. But we're looking at who he fought at MW instead.

He has similarities with Calzaghe's career.

Both of them made huge sacrifices in order to dominate weak divisions, instead of trying to target better opposition at the weights above.

The reason that they both did that is abundantly clear to me.

No. Dariusz was just used to illustrate my point in that Bernard should have been in the mix with the likes of him, instead of being happy to fight whoever the IBF lined up at MW.

Of course. But Roy could make $4-5m a fight at that point, whilst Bernard was making around $1m for most of his.

Like I've mentioned to Philly, I've no issue with where Bernard wanted huge money to fight Roy. But demanding $10m wasn't a negotiating tactic in order to gain the best deal for himself. It was obviously done because he didn't want to fight Roy. That should be obvious to anybody.

This is why he's not a legend to me. He swerved the fight in 2002 when Roy was still great, but yet he was happy to fight him when he was finished years later. And that's what Calzaghe did too. Roy was right when he called Bernard a bottom feeder.

Again, different circumstances.

Bernard liked to be the big fish in the small pond.