By Tim Fletcher: Bernard Hopkins (55-7-2, 32 KOs), now inactive, says he accepted a fight against IBF/IBO/WBA middleweight champion Gennady Golovkin, and that he would have come down in weight from light heavyweight to take the fight with the 33-year-old Kazakhstan fighter. Hopkins says that Golovkin would have had to come up in weight from middleweight to take the fight.
Golovkin’s promoter Tom Loeffler said recently that a fight against Hopkins is something that they would be open to if they can’t get a unification clash against WBC middleweight champion Saul “Canelo” Alvarez in September.
However, it’s hard to know how serious Loeffler was in talking about a fight between Golovkin and Hopkins, because he was kind of naming a lot of names in speaking about potential opponents for Golovkin. Loeffler also would like to match Golovkin against Daniel Jacobs and Billy Joe Saunders among others. Those fights aren’t likely to happen anytime soon if ever.
“BERNARD HOPKINS EX @THEREALBHOP It’s was talk about me and GGG Boxing! I would’ve came down and he would’ve came up. I did accept the fight,” Hopkins said on his Twitter. “I don’t turn down any fights. I’m old school fighter. Let’s talk! I’m 51 had a great career. I want to fight one more time soon before I shut it down! I fought Krusher Kovalev; he’s a great strong tough fighter! He’s a great champ and friend.”
Hopkins hasn’t fought since losing a wide 12 round unanimous decision to light heavyweight world champion Sergey “Krusher” Kovalev in November 2014. Hopkins didn’t have the fire power to match up with the younger, stronger Kovalev in that fight. Hopkins did the best he could, but all he could really do was survive by using movement and not really trying to win the fight. It was pure survival for Hopkins.
Hopkins is already in the shutdown mode with his career whether he wants to admit it or not. He stopped fighting after the loss to Kovalev, and that was a mistake on his part. If he kept busy, he could have gotten at least three or four extra fights by now. Maybe he wouldn’t have gotten the big names, but he would have at least kept busy and stayed sharp.
Hopkins is doing what Winky Wright did by staying out of the ring near the end of his career and waiting for one big fight. You can’t do that in this sport. You have to keep busy by taking the best fights you can. If you get beat, then that’s the way it is.
Hopkins says he offered to fight WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson in Canada, but he doesn’t want to fight him. Instead, Stevenson is looking to fight a rematch with one of his past opponents.
“BERNARD HOPKINS EX @THEREALBHOP Now this @AdonisSuperman isn’t a real champ!! I said I fight him in Canada. He don’t want to fight me!!! He wants to rematch a guy he beat,” Hopkins said.
I think Hopkins is referring to Andrzej Fonfara as the guy that Stevenson is possibly interested in fighting again. There’s nothing wrong with Stevenson fighting Fonfara again. At least Fonfara has been busy lately and not sitting inactive since the tail end of 2014.
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