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As for Hopkins being in the top ten P4P of all time, well, that is just going ridiculously overboard and I think this is obviously a bait thread. Just looking at his accomplishments in a very large general sense, he is a two weight champion. Many defenses like quite a number of fighters, especially modern fighters.
Look at it this way, which is the way everything should be looked at really. How many HOF fighters did he beat? Three or so? Maybe four. Now let's look at them individually though.
Winky Wright. Hopkins fought him at 170 pounds well above Wright's 154 pound weight, and he was past his best and very inactive.
Oscar was a legitimate WW who started out at LW, but was a huge LW/SFW. Nonetheless, it was a massive size difference and Oscar was certainly no MW.
Tito could have been a genuine MW, as he showed with his dominant win over the very fine MW champ Joppy, however suss that win may have been (I'm sure many of you know about Tito's hand wraps being caight in his next fight against Hopkins and how Joppy had said that every punch he was hit with felt much too powerful to be a normal glove. He did genuinely say this after the fight. That he thought his gloves felt wrong, like they were unnaturally heavy). Great win for Hopkins.
Tarver? I don't know about him being a HOF'er but he was certainly one of Hopkins' biggest wins. Moved up and beat him at LHW. Great win.
Who else though? Simon Brown? He may be a HOF'er one day. Again though, he is another WW that was at his end of a long career when he moved up and fought Hopkins. Nothing special.
Johnson? Good win, though Johnson has become strangely overrated and underrated at the same time today.
Jackson? Was another LMW and at the end of his career. His two big fights at MW with Jorge Castro both ended in defeat for him well before the Hopkins fight, the first in a brutal KO.
The other HOF'ers he fought, Calzsghe, and Jones he lost to, apart from losing his MW title to Taylor twice.
He's certainly an ATG, but he is definitely not near the top ten.
Look at it this way, which is the way everything should be looked at really. How many HOF fighters did he beat? Three or so? Maybe four. Now let's look at them individually though.
Winky Wright. Hopkins fought him at 170 pounds well above Wright's 154 pound weight, and he was past his best and very inactive.
Oscar was a legitimate WW who started out at LW, but was a huge LW/SFW. Nonetheless, it was a massive size difference and Oscar was certainly no MW.
Tito could have been a genuine MW, as he showed with his dominant win over the very fine MW champ Joppy, however suss that win may have been (I'm sure many of you know about Tito's hand wraps being caight in his next fight against Hopkins and how Joppy had said that every punch he was hit with felt much too powerful to be a normal glove. He did genuinely say this after the fight. That he thought his gloves felt wrong, like they were unnaturally heavy). Great win for Hopkins.
Tarver? I don't know about him being a HOF'er but he was certainly one of Hopkins' biggest wins. Moved up and beat him at LHW. Great win.
Who else though? Simon Brown? He may be a HOF'er one day. Again though, he is another WW that was at his end of a long career when he moved up and fought Hopkins. Nothing special.
Johnson? Good win, though Johnson has become strangely overrated and underrated at the same time today.
Jackson? Was another LMW and at the end of his career. His two big fights at MW with Jorge Castro both ended in defeat for him well before the Hopkins fight, the first in a brutal KO.
The other HOF'ers he fought, Calzsghe, and Jones he lost to, apart from losing his MW title to Taylor twice.
He's certainly an ATG, but he is definitely not near the top ten.
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