By Michael Lieberman: Joe Calzaghe must be feeling a huge sense of relief right about now after middleweight knockout artist Kelly Pavlik was defeated by Bernard Hopkins on Saturday. There’s no getting around it, the loss was a huge defeat for Pavlik, and one that wiped out a lot of opportunities for him, one of which may or may not have been a fight with Calzaghe. Before the fight, Pavlik had been pushing hard for a fight with Calzaghe, but with little luck. Instead of wanting to face Pavlik, a fighter with an unbeaten record and an enormous amount of knockout victories, Calzaghe decided on Roy Jones Jr., a fighter that is perceived by many boxing experts to be the lesser threat than Pavlik.

Instead of Calzaghe facing Pavlik, the forty-three year-old Bernard Hopkins manned up and took the fight, and ended up giving Pavlik a terrible thrashing in the process. It’s unfortunate that Calzaghe chose to fight Jones rather than Pavlik, because who knows? Maybe it would be Calzaghe who would be getting all the praise right now for having beaten Pavlik instead of Hopkins.

Believe me, the win did wonders for Hopkins’ sagging career, increasing his standings among boxing fans and giving him new life to his career despite his advanced age. In fact, in that one fight alone, Hopkins arguably did more for his career than in any of his previous fights put together. Sure, he got respect for having beaten fighters like Winky Wright, Antonio Tarver and Felix Trinidad, but none of them can compare to his victory over Pavlik.

The reason being was because few people felt that Hopkins could win in the first place, and also because of his age when he did accomplish it. Hopkins showed tremendous courage to even take the fight in the first place, especially when you look at the fact that he hadn’t looked good in the ring for at least a couple of years. Hopkins’ win took away any argument that Pavlik had for a fight with Calzaghe, while at the same time giving Joe a suitable excuse for not having to face him. It’s too bad that it had to be Hopkins that showed the courage, and was man enough to take the fight with Pavlik rather than Calzaghe.

I imagine Calzaghe must be feeling a mixture of relief and possibly self anger right about now, thinking perhaps that it could have been him that is being praised right now for having beaten Pavlik rather than Hopkins. But the fact of the matter is Calzaghe will probably get nowhere near the praise for beating Jones on November 8th, at least from the knowledgeable boxing fans, because many of them already perceive Jones as being a faded fighter. If Calzaghe really wanted to cement his legacy, he would have taken the bigger gamble by facing the previously unbeaten Pavlik rather than Jones, who has lost three out of his last six fights.

With Jones near 40, his reflexes badly slowed, his chin not as sturdy as it once was, who will be impressed with Calzaghe if he beats Jones? It isn’t like Jones has fought anyone of worth recently to warrant a fight with Calzaghe. It’s been a year since Jones fought Anthony Hanshaw, and he looked positively terrible in that fight, staying on the ropes and absorbing a lot of punishment in eking out a win.

As it is now, Calzaghe will get little credit if he does end up beating Jones, and will likely face continuing criticism should he stick to his word and retire from boxing after the Jones fight. If money is his only ambition, then I say fine, retire from the sport and don’t worry about what people say. But, if Calzaghe wants to cement his image with boxing fans and ensure that he’s well thought of afterwards, he’s got to run the table and face Hopkins, Chad Dawson and Pavlik. I say Pavlik, because he needs to show that he’s not afraid of him, which is what many people assumed when Calzaghe chose Jones instead. I doubt that Calzaghe will do the fight thing and man up against any of those fighters, and that’s really too bad for him.