RJJ v Calzaghe

I've seen some pretty full on hooligan dvd's. It's so crazy over there.
Theres nothing like it here in Australia. Very rarely are there fights at games.

Have you seen the quality of the Aussie league?
M€any managers here say it's similar to the championship in terms of quality, but I'd say it's somewhere inbetween division 2, and 1.

 

Man, I'm sick of everyone claiming Calzaghe has a light resume.

Not long ago I started asking in a thread in the general forum exactly who Hopkins beat to become the legend he was at MW. The immediate response from all the US based posters who believe they are so inbiased and knowledgable was in the vein of "STFU B-Hop = LEGEND, he KOs Calzaghe 1"

And I got the usual boxrec recitation of the big names on his resume - Trinidad, DLH, Johnson, Echols, Holmes, Joppy, etc.

Not a bad list of names, pretty solid, but I pointed out that Trinidad was a blown up welter, DLH was a blown up JMW, Johnson and Joppy were gatekeepers (Johnson a better one than Joppy) and Echols was a contender at best. I also asked how many of Hopkins opponents actually held a world title at the time he fought them, and what were the circumstances in which they won their title (was the title vacant when they fought for it, who was their opponent, etc.)

They hit the ****ing roof, called me everything under the sun short of "heretic" and accusing me of sacrilege, but not one of them could answer my questions satisfactorily.

These are the same posters who contuinually bag Calzaghe's resume, when he has plenty of ex-champs and big names on it, the only difference is that these names aren't predominantly American, therefore these posters aren't familiar with them, therefore they don't place any value in them.

It's a joke man, Calzaghe is as good a fighter, in fact better, than many of the US 'legends' but is being given zero credit because these nancy boy yank-a-tanks can't accept that their tough black ex-con homeboy ghetto king boxers can't beat him.

 

It did get pretty nuts back in the day , lots of firms doing battle every week , i luckily settled down reletivley young but still laughed when i took the wife to watch Robison v Hamed and ran into the entire "Soul crew " Steveo got parked up but we had a mental night . I caught that Bridges kids goal the other day , Feking brammer mate if thats the standard its hard to argue against it being championship level ..

 

I'm not saying Calzaghe's resume is terrible, but imo it did have a very lean period through the middle years.

I was critical of him years ago, but have taken a liking to him since the Lacy and especially since the Kessler fight.
His last few years have been superb.

 

That was a good goal, but overall, it's nowhere near the Championship in quality. I'd like it to be, but it isn't.

Nicky Carle was player of the league 2 years ago, and now he's struggling to fit in the championship, with many Palace fans saying he's a waste of money.
A team like Leeds would win the comp if they were in the A-League.

Still, it's a young league, and it appears to be on the way up. :good

 

****ing brilliant post Mutt , I bet Bernie took a bit of **** back in "DA OOD" after getting done by a skinny white boy who slaps ,as punishment he probably had to wear a belt around his jeans for a week and not say SUP

 

Hopkins wouldn't have gone near him at that point in time. You don't just land a big fight, you need to get wins on the board.

 

Thornberry was WBO mandatory.

 

Maybe he was, but theres still many other poor voluntary fights he's made.
Even the Bika fight which was after the Lacy fight was a poor choice at the time. It wasn't until that fight and afterwards that Bika actually made waves.
Beyer was even laughed at when he picked Bika.

I just fail to see why he abandoned the US completely and went back to fighting Ashira's ect in the UK after Hopkins supposingly dogged out of their fight.
If he wanted to capture the American's attention, it'd have made more sense if he had searched around for some other high profile fighter, or even someone a step or two down from Hopkins.

 

Bika was laughed at by those who don't follow the sport too closely IMO. Just because people haven't seen someone fight on HBO doesn't mean they can't (and I'm not directing that at you at all, Pecks). Ashira was a dud, but Lacy was signed and sealed by then. An easy pay day and not much else. Calzaghe was stuck between a rock and a hard place in the negotiation side of things. He needed a break out opponent and struggled to get one. His win against Eubank is completely underrated. Eubank went on to give Carl Thompson two absolutely brutal wars.

 

I agree that Bika was underestimated by the public, I also think that Joe and his team underestimated him too when selecting him.
Fair enough re Ashira, as he had the Lacy fight already signed. But prior to that, his resume is fairly average, and it's hard to imagine that none of it is from Joe's doing.

 

The A-League aint even close to championship level.
Its more like Coca-Cola Division 2 level bordering on the Conference Leagues.
I would back some well drilled tactical Conference teams to knock off the Glory & Pheonix especially very easily.

 

Mate it's better than conference leagues, of course there wld be sides in conference leagues that wld beat Glory etc What about a conference side a few years back held Man U (obviously not full strength) 0-0 draw in FA cup.

I'd say League 2, and some of our better sides could hang with League 1 etc

 

Yeah, but I think you consider it lean during that period because perhaps many of his opponents are unfamiliar to you.

Taking a look at his resume, after beating Eubank for the title, he fought 17 times before facing Lacy, and 8 of his opponents were ex-champs or title contenders - Robin Reid^, Rick Thornberry^, David Starie^, Omar Sheika*, Richie Woodhall^, Charles Brewer*, Byron Mitchell*, Kabery Salem*.

^ = non-US opponents (mainly British) therefore little US recognition

* = US opponents, who are now called bums and over-rated by the US posters I'm talking about. However, at the time they fought Calzaghe they were either mandatories or were considered at the top of the SMW rankings - Sheika, Brewer, Mitchell for example.

Then he fought Lacy, who was touted as the next big thing, the SMW Mike Tyson, he was going to KO Calzaghe in 2 rds, etc. Look at how he is viewed now - an over-rated never-was. As we know Calzaghe absolutely whipped him, and he has never been the same since. However, the US fans I refer to refuse to acknowledge the whipping Calzaghe put on Lacy is what killed his career - they would rather pretend that they never rated Lacy, and call him over-rated now. These same guys however, still rate Pavlik, after Hopkins shut him out for 12 rounds.

After Lacy he faced Bika, who has, funnily enough, become liked in the US from his performance on the Contender! Now we all know he's not the most technical of fighters, but he's a tough customer. However, the yanks love him because he won the Contender and gave Calzaghe a difficult fight

After Bika was Manfredo, which was a blatant attempt to gain a profile in the US and get some momentum going from his win over Lacy.

Then there was his win over Kessler, and the yanks are all now claiming Kessler is an over-rated, protected Euro-bum But he was the greatest thing since sliced bread when he beat Andrade, because they actually saw him in action! I reckon most of those dicks haven't even seen the Kessler fight, you can tell by the way they never talk in detail about it, and instead write Kessler off as over-rated.

Finally, there was Hopkins, in an ugly, spoiling fight. Calzaghe won it, and all the US posters are in a bind now - they can't claim Hopkins is over-rated, because he's their God! So instead, they look for any possible excuse to take away from Calzaghe's win - split decision, B-Hops was robbed, B-Hops didn't take Calzaghe seriously, etc. NEVER ONCE do they acknowledge that Hopkins couldn't fight his normal fight because Calzaghe was simply too good for him. Especially since Hopkins beat Pavlik, now they're saying if Calzaghe and Hopkins fought again, Hopkins would KO him, because Hopkins said after the Pavlik fight he had decided to go for the KO from now on!!

These guys have started to learn a bit from their mistakes now, which is why some are claiming RJJ is completely shot, and Calzaghe ducked him and Hopkins in their primes, while others are still hopeful and praying that RJJ KOs Calzaghe. If Calzaghe wins this weekend, it'll just be more of the same.

I agree with Calzaghe when he says he doesn't have to prove anything to anyone but hinslef, and he's happy with what he's achieved in his career.

It all comes down to how you look at it.

 

For sure mate, all that false pride meant he couldn't just wear the loss, he had to ***** and moan and make a lot of noise about it so his peeps wouldn't think he was simply accepting Calzaghe beat him.