Bernard Hopkins: An Unsportsman-like Flopper

[Addison]

It certainly shows that people have different likes and dislikes when it comes to judging.
Bernard did very well for a fighter of his age, he said he busted Joe up, but, apart from one tiny cut on his nose, Joe was blemish free. If you are landing shots that are that much more hurtful than your oponent then surely that should slow the opponent down, Calzaghe accelerated in the later rounds.... no Jumbo sunglasses needed the next day to hide the 'cleaner shots' that landed

Let's not remove Calzaghe's resolve from any equation. Combine that with his will power and chin, and you have a guy it would take an entire 17 shot clip to put down. Can't quite go with that logic anyway.. HaHA.. Ever heard of something called degrees?

Where is this coming from anyway? HaHA..

[Kris Silver]

This article is the biggest one-sided piece of crap I've read in a while on this site. You have obviously gone over the top and made exaggerated claims to prove your point. You even said you scored the fight 116-113 yet this article sounds like Hopkins was the one who got knocked down in the first round. Joe won by the standards of most judges and apparently most of the boxing public (simply more activity and being the "aggressor"), however Bernard won by the standards of a lot of judges, most boxers and a decent amount of boxing fans (landing harder, more effective punches as opposed to amateur and Olympic style taps that count for 1 point just like a knockdown in that scoring system). CompuBox is not God and has shown to be flawed in the past and you must be smoking something if you quote and follow Joe's 189 to 111 power punches. How do you determine how many punches land when Joe throws a combo of 10 in two seconds and Bernard retaliates with 3 or 4? Looked like 4 landed for Joe and 1 landed for Hopkins. Bernard didn't get hurt, Joe didn't really get hurt. Bernard did get hit with a low blow, but definitely milked it for rest. But can you blame a 43 year old man. And isn't that a smart thing to do if you were him and truly were tired? I didn't say "brave" or "manly", I said "smart" and completely within the rules.

Unlike an over passionate, ranting biased fan, a journalist/writer has to be balanced and unbiased, so if anyone's out of line it's you. This site is well respected with decent, fair journalists and writers. Who are you to try to undermine them, with an argument akin to a child acting out against the unconvenient truth, and saying, nah nah, I'm right.

Look for blame elsewhere, like the losing fighter, and your bias, not cowardly elsewhere at judges, journalists and writers, like Hops and clearly you. Your in the minority, answer why that is? Is there some kind of conspiracy against the American legend against the underrated Welsh fighter, in America? No. When your arguments have an underlying feel of effectively suggesting such a thing though, the only person your proving to have a lack of objectivity or judgement is yourself.

Nard got a flash knockdown, something the writer even doesn't say, just knock-down. He didn't say Joe was out of balance and partially pushed. He didn't say Joe was not hurt and down for a second, then back up and as normal.

If that was even 60% of his hardest shot, he had nothing on Joes solid chin, he took much harder shots of Kessler and carried on un fazed. Joe did got the more effective punches in, hence doing two things rarely seen with Hops. He was slowed right down to throwing even less, holding, and time wasting to catch his breath. He had the most punches landed on him for many many years. He was out witted, and out gunned. I suggest you re-read the article on Hopkins being a bad loser, because it seems to apply to you aswell.

[Pullcounter]

By John Hively - Bernard Hopkins showed his usual unsportsman-like conduct after he got his butt kicked by Joe Calzaghe last Saturday in Las Vegas. After the bout, he did his best to convince his audience that he'd won, that he had given Joe a boxing lesson, that the decision was a bad one. He refused to give the man, who had so obviously trounced him, any credit whatsoever for landing 232 times to the head and body over twelve-rounds.

This fight was a little more one-sided than the judges decreed, at least from my point of view. True, Hopkins was competitive. He floored Calzaghe in the first round with a right cross, and he won a few rounds afterwards; and a few other rounds were difficult to score. But he was out hit nearly two to one over the course of the fight.

The seventh, eighth and tenth rounds demonstrated how badly those 232 punches slowed 'The Executioner' down.

I gave Hopkins the opening round 10-8 based on his knockdown. During the early rounds, Hopkins counterpunched, but not all that effectively. In the second round, he landed a nice right cross. Hopkins was landing less than Joe, but Max Kellerman suggested he was landing more effective punches. The commentators repeated this throughout the fight, but I have my doubts that it was true. For example, Calzaghe landed a crackling left hook flush to Hopkins jaw in the second heat. If what Kellerman said was true, that all began to change in the third stanza, as Calzaghe began landing not only more punches than Bernard, but also clouts that were just as effective as anything landed by Hopkins, except for the right cross that floored Joe in the first.

Bernard’s primary offence was to throw one punch at a time, then clinch. Sometimes it seemed as though he was leading with his head. This tactic did not work very well. [details]

One can make a case that Hopkins won the fight. It was an ugly, sloppy fight. Hopkins shouldn't complain though, but Calzaghe didn't really "beat" Hopkins.

[adthomas2]

I personally think Joe won the fight easily and I do think BHop should retire and like I said before the fight I think running should be left for the track stars and fighting should be left for the ring BHop would just throw a punch and then hold on as long as he could and then run to me thats not a fight Joe on the other hand chased him all around the ring and even tough alot of his punches didnt connect as clean as one would have hoped for at least he was throwing and not running like he was scared but hey its just my opinion and everyone has one....lol

[The Hammer]

This is the most accurate article I've read on the fight!

[marsman]

This is a poor article because if you watch the tape, Hopkins was beating Calzaghe, and as a matter of fact he fought him the same way Floyd fought Ricky. This article sucks, just let people watch the tape.

[kayjay]

lol............

[mECHsLAVE]

I think Hopkins looking for help, twice, is the most telling fact.

Ok, so if none of Joe's punches were landing, or landing hard, then why would Hopkins be looking for a way out? Hehe. That acting **** was just embarrassing. And he even tried it again, which screamed desperation. Why is Hopkins so desperate to lobby the ref for a point deduction/dq if he's not getting hit and is winning so convincingly? LOL If the fight is so easy for him, why does he need to fake it for a "time out"?

Last I looked, fighters who are giving the other guy a "boxing lesson" don't fake injuries looking for help from the ref. All that walking around and fake grimacing was just lobbying Cortez to take a point away, because Hopkins knew he needed it. And he was really hoping for a DQ, I think, esp the second time. But Cortez was having none of the acting. Good for him. Cortez saw through it both times. The guy's been around boxing long enough to know when a fighter got hurt with a low blow and when he's faking it.

Hopkins has never admitted defeat, so why would he start now? He got beat. It wasn't even a hard fight to score, unless you are a diehard Hopkins fan. I picked Hopkins to win, but he didn't. The sour g****s from the delusional Hopkins fans is getting old quick.

[Haglerwins]

That assessment makes no sense. BHop was dead tired buddy. I bet on this more than him doing what he did to try to get points out of it. He took every opportunity he could to conserve energy once the speed of the bout picked up. If he wanted out of that fight he would have blatantly fouled Joe to the balls or used his head/elbows to get DQ'd.

[Degsy]

Let's not remove Calzaghe's resolve from any equation. Combine that with his will power and chin, and you have a guy it would take an entire 17 shot clip to put down. Can't quite go with that logic anyway.. HaHA.. Ever heard of something called degrees?

Where is this coming from anyway? HaHA..

Yep Joe does have a great chin and determination, he didn't give up chasing Bernard.

Just can't see in any way how anyone could give Bernard the fight, but opinions are like *******s everyones got one lol