By Eric Thomas: After watching Bernard Hopkins give previously undefeated Kelly Pavlik a total boxing lesson en route to defeating him by an easy 12-round unanimous decision, I have to wonder whether or not Pavlik will ever be the same fighter again after the way he was beaten. It wasn’t just an average run of the mill type beating, this was a thorough domination from start to finish with Pavlik utterly helpless against the faster, stronger and much more nimble Hopkins. Hopkins won by the scores of 117-109, 119-106 and 118-108, but they only tell the partial story of how badly Pavlik was beaten.

He got beaten every way you could imagine – on the outside, inside and in the power game. Pavlik was just too slow and crude, and looked like he didn’t belong in the same ring with Hopkins. While Pavlik can console himself with not having lost his WBC/WBO middleweight titles, which weren’t on the line on Saturday because he was fighting at 170, the loss is perhaps even more damaging than him losing mere titles.

Being 26, 17 years younger than the 43 year-old Hopkins, it was assumed that Pavlik would be able to easily beat the older champion. After all, Pavlik was considered by many to be the best middleweight in the division bar none. However, he was never competitive against Hopkins, who hit him at will with lunging jabs, left hooks and right hands all night long. Pavlik was only effective in a couple of rounds, mostly the middle rounds, but then Hopkins easily pulled away from in the latter half of the fight.

After the fight, Hopkins walked up to Pavlik, whose face was red and beaten from having been hit so often during the fight, and tried to console him, but Pavlik looked shattered as a fighter. Hopkins told Pavlik not to let the loss destroy him as a fighter, and that he was still the best fighter at 160. However, judging by the way Pavlik looked and the way he was beaten, I’m not so sure he’ll ever be the same again.

He has future plans of fighting Arthur Abraham, the IBF middleweight champion. I’d say that’s a bad idea for Pavlik, because Abraham will no doubt have looked at this fight and will have a blue print in which to beat Pavlik. As it is, Abraham has the speed, combinations and the foot movement to prevent Pavlik from being able to get off his punches like he usually does. What Pavlik needs to do, though, is to stay away from really good fighters like Abraham, Hopkins, Paul Williams, and focus on just defending his titles against the lesser fighters in the middleweight division.

Right now, the division is the weakest it’s been in years, and even though Pavlik was totally exposed by Hopkins as a limited, straight ahead, one-dimensional fighter, Pavlik is still good enough to defend his title for a long time against the likes of John Duddy, Marco Rubio, Sebastian Zbik, David Lopez and other fighters of that ilk. Pavlik has got to stay away from the good middleweights because they’ll now know how to beat him. I’m not sure if Pavlik will ever be the same after Saturday night. It’s too bad, because he didn’t have to take this fight with Hopkins.

This was a fight that Pavlik chose to take because of the money. Believe me, he would have been much better off if he had just continued defending his title against the limited opposition in the middleweight division, making easy money, until he finally met up with a fighter that used lateral movement like Hopkins. Once that happened, Pavlik would have probably been exposed like he was on Saturday night by Hopkins, but at least it would have taken awhile for it to occur. As it is now, I think Pavlik may be ruined, his confidence shot to pieces in the same manner than Jeff Lacy’s was after his defeat to Joe Calzaghe. It’s too bad, because Pavlik had such potential.