By Adam Fillingham: After Carl Froch’s defeat of Jermain Taylor on the 25 of April a lot of people have written off the victory due to Taylor being ‘past his best’. Is this true? Or is this just an excuse due to Froch being British? Just look at the fighters that he has as potential opponents:

Lucian Bute:

Bute who holds the IBF world championship is a good fighter with an unbeaten record. Bute though hasn’t defeated anyone with any substance (maybe with the exception of Sakio Bika). He also isn’t a very big name, so with Lucian Bute on your record it isn’t going to give him much credit. Also it is pretty risky due to Bute’s power but Froch does have a granite chin.

Mikkel Kessler

Although by most people being ranked number one in the super middleweight division and being the WBA world champion, Mikkel Kessler is slatted by mainly American pundits for not facing the ‘best’ American fighters and staying in Europe. If Froch defeats Kessler (which in my opinion at this moment in time he wouldn’t) he will get the same recognitions as Calzaghe did. None.

Bernard Hopkins

Although Hopkins is by far the biggest name on this list, he is probably the easiest to come up for excuses for. Bernard is 44 years old and is will most likely be slower than he was against Calzaghe. Froch also may not get much recognition as Calzaghe has already beaten him, unless he can be the first man ever to knock Hopkins out. As far as I can see only knocking Hopkins out will do anything for Froch’s legacy to American fans.

Karoly Balzsay

A unification bout with Balzsay could be on the cards. Balzsay though is virtually unknown to most, even hard core boxing fans, and rated the worst champion in the division. Defeating the undefeated in 21 fights Balzsay would do nothing for Froch’s legacy because of this and would make little money in a bout with the Hungarian.

Kelly Pavlik

A name being thrown around a little is WBO/WBC middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik. Pavlik is already being called overrated by a lot of boxing fans and for Froch to beat him would only enhance this statement. Also Pavlik has lost heavily recently to a 43 year old Bernard Hopkins which will also help to take the sting out of a victory.

Jermain Taylor (Rematch)

If Froch was to defeat Taylor again hopefully more convincingly, then I do doubt that he would get much credit for it. Taylor has now been defeated 3 times in his last 4 bouts. This point will crop up if Froch was to defeat him again.

So as far as I can see Froch can’t get any credit for anything he achieves. The only thing I can think of is if he defeats all of the above fighters. This could be on the cards, you never know.