By William Mackay: Former super middleweight champion Joe Calzaghe (46-0, 32 KO’s) has no interest in making a comeback for a big money fight against 46-year-old Bernard Hopkins despite the cash that Calzaghe could make to help cushion his retirement. Calzaghe was at the Amir Khan – Zab Judah fight last Saturday night in Las Vegas and was given an offer to sit down next to Hopkins.

However, Calzaghe opted not to take the seat, saying this to Primetime: “I think Bernard has a seat for me on the other side of the ring. I know what he will do, he will try and talk me into fighting him, but I am done. I am finished. I’ve done my thing, undefeated, two years ago and I am not coming back. So sorry to disappoint everybody.

Calzaghe won a controversial 12 round split decision victory over Hopkins three years ago in 2008 in a fight that many boxing fans felt should have gone to Hopkins. Calzaghe had no interest in clearing up the controversy and instead of taking on Hopkins in a rematch, Calzaghe opted to finish his career by facing the shot Roy Jones Jr in November 2008. Calzaghe easily won that fight and then retired. Calzaghe had offers to face the much more dangerous Chad Dawson and Kelly Pavlik at the time, but fought Jones instead.

The criticism about Calzaghe is that the 10 year period where he held the WBO super middleweight title he was facing weak opposition in a very weak division during those years. The super middleweight division didn’t start heating up until 2008 when guys like Carl Froch, Lucian Bute, Andre Ward, and Andre Dirrell started to make noise. However, Calzaghe didn’t see any reason to fight any of those fighters for some reason, something that has led to more than a few fans thinking that Calzaghe was afraid to risk his unbeaten record against them. It’s hard to argue with the timing of Calzaghe’s retirement. He clearly got out when the division got really, really good. Had he stuck around, Calzaghe might have lost over and over again. It’s good thing that he got out but he short changed himself in the process.