Dawson Would Have Beaten Calzaghe
May 11th, 2009
By Scott Gilfoid: Having seen the IBF title fight last Saturday night between champion Chad Dawson and challenger Antonio Tarver, I think Dawson would have beaten former WBO super middleweight Joe Calzaghe had it been him in the ring instead of 40-year-old Tarver. Dawson looked good for the most part, showing fast hand speed, good power and excellent defense. Dawson controlled almost the entire 12-round fight with Tarver and only had a problem when Dawson eased off the throttle in the last two rounds.
Dawson said later that he had hopes that Calzaghe would want to fight him after seeing the fight. Dawson, however, is a completely different fighter than what Calzaghe has faced in his career, and I don’t imagine that Calzaghe would want to step out of retirement to face an A class fighter like Dawson.
I got to give Tarver some credit. Antonio tried hard to take the fight to the young Dawson, even though it meant that Tarver was going to have to absorb all kinds of punishment by Dawson. Tarver didn’t care and kept coming forward, getting hammered by Dawson’s fast left hands and right hooks.
Dawson had no problems winning the first half of the fight, and continued to glide towards victory into the 11th round, when Dawson started running out the clock in the fight by focusing on his defense rather than offense. Calzaghe would have had a tough time against the speed of Dawson and with his power.
Chad hits too hard and has too much size for a fighter like Calzaghe to deal with properly, and I could see Calzaghe taking big shots from both hands of Dawson as Calzaghe tries to land his slaps. The shots that Dawson was landing on Tarver in Saturday’s fight, would have likely knocked Calzaghe into next week.
Calzaghe had problems taking big shots in his last two fights against Bernard Hopkins and Roy Jones Jr. Dawson looked like a fighter on a whole different level as he came forward, hitting Tarver with strong left hands and hooks. Dawson landed really well to the body, and was putting a lot of power into his big body shots.
Tarver took the punches, but wasn’t able to fire back with anything near as hard as what Dawson was throwing at him. Dawson, as well as a number of boxing fans, was hoping that Calzaghe would see the Dawson-Tarver II fight and decide that it was a good opportunity to prove himself against the talented American fighter.
Even though it wasn’t one of the best of performances by Dawson, I expect that Calzaghe won’t come close to returning to the ring to fight him. Dawson isn’t like many of the slow and marginal opponents that Calzaghe built his unbeaten record on and it would be a fight where Calzaghe would be facing a type of fighter that he had never seen before in his career.
Tags: 25 Responses to “Dawson Would Have Beaten Calzaghe”
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infact just watched joe vs bhop and how bernard thinks he won i dont know is it him playing a sick joke lol.
infact just watched the kessler fight on you tube joe is real sharp he would have way 2 much for any usa boxer in the last 20 years including dawson, and i hate 2 admit this but enough is enough.
Excellant article.Calzaghe is a nobodoy and faught a bunch of old timers to try and get his name out there before he retired.Dawson is 26 and has already faught better opposition than Calzaghe.Poor Brits.It’s looking pretty dark for you guys nowadays.Pretty sad to put your last hope in a big mouth btch like David Haye who can’t even get support from his own people.Both Cooper and Tyson Fury have already told him to stfu and that he’s gonna get his azz whooped on june 20th.I do feel for you guys.Even in the poor state of boxing that the USA is goin through right now,wwere still better than the Brits.WOW
Dawson Would Have Beaten Calzaghe
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Did Calzaghe Duck Dawson?
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Calzaghe Thinks He Would Get Beat If He Came Out of Retirement
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Why Didn’t Calzaghe Face Better Fighters?
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Is Calzaghe the Worse Champion Ever?
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Did Calzaghe Retire To Avoid Having To Fight Dawson?
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Calzaghe vs. Dawson – Dream Fight
(By Scott Gilfoid)
What Does Calzaghe’s “0″ Mean?
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Calzaghe Needs To Retire Already
(By Scott Gilfoid)
Would Joe Calzaghe’s father beat Dawson in bare knuckle fight
(By me, Ok I made that one up) But the answer is yes lol
It goes on and on and on and on, probably another 30 more. Its quite an obsession
It is good that you dedicate such a large amount of time on such a good fighter
lol Scott, your article = huge fail
Dawson is not in the same league as Calzaghe. All these fighters chasing Joe should fight Kessler first, they have not earned the right to fight Joe if they cant beat Kessler, Kessler isnt in retirement.
Dont hold your bad breath on that fight happening anytime soon though.
Kessler would wipe the floor with Dawson full stop.
Calzaghe beat kessler, work the rest out you imbociles it’s not rocket science!
Dawson sucks. He barely beat Tarver and Tarver’s a bum. He’s not fit to be mentioned in the same breath as Calzaghe, and Scott Gilfoid knows it. Hence why he’s so bitter that every article he craps out is a vain effort to try and rewrite boxing history. Pathetic.
well written comment erc7player.
Almost poetic.
shut it you all can’t imagine you guys are even thinking about this dawson will destroy calzaghe period and calzaghe knew that so he took the easy road and quickly retired and you say fighting in your prime but during the Ali,Frazier and Foreman era they fought everybody that matters from contenders to champions and never dodge fights like calzaghe did and i can remember Ali came over to london to fight henry cooper.
The hypocrisy is astounding, you cream over a 26 year old Dawson beating GOOD 39 and 40 year old boxers but slag of Calzaghe because at 37 he beat GREAT 39 and 43 year old boxers.
SCOTT WHY DON’T YOU GO ON STEVE BUNCE’S BOXING HOUR AND SAY THIS, OR ARE YOU SACRED YOU’LL GET LAUGHED AT. If dawson was that good why could you buy tickets for 30dollars a pop, he obviously aint that good. Joe would have humiliated him.
If joe was still around Dawson would just be outboxed and outclassed over 12 punishing rounds in which sad Chad wouldnt win any.But king joe aint around because he is RETIRED.
This is ridiculous, how many of these articles is boxing24 going to allow? I’m all for free speech and opinions but give it a rest.
Scott, you must be cracking up at the reactions you create, I think you are far from stupid, more sneakily clever in my book. We all read your articles and we all invest time in replying to them.
You are manipulating us you mind Jedi.
I think a Calzaghe (of now) against a Dawson (of now) would be a close fight but I still see Calzaghe edging it points wise. Calzaghe has a great defence when he is focused. The knock downs to Hopkins and Jones were flash knock downs and in neither case did either opponent gain much of an advantage from them.
Just my view.
M
Yawn…..don’t you guys go on should Lennox Lewis have hung around until he was 45yo so lardy Arreola could have a go?
The fact is however many fighters Joe fights and beats there will always be another fighter who is undefeated and the next supposed big thing to fight.
At the time of his retirement Pavlik, Dawson and Froch were all being touted – the fact is Joe could easily beat any of these three fighters. Pavlik was exposed against Hopkins as the limited fighter he is, Froch despite coming through against Taylor showed enough to indicate he is made for Calzaghe and would be an easy fight. And finally Dawson has beaten an aging Tarver who got demolished by Hopkins a couple of years ago and almost lost to G Johnson another old fighter. He too would beaten comfortably by Calzaghe.
Calzaghe has been sensible and retired with enough money and his faculties intact. He beat world champions in Robin Reid, Richie Woodhall, Jeff Lacy and Mikkel Kessler and supposed ‘hall of famers’ like Jones and Hopkins when they could avoid him no longer. Calzaghe would have more names on his record if he wasn’t so avoided. How about some American fighters fight Kessler another avoided European fighter???
I find it hilarious that people say joe is overated but then they are all so keen to fight him. So obviously hes not overated your just crying because no one was able to beat him, keep making these articles you just keep on proving how great he really is =D
every Ammerican out therre is ducking Kessler at the moment, he’s present, he’s relevent and he’d fight any one of pavlik, Dawson, Jones, B-hop.. the fact is none of them want a piece of him for two reasons,
a) He’s to dangerouse, I can only see Hoppkins staying with him, the rest he would finish inside of 10 rounds.
b) There’s no money in him… and this is the key point.. Point ‘A’ was once True of calzaghe as well, to dangerouse to fight, thats why Jones and hopkins ducked him for 10 years, but as time goes on like all things in life the cream eventualy rises to the top as Calzaghe did and thus, Jones, Hopkins, Tarver, Dawson, Pavlik all went chasing, he’s was the biggest fish out there because of a long lasting title righn and an unefeated status, he was number one in two devitions when he retirerd.
We hear from Scott and Lieberman about how Joe only fought fighters passed there prime and B class.. but Calzaghe is from the same genneration of fighters as hopkins and and Jones, he’s essentialy fighting his pears and in Hopkins a current P4P top ten. Dawson on the other hand is 20 odd and doing a fine job of targeting the old boys and has proved nothing to me in doing so, tarver has been shot ever since getting a lessong from Hopkins who i predict would dominate Dawson much the same way he did pavlik.
Some writers would have you believe that Calzaghe was a second rate fighter that never beat any one of relevence and yet they dedicate every second article to his very name.. kind of defeates the object if you ask me
Kessler = in his prim
Lacy = in his prime
Hopkins = made him look old even thou he showed he still has plenty in his last fight.
theres more but those 3 alone are more than anything dawson has ever faced, enough said.
calzaghe would have struggled with dawsons speed??? are you smoking crack?
Calzaghe knows its suicide 4 him 2 fight Dawson,whateva Joe if u reading,just stay with your so called great record with no wins over great prime fighters and wins over a bunch of bums,and NICK u are retarted 2 call Joe a great!! dont get me wrong Chad is nothin close 2 great and has a lot 2 prove,but so does Joe,Joe is nothin but OVERRATED,VERY OVERRATED!!!,he will neva be seen as a great!!
sorry if anything i said sounds anti American thats not the case its just about boxing love the USA and the people. Nick England.
calzache would have kod dawson that night , dawson should have kod tarver , tarver was slow as hell and he was still landing on dawson , calzache would have thrown too many punches
Lacy was young and in his prime and acording to the Americans the next big star, he wasn’t old and beat up Adam, but look what Calzaghe did to him. who has Dawson faught? Joe would land punches with ease and beat him on points easier than Dawson beat Tarver. If Calzaghe came back the only thing to beat him would be age, he should stay retired Dawson is good but he’s not great Joe Calzaghe is.
Why do you think Dawson is such a powerful puncher? Because he has only knocked out like 17 of his 29 opponents. Plus Calzaghe is probably quicker than Dawson is. You say Joe ducks? Dawson has faced two notable opponents. A 40 year old Tarver, and a 39 year old Glen Johnson whom he was very lucky to win. Dawson will get caught out soon. Scott you racist twat
Calzaghe wont fight Dawson.Dawson is still young,not old and beatup.
Well Joe wont come out of retirement purely because his love for the sport has gone and hes made enough bucks from it. My personal instinct tells me this. You have to go back to 2007 to see a Dawson KO. I think people underestimate Calzaghe’s speed and work rate. It would be double the effort what tarver put in. When you have a guy throwing six consecutive punches at you like calzaghe would throw against dawson, they are, whilst not powerful punches, they are point winning punches. Calzaghe is no Tarver and it’s all good saying Calzaghe has never been in with someone like Dawson, but Dawson has never been in with anybody like Calzaghe. Calzaghe points if i was to predict. Would be a good fight to see but wont happen. There careers just missed each other and whilst its a shame, thats part of boxing.