By Mark Vester
We may have seen the end of Bernard Hopkins last weekend. After his dominating win over Kelly Pavlik, Hopkins told BoxingScene.com's Jose "OnFire" Aguirre that his only motivation to continue fighting was to land the winner of the November 8 bout between Roy Jones Jr. and Joe Calzaghe. Calzaghe, who won a close decision over Hopkins in April, said that he was not interested in a Hopkins rematch and would not even consider the fight.
Jones has followed the lead of Calzaghe. He won a unanimous decision over Hopkins 15-years-ago and while the rematch was discussed about 20 times over the years, it just simply may never happen. Seaking with the father of BoxingScene, Tim Smith, at the Kingsway Gym in Manhattan, Jones was pretty serious when stating that no matter what Hopkins or the people say - there will be no rematch.
"I don't care what people say, I'm not fighting him," Jones said. "They can ask all they want. I'm through with him."
According to Jones, Hopkins turned down $8 million for a rematch back in 2001. He also spoke to Jones about a rematch in 2006, but Jones called it a ploy to land the fight with Tarver.
"After that I told him we were through," Jones said. "I told him that I wasn't going to ever fight him. I don't see how it's ever going to work out."
Jones did praise Hopkins for his win over Pavlik and said that he wasn't surprised by it.
"I thought he fought a brilliant fight," said Jones. "I wasn't surprised. Kelly Pavlik didn't have any experience. He hadn't fought anybody except Jermain Taylor. Kelly Pavlik didn't belong in the ring with someone with the kind of experience that Bernard Hopkins has."
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