By David Lahr: World Boxing Council light heavyweight interim champion Chad Dawson (29-0, 17 KO’s) had some choice words to say about Bernard Hopkins in today’s press release, saying “He’s [Hopkins] on the run like the one-armed man in ‘The Fugitive’. Eventually the law catches up to him. Well, I’m the sheriff of the light heavyweight division and I’m putting a stop to Hopkins’ con.” Ouch!
Dawson, a former IBF and WBC light heavyweight champion, has been fruitlessly been pursuing a fight with Hopkins for well over a year without any success. Instead, Hopkins has elected to fight middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik at a catch weight of 170, and now Hopkins will be facing another middleweight Enrique Ornelas tonight in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Hopkins, 44, was using the fight against Ornelas, more or less, as a tune-up bout for his March 2010 fight against Roy Jones Jr. The fight against Jones appears to be up in the air now that Jones was taken out in the 1st round tonight in Sydney, Australia by International Boxing Organization (IBO) cruiserweight champion Danny Green. It would seem logical that Hopkins would almost have to consider fighting Dawson now.
There’s really few other options for Hopkins unless he wants to move up to heavyweight and try to pursue WBA heavyweight champion David Haye. If that’s the case, Hopkins is going to have to get in line and wait a little longer, possibly until the end of 2010, if ever. Haye has a title defense against John Ruiz in early 2010, and following that Haye has interest in fighting one of the Klitschko brothers.
A fight against either of the world champion Klitschko brothers would clearly give Haye a much bigger payday than a fight against an undersized, 45-year-old Hopkins, who has no title belt in his possession at this time.
Dawson had more to say about Hopkins, remarking “First he said he’d fight the winner of my fight with Glen Johnson. I won and Hopkins hid. Second, he said he’d fight the winner of my rematch with Johnson. I won and this time Hopkins chose to fight some guy named Enrique Ornelas, who has lost to almost every decent middleweight he’s ever fought. And on top of that, the fight isn’t worthy of being broadcast on HBO, Showtime or even ESPN2!” It’s hard to find anything to disagree with Dawson about his views on the Ornelas fight. Hopkins chose a middleweight to fight instead of someone in his own division, the light heavyweight division.
You can understand Hopkins wanting to fight Jones, because he has a victory over him and it would have been a good payday. But the Ornelas fight is disappointing. But now that Jones looks to be out of the picture due to his loss to Green, Hopkins needs to step up and take on Dawson rather than another middleweight. The Ornelas bout is the second consecutive middleweight that Hopkins has fought. He needs to start fighting people in his own division or if he is serious about wanting to fight Haye, he should gain some weight and go after a tune-up fight against a good heavyweight contender.
“Hopkins knows that if he fights me, he’s looking at a loss of Calzaghe proportions,” Dawson says.
Hopkins lost a narrow decision to Joe Calzaghe in April 2008, a fight in which Hopkins clinched constantly and fell down a number of times due to low blows that didn’t appear to be all that low. Although Hopkins redeemed himself by beating Pavlik in October 2008, the loss against Calzaghe was a disappointing performance from Hopkins.
“Bernard, it’s time for you to pack it in and get out of my division,” Dawson says. “If you’re not willing to fight the best light heavyweight, move along and quit wasting everyone’s time. You deep well of excuses, along with your credibility has dried up. You weighed 175 pounds for tonight’s fight [with Ornelas], Roy Jones was knocked out in 122 seconds today and HBO has a March date available. No more excuses.”
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