By Scott Gilfoid: Joe Calzaghe, the Legend Killer, as many of his fans like to call him, has done well for himself during his 16-year career. With wins over Roy Jones Jr. and Bernard Hopkins, Calzaghe has beaten two of the biggest names in boxing during the 90s. Granted, Calzaghe caught up them at the tail end of their career, both 40ish and clearly not the same fighter they were in the early portion of their career.
It doesn’t matter, because Calzaghe still beat them and that’s all fans care about, right? Years from now, people will look at Calzaghe’s record and see that he has wins over Jones and Hopkins and will probably be very impressed, even if the current boxing fans base don’t see it as a particularly big deal. Who cares? What do they know?
Not only has Calzaghe beaten Jones and Hopkins, he’s also beaten former WBO super middleweight champion Chris Eubank by a 12-round decision in October 1997. It doesn’t matter that Eubank was pretty much past it by that point in his career, having lost two out of his last six fights by the time Calzaghe got a hold of him. it doesn’t matter, a win is a win.
At the end of the day, Calzaghe can say that he beat Eubank, even if it was at the end of Chris’s career. He still beat him, and whenever fans look at Calzaghe’s record, they’ll see and have a lot of respect for Calzaghe. It doesn’t matter that a lot of existing fans nowadays don’t see it as an impressive feat. If they don’t, future cans will, you can bet on it.
If that wasn’t enough, Calzaghe has also beaten Richie Woodhall, the former WBC super middleweight champion and highly talented fighter, by a 10th round stoppage in October 2000. By coincidence, this was Woodhall’s last fight of his career, and he, too, had a degree of misfortunate strike him a year earlier, losing his WBC super middleweight crown to German Markus Beyer by a 12-round decision. It doesn’t matter, Calzaghe still beat him.
Taken together, these three wins have shaped Calzaghe’s career, made him what he is and has carved a name for him, making him the Legend Killer, a fighter that has beaten some of the biggest names in boxing, even if it did come under less than desirable circumstances. He still did it and you can’t take that away from him. Those names will shine on Calzaghe’s record for all of time, showing that they weren’t good enough to beat him. For all eternity, his fans can point to that to validate how good he really was.
Comments are closed.