WLAD OR HOPKINS?! who is the better fighter today???

I'm a big Hopkins fan and an admitted Wlad hater, but Wlad is an elite fighter today, Hopkins isn't. It's as simple as that.

 

Bhop...he holds more than he boxes nowadays but he is still a great defensive fighter with a solid chin,accurate right hand and is also very intelligent..Wlad is good and is better offensively than Bhop..but as an overall fighter i'll go with bhop

 

wlad b-hop is just to old

 

Excellent thread! I'll have to go with Wlad...barely

 

LHW is a weak division right now, but when Calzaghe moves up it'll have two elite fighters.. enough for one big, competitive fight.

1. Chad Dawson
2. Clinton Woods
3. Glen Johnson
4. Bernard Hopkins
5. Zsolt Erdei

Tarver is pretty much shot, Hopkins is nearly shot and will be ruined after the Calzaghe fight.

 

How do you think Hopkins would do against Zsolt Erdei?

 

Today? Not even close. Wlad.

At prime? Not even close. Bernard.

 

It would be a close fight. If I had to pick I would favor Hopkins because of how limited Erdei is and I think he would be lured into fighting Hopkins' fight more than anyone else in that top 5. But I also think that Hopkins is a lot more shot than people think he is right now. The Taylor fights said a lot about how old he was and that was a few years ago.. at 43 a fighter gets exponentially worse every year. Fights against an old Tarver and a blown up, past-it Winky don't prove a lot.. they're not what I would call very live fighters. So Erdei would have a chance to outwork Hopkins if he fought smart and didn't get into a clinchfest, slow paced old man fight.

 

Same, but Erdei is the only fighter in the top 5 that I would pick to lose against Hopkins. He looked like a shell of his old self against Winky when I rewatched it yesterday. Obviously he still had good reflexes, excellent defense, ring generalship, good timing, and technical skills, but his stamina is a concern. He was getting tired in the mid rounds and Wright definitely got his attention with a straight left hand flush on the chin. Hopkins froze in his tracks and held on. As much as I love Bernard and want him to win, I am starting to think there is a decent possibility he quits late in the fight out of exhaustion - similar to Tszyu agaist Hatton or even Freitas against Diaz, although I don't think Calzaghe will put that kind of beating on him. Calzaghe will definitely make him fight at a very fast pace, but Hopkins is so tough, cagey, and crafty, so I'm picking him to last all 12. A question that comes to mind is whether or not Hopkins had some trouble making 170. He looked more tired than I've ever seen him. Could the 175 pound weight limit serve better for his stamina, or is it age finally starting to really catch up to him?

His punches don't look as crisp or sharp as they did in the Taylor and Tarver fights. His timing has dropped significantly too. Compare him with the B-Hop of old, and it's night and day.


To answer this poll question, Wladimir...I feel he's simply performing at a higher level than Bernard.

 

Hopkins, hands down. And I'm a big fan of Wlad.

Wlad doesn't like to fight on the inside, he can't take the foe to the dogfight - cause he has to worry about his mediocre chin.

Yep, B-Hop was comletely loosing the boxing match from the outside with Winky. His speed and reflexes deteriorated significantly. But that was WINKY, not Brewster or Austin. And Hop managed to take Winky to the wrestling and pull out an ugly but still a win.

This is versatility, this is the reason why Hop is still higher in P4P rankings.

 

The stamina thing most likely has more to do with age than anything else. Hopkins is extremely tough and crafty, but I think by the time he fights Calzaghe in April he will look significantly worse than he did against Winky and it will be nearly impossible for him to last 12 rounds. I see the fight ending in rounds 8-10 when Calzaghe constantly swarms Hopkins and Bernard looks dead tired and stops responding. Either that or a bad situation where he starts getting very desperate and fouls Calzaghe multiple times, leading to a DQ. The more I think about it, the more I actually see a DQ. This will be a very tough night for Hopkins to say the least and I will not enjoy watching him get beat up at this age. Just look who he has fought in his past-prime years since DLH.. Eastman, Taylor X2, and old Winky/Tarver. In April it'll be almost a year after the Winky fight and he's going to be up against arguably the best fighter in the world, who is 100% motivated and focused to put on the performance of his lifetime and will without a doubt be going for a stoppage win, not a safe victory.

You don't even need to compare the 2008 version of Hopkins to a prime Hopkins. Compare him to a 2004 Hopkins and there are huge differences. I'm very confident Hopkins will be stopped and after this fight he won't even be able to compete with Erdei level fighters.

 

The more you chat about this fight the more it makes me want to up my wager on the under rounds