Hypocrisy in Calzaghe Criticism

[Live Dog]

The hypocrisy of late is underlined with Pavlik fighting Williams. Ppl say it's not on or good that Williams is jumping up 2 weight divisions to fight him. Yet it's ok for Kelly to do it, if he were to fight Joe.

Another is the justification so often of so many fighters and fights, is there, fight at this weight to prove yourself first. Yet ppl think Pavlik after one defence against a bum, is worthy of just jumping up in probably 2 weight divisions to take on the #1 guy. What happened to work your way up? And then ppl say Calzaghe should have moved up to LHW to get into a position to fight the top guys at LHW. Well, erm, isn't that what Kelly should do if he wants to fight the big boys at different weights?

1) Pavlik has had two defenses.

2) You can't fault Kelly for wanting to fight Joe asap. Joe is an aging fighter and probably does not have all that much time in the sport. If Kelly doesn't get a shot now, he may never get one at all.

[Kris Silver]

then thats just the way it is, and i understand that, and if joe couldnt get the fights back 6-7 years ago, well then maybe its not his fault... but regardless of fault... he didnt fight them, he didnt beat them..

i didnt mention the other names because im talking about his best wins... your best wins define your career in my respective opinion.. and his best wins to me are lacy kessler and bernard, possibly roy...

lacy and kessler arent kind of proven fighters... they arent proven fighters...

kessler has a great record, but ricky hatton and diego corrales showed us that doesnt mean much...

and that doesnt mean im saying kessler isnt good, he is good, hes very good, he can fight... but hes not great...

and weve went over roy and bernard...

beating roy and bernard in their primes would be GREAT wins... beating them now would be very good wins...



and your right, if he were to beat pavlik.. a guy whose been the MW champ for about a year or less, jumping up two weight classes.. no joe probably wouldnt get much credit for it...

although me personally... i think it would be a great win for joe, if he were to beat pavlik... then again... when u go from MW to LHW in one fight, that severely ****s up your fight game, for some anyway, not all..

and chad dawson, yeah hes not exactly a great fighter, but he is young, he is a champion... but ur right, he isnt as proven as the aging greats...


im not blaming joe, joe very well might have gotten the short stick on great opponents, by the time he got the great fighters, they were well past their prime, and the other good fighters, werent proven yet... and that sucks for joe...


but regardless of whose fault it is, i still havent aeen a "great" win from Joe against a "Great" fighter...

im not blaming him for it, im just calling it like i see it

Good post and fair. I feel like we delving into excuses now, but it's more just trying to paint the bigger picture of the scene at certain times, and how a lot of other fighters aren't as different as made out. I mean even Kesslers getting some respect on the boards now, and to be fair, he hasn't fought as decent competition or out of his country as much as Joe. So why does Joe get a harder time on both these points.

I'm sure even Calzaghe would've wanted bigger, greater wins, but in the grand scheme of things, he's done pretty good. The benchmark for respecting or crediting ppl significantly seems to be oddly high on some fighters, some times.

As I said, you can put a negative spin on many fighters, even sometimes there best wins, just how it is. It's important to not over focus on certain aspects, but the wider picture, and comparisons however. And in doing that I think Joe's resume, greatest wins, and his top 10 wins, aren't half as bad as is often made out. There's lots on the plus that just never gets commented on, yet the negatives are, ppl read it, it spirals and so on.

[THE REED]

Good post and fair. I feel like we delving into excuses now, but it's more just trying to paint the bigger picture of the scene at certain times, and how a lot of other fighters aren't as different as made out. I mean even Kesslers getting some respect on the boards now, and to be fair, he hasn't fought as decent competition or out of his country as much as Joe. So why does Joe get a harder time on both these points.

I'm sure even Calzaghe would've wanted bigger, greater wins, but in the grand scheme of things, he's done pretty good. The benchmark for respecting or crediting ppl significantly seems to be oddly high on some fighters, some times.

As I said, you can put a negative spin on many fighters, even sometimes there best wins, just how it is. It's important to not over focus on certain aspects, but the wider picture, and comparisons however. And in doing that I think Joe's resume, greatest wins, and his top 10 wins, aren't half as bad as is often made out. There's lots on the plus that just never gets commented on, yet the negatives are, ppl read it, it spirals and so on.

seems like this would be a good time to conclude our debate then

[Live Dog]

Good post and fair. I feel like we delving into excuses now, but it's more just trying to paint the bigger picture of the scene at certain times, and how a lot of other fighters aren't as different as made out. I mean even Kesslers getting some respect on the boards now, and to be fair, he hasn't fought as decent competition or out of his country as much as Joe. So why does Joe get a harder time on both these points.

I'm sure even Calzaghe would've wanted bigger, greater wins, but in the grand scheme of things, he's done pretty good. The benchmark for respecting or crediting ppl significantly seems to be oddly high on some fighters, some times.

As I said, you can put a negative spin on many fighters, even sometimes there best wins, just how it is. It's important to not over focus on certain aspects, but the wider picture, and comparisons however. And in doing that I think Joe's resume, greatest wins, and his top 10 wins, aren't half as bad as is often made out. There's lots on the plus that just never gets commented on, yet the negatives are, ppl read it, it spirals and so on.

Kessler is not considered one of the two best fighters in the world.

[THE REED]

Kessler is not considered one of the two best fighters in the world.

i was gonna say that... because joe is looked at as one of the best, and when your looked at as one of the best... people want to know why and how... and there going to investigate.

[Sir_Joe]

1) Pavlik has had two defenses.

2) You can't fault Kelly for wanting to fight Joe asap. Joe is an aging fighter and probably does not have all that much time in the sport. If Kelly doesn't get a shot now, he may never get one at all.

Kelly has 1 defence.

[bsrizpac]

There is a lot of criticism going around for Calzaghe at the moment, predominantly from American posters and while I can accept some of the critcism as justified, I cannot accept the hypocritical nature of it.

Joe Calzaghe is not the first and nor will he be the last boxer to choose an easier, older fighter for better money. That's me accepting that Kelly Pavlik is a harder fight than Roy Jones Jr. He is, but not by the distance some of you seem to think.

Three famous examples:

* Larry Holmes fighting Muhammad Ali
* Marvin Hagler fighting Roberto Duran
* Manny Pacquiao fighting Marco Antonio Barrera (again)

Each of them had younger and/or more deserving opponents they could have fought, yet not one of them has had the harsh criticism Calzaghe has. Setting aside facing old 'name' fighters, what about the other fighters 'ducking' worthy opponents? Rocky Marciano 'ducked' Floyd Patterson, Riddick Bowe 'ducked' Lennox Lewis and in a very appropriate example, Roy Jones Jr 'ducked' Dariusz Michalczewski. Why haven't they had the same criticism?

You could argue that they have all escaped retrospective criticism by appeasing critics afterwards in other fights, with the exception of Marciano, but it doesn't change the fact that they either 'ducked' another fighter or fought an old 'name' fighter, and in some cases did both. Calzaghe should be criticised for fighting Roy Jones Jr and he may not appease the critics with a fight afterwards, but he has still only been guilty of this boxing crime once, the same number of times each of the legendary fighters I have listed above were guility. Don't forget that Calzaghe himself has been the victim of 'ducking' as well, in the now famous cases of Ottke and Hopkins.

This admittedly justified criticism is hypocritical and has been taken by some haters as fuel to attack Calzaghe; drudging up the same old-same old about his apparantly weak early career resume and his 'slapping', despite this all being ill-considered, ignorant bull****. The worst part is that some respectable posters critical of the Jones fight have been entangled in this, purely in anger at the decision. Calzaghe deserves criticism, but he doesn't deserve the hate he is getting.

I'm personally of the opinion that Calzaghe will fight Pavlik afterwards anyway, but even if he doesn't, the criticism needs to be detached from the hate.

FAIL.

Once again you miss the point.

Calzaghe CAN take an easy money fight. That's fine. He's earned it.

What is pissing rational people off are his douchebag fan and Joe propping up a shot to **** Roy Jones and saying this will be a great win and cement Joe as an ATG, and that this PROVES he was the best of his era.

Gimme a ****ing break.

If he wants to take the easy fight, more power to him. Just stop sucking his balls.

[Kris Silver]

But the investigation so late on down the road kinda beggers the question, why are you having to investigate sooo much now? Most didn't know the half of it before the Lacy fight. Theres a wide array of reasons as to why, it would have been different had the Johnson fight worked out, or Hopkins not doubled his wage last minute. Those 2 scenario's I have no doubt would have gotten Joe loads more exposure to ppl whom otherwise, don't know about him much thus are overwhelming suspicious and cynical down the road.

Another is just plain ignorance I'm afraid. This is the one that gets me, there's ppl whom just don't know about Joe's career much, whether they bother to find out later or not. The attitude sometimes is one of "if I didn't get to hear, then he couldn't have been that good". As if it's some duty for news drops to be made to them from the media whom are exposing said person more.

Another is lack of exposure in general, and I'm afraid a lot of the cynicism on Calzaghe comes from the states, where also, Calzaghe and many have said he's not had the exposure they felt he deserved. The media and networks haven't been great on covering his fights, and many boxing experts, commentators and more haven't mentioned Joe when in similar scenario's in other parts of the world, they would have. I mean recently hbo listed potential opponents for Wlad, omitting Haye, reason being he's often on Showtime. Think that's about right. I mean that's mega, just apply that to easier scenario's in Joe's history. Even Boxing Scene's p4p list previously commented, could the LHW #1 been right under our nose all this time in Joe Calzaghe, it's not out of reason". And that's the thing, Joe's at that level and ppl are only just coming to terms with it, let alone retrospectively. So the idea still seems radical to ppl, when it's not at all.

[Steel Town USA]

but regardless of whose fault it is, i still havent seen a "great" win from Joe against a "Great" fighter...

im not blaming him for it, im just calling it like i see it

Exactly. It doesn't matter WHY Joe never fought any great fighters in their primes, it just matters that the DIDN'T. As such, he simply cannot be ranked up there with the very best of the era.

[Live Dog]

Kelly has 1 defence.

You and Kris are right. I forgot the second Taylor fight was at a catch weight.