Hopkins-Pascal: Can Bernard keep beating father time?

By Boxing News - 12/11/2010 - Comments

By Tommaso Nappo: There is no truth to the rumor , that Bernard Hopkins was on the under card of David vs Goliath. Also electricity had been invented so he did not train by candle light upon starting out. Age jokes aside Bernard Hopkins has transformed himself from inmate to one of the greatest boxers of the last twenty years . He had a stretch of 12 years where he was undefeated. No doubt he would be included in the top 10 Middleweight Champions of all time possibly even in the top 5. Sitting back and reflecting over his career he has fought a who’s who in boxing. Continuing to fight at his age and take on the challenges he has at this advanced age (in boxers years)is commendable. Since turning forty he has fought Jermaain Taylor twice, Antonio Tarver, Winky Wright, Joe Calzaghe, Kelly Pavlik, (Ornelas fight was a keep busy fight), and Roy Jones. Granted the Jones fight was looked forward to by fight fans with about as much enthusiasm as having that crazy uncle on your wife’s side over to your house for the holidays.

I have heard two schools of thought on this up coming fight with Pascal one being Bernard is too crafty and will frustrate this young man and win a typical Hopkins mauling fight by decision. The other that Pascal will out work Hopkins ala Calzaghe , and at this stage B-Hop doesn’t have the punch output in him to do enough to take the decision. Therefore Pascal would win by decision.

Hopkins the master promoter has stated he will knock out Pascal. Now I don’t want to disrespect B-Hop but he hasn’t scored a knockout in about 6yrs (2004 I believe against Oscar). That knock out was a against a smaller fighter moving up in weight. Since then he has not come close to knocking anybody out even Roy Jones who looked awful in that fight.So to think he will be able to stop a young light heavyweight who has shown a decent chin is unlikely.

The intangibles in this fight are will Pascal be able to force Hopkins to fight at a pace he is uncomfortable at or not used to. Was Pascal’s win over Dawson a result of what, Pascal did, what Dawson didn’t do, or a combination of both. Will Pascal’s lack of experience in big time fights be a problem for him? Can Hopkins impose his will and dictate the pace of the fight at age 45. How much left gas is left in the 45 year old tank? Will the location of the fight with Pascal being the hometown fighter have any effect on the outcome?

For Pascal to win he must come right out and get to a fast start forcing Hopkins to expend energy while putting rounds in the bank. Pascal can’t get caught up in the emotion of the crowd and deviate from his game plan. To beat Hopkins a certain future Hall Of Famer it will take a tremendous effort requiring perfect focus and execution on his part. For Hopkins to win its simple he has to slow the younger man down by going to the body early. Hopkins must employ what we have become accustomed to seeing from him as a “Hopkins fight”(bullying, in fighting, and the odd questionable tactic) against Trinidad he executed it to perfection.

On to the big question who is going to win on December 18th? If I new that for a certainty I would have one of those 800 lines people could cal for 5$ a min, but in my humble opinion I have trouble seeing Hopkins knocking Pascal out. Another factor that prevents me from feeling good about predicting a Hopkins win is his low work rate making winning a decision difficult as he has virtually no room for error when winning rounds. He must start early and continue to pile them up if he has any hope especially when fighting in Pascal’s home town.This leads me to believe that Pascal will win a decision . Now it would not shock me if the “old man” was able to somehow pull it out.I expect a different Hopkins then the one that fought Jones but how much better? I could clearly envision watching the fight unfold on December 18th thinking to myself ” that son of a gun ” did it again. But more likely while Pascal will get the win it will have been father time that did the real damage.



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