Did Calzaghe do enough in his career to be considered great?
April 25th, 2011
By Saqib Khan: When a boxer retires we always look back at the memorable fights the boxer had. When i think of Joe Calzaghe I can’t think of many.
That was the annoying with Calzaghe, he was good boxer I believe he would have beaten most of the superstar Americans not all for e.g., Glen Johnson; he would have made a massive name for himself in the US at the time. But in boxing you have to go by facts, and when you look at his record you have to say which legend has he beaten in their prime, had any wars like Morales/Barrera or Dela Hoya/ Vargas etc
I think Calzaghe and his dad Enzo were very clever men, they knew what they were doing in and out of the ring, boxing is a business and the o in his record meant he could get easy match ups with Bernard and Jones later on, that resulted in good pay days. After the lacy fight he fought Sakio Bika and Peter Manfredo Jr. no disrespect to them two hardly pound for pound calibre opponents in your 42nd plus fights.
The only highlight of Joe career was when he fought Mikkel Kessler which was to give credit to Joe was good fight but the fight was in Wales, had Calzaghe fought against him in Denmark like Carl Froch or Vegas would Calzaghe would have won ? I don’t think so.
Calzaghe last two opponents two living legends of the game, the great Bernard Hopkins and Roy Jones Jnr. Victory over them two was nothing special as they were not in their prime, Even though in both fights Calzaghe hit the canvass. What do you think a prime Roy Jones or Bernard would do to Calzaghe? That thought is scary.
I class Calzaghe as a good boxer with good fast hands and good foot work. Who can forget the Byron Mitchell fight Calzaghe showed a lot of heart in that fight but in that fight he was badly hurt. Apart from his protected record he always be labelled as a “what if fighter” what if Calzaghe went over the US and fought the like of glen Johnson, Bernard Hopkins, Roy Jones Jnr “what if Joe didn’t retire and he fought André ward or Froch. Carl Froch probably the most annoying man on the planet but credit to him he will fight anyone anywhere whether he wins or loses, one can argue did Calzaghe duck him. Even Ricky Hatton and Prince Naseem Ahmed fought the best at their time they may have failed but they got both boxing fans appreciation for it.
I know Amir Khan is not everyone’s cup of tea but even he fought the best puncher in his division in Marcos Maidana and now in his 26th fight he will unify the division by fighting the best at his weight class which is Tim Bradley.
Maybe I’m being too harsh on Joe but when I look through his record I do not see any opponents that are pound for pound champions or massive super fights where the contest was a pickem fight, maybe with Joe we will never know how good of a boxer he really was.
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Joe Calzaghe hit the floor against Jones… So?! He annihilated Jones. That was about the only punch Jones landed. Calzaghe beat him like a little baby and made a legend look like a little disabled baby.
Come on! Jones and Lacy the so-called big Americans were the easiest fights of his career. Peter Manfredo was a lamb to the slaughter but Joe only fought him because Americans think only American boxers are worth fighting. Joe’s toughest fights were all in Europe.
‘true brit says:
April 26, 2011 at 11:07 am
@all joe haters,46-0.it is up to the other fighters to prove your no good.That didnt happen.b-hop,jones,lacy,kessler.send me a link with joe getting beating. And i will take my hat of to you all!!’
yeah but if you say that then buster bloodvessel could build up an undefeated record by fighting a string of unknowns and retirees.
try to make sense please.
I see you deleted my comment.
Joe beat everybody he boxed. Why do you think BHop skipped SMW to go to LHW??? Joe was too fast for him – at 31 Joe would still have won. Boxing is about consistency – Joe was always consistent, trained hard and got the win. He was the lineal champ in two weights and held all four belts at SMW. These are facts.
Just to add he had 91% of his fights in his home country (UK) not 98%. BHop had 94% of his fights in his home country. Do not quote facts when you do not know what the facts are.
Why don’t you delete this comment as well… lol
Lets Face the FACTS people and they are FACTS. Excellently pointed out by the writer. His only two big names were Two fighters Past their Prime. Roy Jones and Hopkins .. YET.. YET.. They both put him on the Canvas.. hey both had him down.. Move back 5 years.. Joe is 31 and they are 33 and 38 respectfully.. he would have been KO’d easily by both.
He spent 98% of his career in England fighting journeymen and packing out kips of stadiums. In UK he is well known and gets respect duhhh.. In Global boxing he is a nobody and the boxing WORLD see’s him for what he is.. Cherry picking padded record overhyped paper chump
@Phil B
Go watch football and drink lager…
Anyone whos a real fight fan knows Joe was great to watch and without a doubt will be remembered as one of boxings best.
What EVERYONE should do before they comment is give an honourable mention to the way this author keeps trying to slip in Hameed and Khan as some sort of benchmarks in boxing LMAO.
The author needs to acknowledge that his surname betrays why he has alliances to these two frauds of boxing.
hell no!!!!!there where way too many fighters left that could of beat him like Bute for example.
Of course Calzaghe did enough in his career to be considered great joe calzaghe is the longest-reigning world champion of the modern era 11 years. Second longest reign in boxing history,He had the Ring Magazine Light-Heavyweight Championship, as well as the WBO, WBA, WBC, IBF,IBO and Ring Magazine super middleweight belts. The only one in history to become Undisputed super middleweight champion he has had 24 championship fights has 3 ATGs on his resume
Roy Jones Jr
Chris Eubank
Bernard Hopkins
Beat 4 Undefeated Fighters
Mark Delaney 21-0
mikkel kessler 40-0
Mario Veit 30-0
jeff lacy 21-0
joe calzaghe is 46-0 REMEMBER THAT
With the bar set so low in Canastota NY (Hall of Fame) He’ll be in no doubt.
@bigmoff…your right bud,hopkins and jones were great fighters, yeah….years earlier, just around the same time that joe came up with the silly excuse that he was scared of flying hahaha, and by the way, your punching mid air…loomis aint american, loomis is an ulsterman through and through….bigmoff got it all wrong hahahaha
Roy Jones was a cherry picker who never fought out of his back yard. He also was a drug cheat and in his prime ducked all of the best Euro fighters including Joe.
The fact that American boxing fans choose to ignore these facts and still to attack the legacy of an unbeaten fighter whom didn’t actually duck anyone in his career at SMW means that these opinions should be classed as Nationalistic Bias and not true boxing commentary.
Joe Calzaghe ruled the SMW division for many of years with no defeats. Shouldn’t we be questioning the legacy of all the people who failed to mount a convincing challenge on a man who dominated a weight division for so long instead of attacking the man with the unbeaten record?
I question the legacy of all the top fighters that failed to challenge Joe. Let’s face it, Joe couldn’t have backed down. Left Hook Lacy did it and Joe had to respond. Most of the so called great fighters are American made marketing products that are steered away from danger via media propaganda and are bought up buy gullible home grown fans. The same thing is happening in the UK with Amir Khan & David Haye, the media exploits football fans into backing up their fighters using National pride; another unwanted export from the capitalist epicentre USA.
Joe was unbeaten at SMW because nobody beat him or dared to try, and that’s all there is to it!
@smokey.
glen johnson, montell griffin, virgil hill, reggie johnson, michael nunn, mike mccallum, fabrice tiozzo, dariusz Michalczewski all these guys you mentioned are roy jones business/unfinished business! they got nothing to do with joe calzaghe,joe was a super middleweight
jermain taylor and kelly pavlik are middlewights they are bhop business/unfinished business!
joe calzaghe could have fought carl froch and lucian Bute if he kept boxing but you must realize joe calzaghe beat mikkel kessler who beat froch and buy the end of the year kessler is going to give bute his frist L
chad WHO?………..is that the guy who got beat by jean?….
if so then jean got beat by carl froch and we all know who beat CARL FROCH!
Joe is talented but to say he’s great?
I feel as if it lowers the bar too much
How could Hopkins be considered past his prime when he fought Joe, because after that he went on to school Pavlik and remains a top fighter. Lacy was not hype or over-rated; he just was not the same after he fought Joe. But we have no idea what could have, would have, become of him. And Joe would have easily beaten Froch. And Roy Jones was the best at cherry picking his fights. Come on, he went to heavy weight and picked his punches on a limited fighter like Ruiz. I’d like to have seen a so-called prime Jones fight a really heavy weight like one of the Klits. This article is rubbish.
Joe didnt have enough 50/50 fights coz he was just too good…period!
Best boxer ever to have walked on the face of the planet FACT!
Not enough 50/50 fights I mean :0)
I wrote an article about Calzaghe’s legacy a few weeks ago which generated almost 80 comments so it is clear Calzaghe’s career accomplishments are debateable hence why I wrote an article on the subject. On the downside I think Joe made to many ”run of the mill” one sided defences of his world title but in his defence he had no real competition until Lacy and Kessler came along. Hopkins and Jones had bigger fish to fry in different weight divisions to Joe in the early 2000s. In my opinon Joe should have moved up to Light-Heavy earlier and fought the likes of Tarver and Johnson which he was scheduled to do but pulled out with injury against Johnson. He could of then done what Martinez is doing and gone back down to Super Middle if and when a worthly challenger appeared ie Kessler. A big ask I know but Martinez has proven it can be done and is 35. I think that is the only way that Joe could have proved his doubters wrong but I am sure someone somewhere would still say that would not have been enough.
No 1 can deny Joe had a great career and accomplished more that most boxers but in my opinon he wasted to many years with mundaine title defences and was involved in enough 50/50 fights to be classed as a living legend. For some of you 3 50/50 fights maybe enough for not for me……….
@smokey.
All the fighters you list knew Joe area code but didn’t make a valid challenge apart from our J Lacy! You can’t blame the Brit for not fighting the best when the so called best wouldn’t even consider the fight. I remember them all saying things like Joe is over hyped or Joe Who?…
Joe fought to many bums
calzaghe fought between 168-175 between 1993 and 2008 here are fighters realistically it can be claimed joe ducked them or didnt seek to fight at all in his and their prime roy jones (prime p4p king period), hopkins, jermain taylor was a real possibility,kelly pavlik, carl froch, chad dawson,lucian Bute, glen johnson, montell griffin, virgil hill, reggie johnson, michael nunn, mike mccallum, fabrice tiozzo, dariusz Michalczewski the guy everyone says jones ducked at 175 now you cant tell me all these guys said or would say no to a fight with calzaghe bottom line joe was good but was not great with all these fighters fighting during his career and to not have anyone one of them except hopkisn and Jones who were past their best so he cannot be considered great but he was good not great
@TAKE YOUR HAT OFF HMMMM. show me a link were joe fought 5/6 great fighters back to back like froch has, and i,ll shed my clothes and run up picadilly circus LOL, and considering joe had 46 fights and was world champion for a very long time.
@all joe haters,46-0.it is up to the other fighters to prove your no good.That didnt happen.b-hop,jones,lacy,kessler.send me a link with joe getting beating. And i will take my hat of to you all!!
LOL The comments on here show how brainwashed the us has become! Joe beat Bhop<(what are you brainwashed us guys looking at?lol)
Start paying attention to your Natzi run government and stop worrying about your overrated fighters!
Things are going to get rough in US and Canada very soon!
all those chumps were suppose to beat him. Calzaghe beat them. go figure . . .
no we will never know the outcome off a froch v calzaghe fight because joe wouldnt take the fight, and as 4 kessler froch has more or less ended his career beacause of the punishment he took off froch dont think he has fought again since ,gave up his belt ?
Across the pond he did, but here in the US I would have to say NO!
I can’t say Lacy was over-hyped because I thought Left Hook was going to take it to him, but I called that one wrong big time!
the great roy rones ducked nigel benn in his prime and wanted no part of chris eubank, hopkins is still fighting even now against top tier opposition and doing quite well, lifes full of ifs, its well known joe had hand problems, and we could say how well would he have done against the best if he hadent had these hand problems, joe could throw 100 punches a round, be them slaps they still sting, and he had great stamina, he could take a punch, ok he was knocked down but if you get hit with a ahrd shot you dont see coming your gonna hit the canvas,joe beat roy jones because he figured out jones fighting style, if you give roy jones distance and room he’ll pick you of all night, calzaghe didn’t give him the room to fight, the elite fighters are able to work out other fighters styles marquez is a great example.
What this boils down to is the same ole argument. White Brits think Joe was the greastest thing since di and Charles wedding and everyone else is smart. It’s a known fact that Kessler had a broken right hand in the fight and lacy had rotator issues in his main weapon the left hook .but lacy was grossly overrated. Bernard had the fight close and of course why would we even debate a prime Roy jones against Joe. But Brits ought to be able to take their medicine….if Tom Britt can say Joe would beat the current crop what is he measuring it against…..certainly not Kessler who ward beat twice as bad…..oh you wanna say Kessler was on the slide when ward beat him….then who did you see him slip against? But no sense arguing with the one track,closed mind Brits…..when the old girl is your countries only claim to fame the rest of the world will have pity on you guys and let you revere Joe. But in the real boxing world he was the second best British super middle behind froch.
@ boxing fan101
you helmet stay off this site
his last 2 fights were in the US
He never was gonna get the chance to fight jones n hopkins in their prime##
you can only beat the man thats put in front of you
He will not be considered great. He never fought outside of Europe. He ducked Roy Jones and Hopkins during their prime. He cherry picked his way through boxing throughout his whole career.
loomis says:
April 26, 2011 at 7:49 am
@YANKSRIDIOTS. JOES A LEGEND?? MORE LIKE A LEG END…HAHAHA!!!
wow loomis you realy need to get out more and get some friends!! that realy wasnt funny and is a very old joke
Amir and Naz smell and should stick to milking goats
Calzaghe is not great!
@MIKEY “carl froch is the man will fight anybody ducks no 1 already fought much better opposition than joe ever did !”
Although I like Froch, he was beat by a past best Kessler who Joe destroyed! Maybe you think Froch is fighting better ffighters because Froch is making them look better as Joe made everyone look bad?
I think we all know the outcome of a Froch v Calzaghe including Froch. I do wish him all the best and would love a true warrior to win the super 6.
Oh, and i do realise that Hopkins did not actually officially beat Pascal, but was stating what EVERYBODY except the judges thought that night.
@liv4one Please tell me what part of the UK Las Vegas is in as that’s where Hopkins fought JC, which Jc clearly won despite being knocked down early and Hopkins crying and saying he had been hit low even though he hadn’t. If they had a rematch JC would have destroyed him. Everyone seems to be on here saying “well Calzaghe wouldn’t beat Pascal, Froch etc. yet JC beat easily beat Kessler who beat Froch and as for Pascal, well Hopkins won that fight nearly TWO years AFTER he was apparantly past his best when JC beat him. Joe Calzaghe may not have done enough to be considered an all time great but he was the BEST Super Middleweight of HIS generation. As for being a “slapper” , I wouldn’t mind being labelled a slapper if I KO’D 32 of 46 !!! All this with dodgy hands, just think what he could have done id he hadn’t had dodgy hands !!
@YANKSRIDIOTS. JOES A LEGEND?? MORE LIKE A LEG END…HAHAHA
Can’t believe some people thing Bhop deserved the fight over JC. If you think throwing yourself on the floor gives you the fight then you are a media brainwashed fan. If Bhop would have stood and fought instead of cheating he would have been TKO’d or retired on his stool, I would have DQ’d him! He is a coward and a cheat! Roy Jones may have been a drug cheat throughout his career but he was no coward, he did all he could against JC but both fighters ducked JC in their ‘prime’.
Pavlic and Chad have since been exposed by lesser fighters, Ward and Hollywood Dirrell were not on the radar, Foch was beat by Kessler and Bute was not rated a good enough test for Joe’s final fights.
In his career, he stood his ground at the weight and with his style on show for many years, everyone had the chance to study him and make a challenge; nobody did, Joe barely lost a round when at his best! 46/0 …….
punchy that simple answer was simply stupid!! calzaghe defo a living legend!!
simple answer to the question no were near enough
Calzaghe is different class to all the present crop of super middle/light bheavy weights. FACT!
you can’t mention khan… thats chalk and chees… khan will never be as good as calzaghe…and considering your name…I would presume its your race you are bringing into count here…
MIKEYu mug, who exactly has froch fought that joe couldnt beat!! erm lets see kessler??? no becoz joe beat kessler! erm what about pascal the local police man! joe would have murdered him like he did lacy!! and if im being honoust if froch got offered to fight roy jones or hopkins he would take it in a shot even know he said joe was fighting old bums! hopkins would still beat froch now easily.
Calzaghe will be no legend but Amir Khan? jeez, he is not fit to kiss the feet of Calzaghe right now, maybe in the future if he can keep it together. The only thing going against Calzaghe is the fighters he didn’t face, he was a beast in the ring. Even a mid thirties Calzaghe would have been favourite to win the Super 6 Tournament on style and skills alone. He beat all styles, most fighters have their kryptonite. Khan’s is anyone who can punch apparently? Props for surviving the Maidana fight though.
carl froch is the man will fight anybody ducks no 1 already fought much better opposition than joe ever did !
More rubbish talk again. Mr Saqib Khan, first of all dont mention Amir Khan compared to Joe Calzaghe. Khan is a joke of a fighter, yes he fought maidana and it was a credit to him. He struggled against the majority of other fighters, the latest Paul McCloskey. I believe Khan will lose to any other world class fighter out there, hes a muppet. Calzaghe was a great fighter and never avoided any fighter is his career. He fought the best in his division throughtout his career. Eubank, Lacy, Kessler etc. He outboxed every one of them. He would outbox any of the super middleweights today. Anyone disagree? Then your deluded. Everyone likes a discussuing however, most boxing fans talk absolute rubbish!!!
Lacy was always one dimensional, but to be fair, Joe was electric that night. It was a good performance against Kessler, in the Hopkins fight i thought Bernard had done enough for the decision and Jones Jnr was a shadow of his former self. Regardless, he always found a way to win. I just dont think he tested himself fighting people like Tocker Pudwell or whatever his name was, Manfredo Jnr and the likes.
I was ringside for the Byron Mitchell fight. Trust me, he was hurt. He got up and showed great heart that night. If he had travelled a bit more, gone and took Sven Otkers titles in Germany then gone over to the US and fought Hopkins and Jones in their prime, there would have been no doubt about him being great!
totaly agree with jackson on this one…saying jc wasnt a great is based soly on jealousy..
@ Liv4One
Calzaghe fought Hopkins in Vegas you numpty!
He is great period, and know amount of whining about him slapping will change that. Get over it!
What a load of old rubbish. Bernard Hopkins was in his prime against Calzaghe as he has since proven. Kessler would have lost to Calzaghe anywhere in the world as Calzaghe completely outboxed him and left Kessler with no answer whatsoever. Naseem Hamed (not Ahmed) fought a prime Barrera and was swiftly humiliated and Calzaghe wasn’t hurt in the Mitchell fight at all, it was a flash knockdown which Calzaghe got straight up from and was a little bit embarrassed rather than hurt. You really should study a few facts before writing this rubbish! “Did Calzaghe do enough to be considered great?” I don’t know but I do know he did a lot more than you’re suggesting.
he must have a hard slap to have so many nockouts!!
@Livfor1
Totally agree, Calzaghe is no great his best performance was against Jeff Lacy, it is true Calzaghe slaps and they should not be scored as punchers, slaps are not scored in the amateur ranks.
So Jeff Lacy was overhyped? The yanks had him down as the next Mike Tyson, with Calzaghe as the underdog. Everyone expected him to come over and just smash JC up. He was only overhyped AFTER Calzaghe demolished him. As for Hopkins, as others have said, he constantly priced himself out of that fight. Not to mention the fact that he is STILL one of the top p4p fighters out there! And Jones Jr said he wouldn’t go to England (dont blame him mind) so Calzaghe said the same about a USA fight. So how can you blame just the one?
Dont get me wrong, im a massive Calzaghe fan, but he did spend too long sat on his WBO belt not challenging (9 years in fact), for one of the other belts.
But he did have all the attributes to have truly been regarded as world class, no doubt.
for all of you who say Calzaghe schooled Hopkins… youtube a video called “the Calzaghe deception, the night Hopkins was robbed”. when you slow that fight down you clearly see how many punched Joe missed and Hopkins landed. Compubox did such a horrible job of scoring that fight, not to mention fighting in the UK with UK fans swaying the judges towards Calzaghe. at first I thought Joe won, but when you study the fight and aren’t just watching it with friends, you see that Hopkins actually schooled and exposed Joe. as far as Joe being an all time great… come on man, he was one of the most sheltered boxers I have ever seen and that slap punch shyt is just ridiculous and shouldn’t be scored as REAL PUNCHES…
And yes guys although I am a huge Mayweather fan Calzaghe was better and faster than Mayweather.
Yes Calzaghe would still whip all the super middle weights and light heavy weights now, no qeustion about that what so ever. Calzaghe was simply the best super middle weight of all time.
yes he does, yanks r idiots (kirkland, jacobs, lacy, and many more) all idiots
calzaghe wud batter froch even now . calzaghe was britain’s best fighter. but nt one the greatest of all time . i fort hopkins won the fight
cal was the best at super middlweight to date. he was a puncher who had to adapt his style to slapping because of injured hands. in his first 26 fights, as i remember it, he had 25 knock outs. without the hand injuries he may have been an atg.
Typical same old clan bigging up their own
trying to put down other races
Naz and Khan are jokes when it comes to calazaghe
Keeping praying to ALah you might have a champion worth talking about one day
Filthy beings
dont blame joe for not fighting a prime hopkins or Jones.
When Jones was in his prime Calzaghe was just enetring the scence any fight of that
magnitude would of been laughed at.
Hopkins it took Hopkins ages to ge t round the table and HE KEPT BEING GREEDY WITH THE MONEY
Oh just noticed that Naz got an honourable mention in this article, how silly of me to have missed it.
Khan Naz Khan Naz Khan Naz………..both have so much in common, same fan base, both equally annoying, both hyped up more than their abilities.
Not even close!he beat an OVERRATED Jeff Lacy,and 2 old men in Jones and Hopkins and I felt bernard won that fight.
Maybe you should acquire the Joe Calzaghe SC Dvd and watch some of his first fights! They were know walk in the park by any means. And all this talk about bhop? come on the guy was great fighter and still causing new boxers problems (Enrique Ornelas, Jean Pascal, Kelly Pavlik) for example. Give the guy his credit! he is retired and unbeating!
@ seul look at the opposition forget the unbeaten record
if u notice all of u are saying he would have beat this guy and would have beat that guy. thats the point. he didnt fight any of the top fighter during his carear. wanted nothing to do with roy and hopkins in there prime. hatton could have done the same thing and we would be having the same conversation about him. he is hatton before the manny and floyd fight. joe never faced anyone.
Joe was much faster than Chad and WAY busier!
UD for Joe!
I think chad dawson would’ve handled Joe. Would’ve loved to have seen that fight happen.
37 is NOT past prime if you take care of yourself!
I’m not sue what some of you guts are looking at when Bhop and Joe fought but Joe clearly
out punched and out slicked Bhop!
I’m a Bhop fan but he lost that fight hands down!
Better watch it again guys.
Joe could fight ,he proved it time after time,Had some close fights,or at least one close fight with BHop,And roy thought he had him early and Calzaghe showed his greatness after a sketchy start wth roy powered him to a knockdown.He has always come back to shine ,perhaps something great or special.
“Did Calzaghe do enough in his career to be considered great?”
Don’t know but I can tell you something — Joe Calzaghe has a better record than Mayweather Jr: 46 Wins, 0 Losses, 32 KOs, vs Floyd’s 41 – 0 – 25.
have to agree with the article…. when i think of great boxers i think of ali, sugar ray robinson,pacquaio,mayweather jnr,bernard hopkins, roy jones, morales and barrera etc and JC fans beleive he is supposed to be in that league.Compare their resume to JC then it tells JC shouldnt be in the same breath as its enbarrising to argue. jeff lacy lol
@ Al come on who the hell was jeff lacy give me a break which living legends did he retire, now your comparing lacy to maiadana khan beat that puncher doesnt mean thats was his greatest victory. Jc did not beat harldy anyone that was good as him thats the problem. JC came ot of retirement he would loose to hopkins or sruggle, loose to jan pascal, carl froch , chad dawson even andre ward and direll if he had beaten them boxers on were on his resume then maybe you could argue, but he missed his time to be great when the greats like roy and bernard were ruling, he chose to stay at home one of the us networks classed him as no show joe lol
I have to agree with the article. His performance against Lacy was magnificent, but even then he was hardly throwing bombs against him. He then slapped his way to a stoppage over Manifredo Jnr. and a decision over Kessler, before getting put down by both Hopkins and Jones jnr, both of whom were considerably past there prime, more so than Calzaghe.
Did Calzaghe beat the best domestic fighters around? Yeah absolutley. Were his international victims enough to make him one of the greatest? No, not really
Thanks to Adelaïde Byrd, you have fools like Kev who after checking his record assume Calzaghe’s SD over Hopkins is a robbery…
yes.
Joe could come back today and beat the hell out of any fighter in his weight class.Nobody has ever had a work rate like Joe . He was and could still be a punching machine who knows every adjustment he needs to make to beat any of the current crop of fighters.And im sure Joe would be the frist to give the credit to his trainer, his dad. The question should be ” is anyone dumb enough not to rate JOE CALZAGHE AS GREAT?”
I agree 100%%%
Guys, at the time Lacy was the most feared puncher in the division and many people siad that he would destroy JC, however JC put on a masterclass of boxing and battered him. Then after the fight all the haters come out and say “well Lacy was no good anyhow”. As for the Hopkins and RJJ fights he won both and yes they were over the hill fighters but remember JC himself was 37 !!! Hardly in his prime either, so lay off the guy. Also JC got stick for taking the Hopkins fight as Hopkins was apparantly too old, too slow etc. etc. but look what happened when he fought “the next big thing” in Pavlik, totally schooled him, did the young Pavlik get any stick for fighting an over 40 ?? Nah, that’s just for Joe.
He is Great and will be remembered as such a Beautiful skilled fighter
@Kev,
I think joe deserved the victory over Hopkins. In my opinion Hopkins appeared to have been worn by the end of the fight. But so what, Hopkins was well past his prime and I believe that had there been a rematch, Hopkins may have prevailed.
Joe was a good fighter, but it’s difficult to classify him as great. His victories over Jones and Hopkins are not worthy of tremendous accolades considering both were well past their primes. It’s too bad that we’ll never really know if he could have been great. Looking back, he and his handlers probably knew he was not a great fighter as he was kept very sheltered.
no he didnt he beat an OVERHYPED Jeff Lacy slapped his way to a victory over an old roy jones and then got away with a robbery against Hopkins…. his only good victory was his slappy match against kessler….
No he didn’t, a few super six fighters might beat him
Yes he did!