next »

[Aaron]

True to a degree, but when the challenge does not come to you, you go to it. For me Joe just did not show the ambition to do that, be it going up a few pound in weight or whatever.

[motoriser]

Are you serious? Calzaghe is probably the best example of being able to adapt mid fight in recent years. He decided to trade when it became clear Brewer was more than competent on the outside. He found himself on the deck and on the edge against Mitchell, so opted to fight fire with fire. Behind on the cards against Kessler he changed strategy to win the fight. Dropped against Hopkins, he didn't let Hopkins assert himself like BHop has done in almost every outing since.

But why let facts get in the way of good Ward post eh?!  

Against a Boxer like Hopkins he did not do anything special to show adaptation.
He could not hurt the guy,he just threw aimless flurries that Manny Steward described as Amateurish coz they were not even landing.With the Crowd on his side,the judges were swayed into giving him rounds in which he did not do anything with substance.
Bhop's Ignorant comments before the fight worked against him and he should have won that fight,even Joe's father told him in the final round that he has to score a knockout or else he will lose.He did not stop him and should have lost,but he MILKED it.
A Prime Athletic Ward who even has a better Amateur Pedigree that shits all over Calzaghe's.Also Ward won his first World Title with less fights and had to defeat a reigning Champion instead of a weight drained former Champion who took the fight at 2 weeks notice.
Ward only took 2 years to Unify,unlike No show Joe who took a whopping 9 years !, plus Ward has not faced anywhere near as many Bums as Joe has done.
You won't see Ward rematching Shelby Pudwill like how Joe re matched Veit.
Joe Slappie's Greatness is padded with a capital P.

[Brick Top]

Against a Boxer like Hopkins he did not do anything special to show adaptation.
He could not hurt the guy,he just threw aimless flurries that Manny Steward described as Amateurish coz they were not even landing.With the Crowd on his side,the judges were swayed into giving him rounds in which he did not do anything with substance.
Bhop's Ignorant comments before the fight worked against him and he should have won that fight,even Joe's father told him in the final round that he has to score a knockout or else he will lose.He did not stop him and should have lost,but he MILKED it.
A Prime Athletic Ward who even has a better Amateur Pedigree that shits all over Calzaghe's.Also Ward won his first World Title with less fights and had to defeat a reigning Champion instead of a weight drained former Champion who took the fight at 2 weeks notice.
Ward only took 2 years to Unify,unlike No show Joe who took a whopping 9 years !, plus Ward has not faced anywhere near as many Bums as Joe has done.
You won't see Ward rematching Shelby Pudwill like how Joe re matched Veit.
Joe Slappie's Greatness is padded with a capital P.

Calzaghe agains Hopkins was not in his prime, he was going into his late thirties, it's pointless to use that version of him as a yard stick

[motoriser]

Calzaghe agains Hopkins was not in his prime, he was going into his late thirties, it's pointless to use that version of him as a yard stick

Lets say we take that fight out of the equation even though Hopkins was 43 and had lost twice to Taylor.
Still when Joe was in his 20s or what ever time his fans consider to be his Prime,who did he beat?
Still I can't see anyone of note,let alone a pure Boxer he faced,to show how he would have handled a guy with freakish Athletic attributes plus very good defensive skills/Boxing fundamentals of Ward?
He got tagged a lot by a basic one two Kessler and his defense was not crash hot anyways.
The same Kessler looked completely lost against a Green Ward as his Jab was offset,his right hand was neutralized from the start.

[presa]

America dude. Like brit pop stars... you need to break America for history to notice you with maximum impact... and the american's had a lot of respect for Calzaghe.

because joe boxed and the americans like boxers with style.. Tbf to joe he had a nice style to watch when in a rythm.

[Baz88]

You know what they say, the world has gone mad. If a guy can reach that level of status with such a small number of maningful wins then there must be hundreds of modern day greats.

I won't deny his skills could of made him one, but his record regardless of the 0 is simply leagues below so many current guys I can't justify that. Without the big two, cotto, Hopkins, Morales, Oscar, rjj, Barrera, juan marquez are just some of the guys I would not mention Joe in the same breath as.

When you consider he is a two time ring magazine champion at two different weights and retired pfp no 2 then you could argue he will be remembered as better than Cotto, and rightly so. The rest will be remembered more fondly than Calzaghe because of their willingness to take on all-comers I agree.

[Tim2366]

When was Calzaghes prime?

[Scarface]

Against a Boxer like Hopkins he did not do anything special to show adaptation.
He could not hurt the guy,he just threw aimless flurries that Manny Steward described as Amateurish coz they were not even landing.With the Crowd on his side,the judges were swayed into giving him rounds in which he did not do anything with substance.
Bhop's Ignorant comments before the fight worked against him and he should have won that fight,even Joe's father told him in the final round that he has to score a knockout or else he will lose.He did not stop him and should have lost,but he MILKED it.
A Prime Athletic Ward who even has a better Amateur Pedigree that shits all over Calzaghe's.Also Ward won his first World Title with less fights and had to defeat a reigning Champion instead of a weight drained former Champion who took the fight at 2 weeks notice.
Ward only took 2 years to Unify,unlike No show Joe who took a whopping 9 years !, plus Ward has not faced anywhere near as many Bums as Joe has done.
You won't see Ward rematching Shelby Pudwill like how Joe re matched Veit.
Joe Slappie's Greatness is padded with a capital P.

The complication arises when you wonder if whether the likes of calzaghe, hopkins or RJJ would have lost to the opponents ward has faced to date. I believe that the majority of the boxing world would say "No they wouldn't have lost".

This is where that air of dominance, styles, ring craft and fitness comes into play.

I am not saying that Ward has under achieved so far... all I'm saying is that perhaps he has defeated boxers that calzaghe would also have defeated too. The same could be said in reverse of course... ward would defeat every one of calzagh's opponents. Nobody can say but the question will linger....

[Baz88]

I'm gonna put it out there that maybe we feel the smw division has more depth now because we know the fighters due to the super 6? Therefore peoples achievements are getting blown out of proportion? The likes of Byron Mitchell were arguably better more established opposition at the weight than Dirrell, Taylor, Johnson (on account of him having not fought at the weight for years), and Abraham. Yet as these fighters have become household names due to the tournament maybe people would think this is a ridiculous statement to make without actually taking into account the histories of the boxers.

Some of the less heralded Calzaghe opponents:
Byron Mitchell made successive defenses of his world strap before being robbed against Ottke
Brewer made successful defenses (wba or ibf i dont remember)
Woodhall made successful defenses (wbc)
Lacy made successful defenses (ibf)
Reid made successful defenses (wbc)

All at the smw limit. Then throw in solid wins against Bika, and a weight drained Eubank. Now we can pick apart the resume of every boxer mentioned there no problem at all as we can with anybody but the records I just listed are stone cold factual.

Does Andre or Carl ACTUALLY beat the list above in terms of the calabre of their respective wins... and thats without throwing Kessler and Bhop in there.

I realise this is a controversial post but then again im just throwing a few facts in to show that actually his career wasnt totally wasted, and although he didnt have many wins against household names back in the day, thats not to say the opposition was any less credible... perhaps when looking at the fact these guys all made several successful defenses then maybe they are even more credible.

[motoriser]

^^The names  you mention were beaten by lesser opponents at a time when the 168 Division was at its weakest.
Brewer was beaten by Echols and Ottke,Echols was outboxed by Mundine.
Lacy was a hype job who would have been humiliated by Mundine had he opted to fight him instead of Joe.
Lacy is pretty much more or less like an Allan Green in that he's left hook heavy and easy to beat.Just that Lacy won a Vacant Belt at a time when the Division was very weak.
If he was fighting in this Era he would not even have won a single belt let alone the IBF.Just look at how talented Dirrel is and yet he does not have a Title yet.If he fought in the Lacy era he would have won titles for sure for he is waaay more talented that Lacy,Mitchell/Brewer  could ever be.
Mitchell was ordinary,he too was beaten by Ottke.
So meh.

[Scarface]

Calzaghe entering a weak SM era is unquestionable but america had 10 years to find an opponent and came up short. Tyson also entered a very weak HW era, but very few people criticise the static terrified opponents he faced to secure his legacy. Tyson faced those in his weight class and so did calzaghe. He was never going to drop a weight class to face hopkins. Naturally heavier fighters rarely do that. Though he should have tried to get a fight with rjj sooner.

You have to try to remember calzaghe was suppose to lose against mitchell, kessler and lacy. The forums at the time were screaming for cowardly joe to face them. He did, he won and then overnight his opponents were considered inferior and of poor quality. That is no fault of calzaghes though. He would probably be the underdog now against ward. Though if he stepped out of retirement and miraculously won. Ward would be considered too defensive or lacking of experience.

With reference to motorisers comments about the defeats suffered by calzaghes opponents. Dont get me started on some of tysons.

[presa]

Calzaghe entering a weak SM era is unquestionable but america had 10 years to find an opponent and came up short. Tyson also entered a very weak HW era, but very few people criticise the static terrified opponents he faced to secure his legacy. Tyson faced those in his weight class and so did calzaghe. He was never going to drop a weight class to face hopkins. Naturally heavier fighters rarely do that. Though he should have tried to get a fight with rjj sooner.   

You have to try to remember calzaghe was suppose to lose against mitchell, kessler and lacy. The forums at the time were screaming for cowardly joe to face them. He did, he won and then overnight his opponents were considered inferior and of poor quality. That is no fault of calzaghes though. He would probably be the underdog now against ward. Though if he stepped out of retirement and miraculously won. Ward would be considered too defensive or lacking of experience.

mate he did.. RJJ stated i think in his book that joe wasnt in roys plans for his career so they snubbed a fight offer.

joe was superb at what he did. there are going to be very few fighters who can match his workrate and skill.

pity he never got to show how good he was against a 'really good fighter', or was it the fact that joe was too good for any of them?

[Baz88]

^^The names  you mention were beaten by lesser opponents at a time when the 168 Division was at its weakest.
Brewer was beaten by Echols and Ottke,Echols was outboxed by Mundine.
Lacy was a hype job who would have been humiliated by Mundine had he opted to fight him instead of Joe.
Lacy is pretty much more or less like an Allan Green in that he's left hook heavy and easy to beat.Just that Lacy won a Vacant Belt at a time when the Division was very weak.
If he was fighting in this Era he would not even have won a single belt let alone the IBF.Just look at how talented Dirrel is and yet he does not have a Title yet.If he fought in the Lacy era he would have won titles for sure for he is waaay more talented that Lacy,Mitchell/Brewer  could ever be.
Mitchell was ordinary,he too was beaten by Ottke.
So meh.

They all made several successful defenses though, which is the point im making, and Joe fought them pretty much in around those periods. Mitchell took an absolute robbing from Ottke and that fight should have been for 3 world straps when Calzaghe fought him, a vastly vastly underrated win.

Just out of interest who has Ward beaten that was undefeated when he faced them then?
Kessler - beaten by Calzaghe already (made successful defenses)
Bika - the same
Green - No better than Lacy apparently
Froch - beaten by Kessler (made successful defenses)
Abraham - no better than Green at smw.

...and people have the audacity to say hes achieved more already? Less of the bandwagon, more of the cold hard facts.

[Aaron]

Baz get over the whole undefeated opponents thing lol, most of the time these days that just means a guy ain't been tested.

Hatton, cotto, marg, Oscar, clottey, Marquez had all lost before they faced Manny, it does not make that run any less impressive. If they were all undefeated then most of them would never of faced each other and boxing would be shit.

[Scarface]

Baz get over the whole undefeated opponents thing lol, most of the time these days that just means a guy ain't been tested.

Hatton, cotto, marg, Oscar, clottey, Marquez had all lost before they faced Manny, it does not make that run any less impressive. If they were all undefeated then most of them would never of faced each other and boxing would be shit.

That is very true, boxing would be shit. However we live in a world where calzaghe is slated for fighting old man hopkins years ago instead of fighting froch. Froch would have given his left tit to face hopkins back then and now.