Where will Hopkins rank All time if he beats Calzaghe?

A Hopkins win over Calzaghe - if it will be dominant and/or ending in a TKO/KO - could turn out to be the Oldman's most impressive victory of his long career, ranked higher than his masterpiece against Tito or his very valuable wins over Johnson, DLH, Tarver and Wright. You could have an argument that Tito came from WW (but I consider this as a ridiculous excuse because he looked to be stronger than ever against Joppy and the only other fighter who defeated him was a LMW Wright), DLH and WW came from lower classes, Johnson wasn’t a great name at the time they fought, Tarver was over hyped and other endless sh*t) but in Calzaghe there’s a seemingly untouchable, super fast, at-his-best, never-beaten-as-a-pro, very skilled fighter who is a legitimate P4P#2/3, bigger than Hopkins (BHop is a natural MW, JC is a natural SMW) and probably will be the favorite at fight night.

A win would move up Hopkins a few good places, a Tarver-Wright-Calzaghe all p4p winning stake at his 40+ career would be a uniquely strong effort to climb up to the 25 or near the 25.



On the other hand, Calzaghe’s fresh top100 ATG status with a convincing/dominating victory over Bernard would rocket him into or near to the top50 IMO. The domination in his class, the way of wins (and no losses, no close fights at all except maybe the one against Reid), the defeated names (Eubank and Kessler are the biggest and the good wins over Reid, Lacy, Mitchell ect.) is good for him to be in right now, but a win over a true boxing icon, at 40+ still very good and skilled Hopkins in a whole new weight class would be a very impressive achievement. It would be so good that another win against an over-the-top Roy/Tito winner would be just another good name on his record nothing else – Calzaghe needs Hopkins' scalp like hell for the (near) top50 status and needs nobody else's.

And you know, depending on his dominance in the fight (even Roy couldn't dominate the very green BH, it was a clear but though 12 round fight), Joe could finish his career in the top50.



People should realize that this is a very important fight for boxing history. At worst we’ll have a less-exciting-than-expected fight between two legends (not too many fights of Calzaghe were ever unexciting) but there will be still a lot of talks about this match-up in the coming years. It's like Jones-Toney, Calzaghe-Kessler, Holyfield-Bowe, Marquez-Vazquez etc.

I predict a Calzaghe UD win, impressive fashion with a pretty good effort from Hopkins not allowing Joe to make it one-sided. But speed and punch output wins this one, baby!

 

I have a top 4 set in stone, but after that, I mix up the rest and can't find a secure spot for any of them...

1. Robinson
2. Greb
3. Armstrong
4. Ali

Competing for the Next 6 Slots
Louis
Langford
Charles
B Leonard
Duran
Pep
SR Leonard
Whitaker
Gans
Walker
Moore

 

i'm not gonna quote bigbone's post, cause it's too long. anyway, i'm not convinced that this is all that "important" a fight for boxing.

 

Lets be serious. old timer Hopkins won't beat Big Joe. Calzaghe is taking this fight because their noting dangerous about it !

 

For the history books, this is one of the most important match-ups of the last decade. Of course there's no "this fight will save boxing" issues here. It's "just" an important fight between two legends, and just one of the most important in years. No past-their-prime battle like Tito-Roy, not an overhyped matchup like Mayweather-De La Hoya. It's P4P 2nd vs. 3rd or 3rd vs. 4th if you like it.

 

Of course defeating Joe would make him the finest boxer this planet has ever seen but that can't happen because he's in fact fighting the finest boxer this planet has ever seen.

That would be a paradox.

 

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