What is next for Bernard Hopkins?

By Cameron - 11/10/2014 - Comments

hopkins8By Cameron Gillon: Bernard Hopkins lost his WBA and IBF Light Heavyweight titles on Saturday to Kovalev, who unified the titles with his own WBO title to now hold three of the four world titles at the 175 weight class. This loss left many wondering whether we have seen the last of the great Bernard Hopkins as he is now a few months short of his 50th birthday and many are left asking what kind of fights are left for Hopkins… could he go on to face WBC and The Ring light heavyweight world champion Adonis Stevenson to try to once more put himself to the top of the latter of holding a world title? Even with a win there, he would be second behind Kovalev as being seen as the best at 175. Stevenson’s advisor Al Haymon won’t likely let Stevenson get in the ring with Kovalev even if Stevenson wanted to, due to the danger the fight possesses for Stevenson, he isn’t like Hopkins as far as skills and toughness is concerned, his style would suit Kovalev a lot better as Stevenson is a puncher.

A fight that many fans would like to maybe see is between Hopkins and great rival Roy Jones Jr. Jones is coming to the end of his career but is still battling away. In my opinion Roy Jones is one of the greatest, if not the greatest fighter of this generation. In his prime at middleweight he was sublime in beating Bernard Hopkins in 1993 to then going on and beating the likes of Thomas Tate, James Toney and so on. Roy Jones went through the middleweight divisions moving up to Light Heavyweight where he beat Montell Griffin to win the WBC title and going through everyone and unifying the division by holding the WBC, WBA, IBF, NBA, WBF, IBA and Ring titles.

Jones then moved up two divisions to face John Ruiz to win the WBA heavyweight title of the world, this fight was seen by many as the downhill for Roy as he didn’t stay at this weight, he moved up these divisions for this one fight and then moved back down and then lost three of his next four fights to Antonio Tarver twice and Glen Johnson. Jones rematched Hopkins in 2010 where Hopkins won a 12 round decision to avenge his loss from 17 years before that.

In my opinion Roy Jones and Hopkins in their prime are both two of the greatest fighters I’ve ever seen. They are both coming towards the end of their careers and one more fight between them could make a great fight of two of the world’s best facing off once more.

 



Comments are closed.