A look into the fraudulent career of Bernard Hopkins

[SkilledB]

Hopkins career > Calzaghes.

he's an ATG and a HOF'er

who else at 44 can do him (age check)

[The Badguy]

Bernard Hopkins: "Mmmmmm, damn boy do you always swallow after you glaze it?"

[Darth Sidious]

Let's see.

Pavlik had already fought Taylor and beat him at 166. Pavlik was heavily favoured to beat and knock out Hopkins. Pavlik is 6' 2.5" so its not like Hopkins was fighting a small guy. Oh and I forgot to mention, Hopkins was 43 at the time.

Pavlik beat a past prime Taylor. Taylor suffers from what Vargas did. Being shot a young age. Also it's not the size so much as it is the weight class. There's a big difference fighting at 160 and fighting at 170.

Winky may have had to gain weight but Hopkins was old. Maybe we should discount Wrights wins against Mosley who looked much smaller than Wright did against Hopkins. Hopkins manages to outbox a defensive boxing master like Wright that few can look good against

Let's stop with the Hopkins was old talk. Hopkins fans always say he peaked late but then use his old age as an excuse to fight smaller fighters.

Against Tarver Hopkins went up from 160 to 175 with no tune up fight and again beat a heavily favoured opponent, one of the top Light Heavyweights at the time. WHy does Dawson get credit for heating Tarver when Hopkins did it when TArverwas much younger moving up in weight.

The only reason Tarver was so highly regarded was because of his high profile win against a shot RJJ. RJJ had been slowing down significantly since Ruiz. Tarver is a C+ fighter. Always has been.

Oscar couldn't make 147 comfortably, he was the champion at 160 and had beaten Felix Sturm. Hopkins weighed in at 156 only 1 pound heavier than De La Hoya.

1. So what if he couldn't make 147? It doesn't change the fact that was Oscar's best weight.

2. Sturm was robbed against Oscar.

Felix Trinidad was heavily favoured to beat Hopkins and was the champion at middleweight. He had knocked out Joppy in 5 rounds where it took Hopkins a 12 round decision to beat him at middleweight.

Again, Trinidad's prime was at 147. He's 3-3 at fights above JMW.

Jermain Taylor gets close victories over Hopkins at 40.

Again with the age. Jermain Taylor beat a prime Bernard Hopkins, who was ranked the number one pound for pound fighter at the time.

Joe Calzaghe fights a 43 year old Hopkins and barely gets a win. Kevin Iole of Yahoo Sports, ESPN, Associated Press, Adelaide Byrd all score the fight in Favour of Hopkins.

That was a clear win for Calzaghe who moved up in weight to fight Hopkins and wasn't exactly at his prime either.

Hate him for his personality all you want, but hes had significant victories.

[The_Demon]

Hes a great fighter but is often over-rated

[BritishBoxing92]

Let's take a quick look at Bhop's greatest wins and some of his losses.

Key wins:

10.18.2008 Kelly Pavlik - Prior to fighting Bernard Hopkins at 170lbs, Kelly Pavlik was the best 160 pounder on the planet. 160 was his prime weight, however Hopkins fought him 10lbs above this weight.

07.21.2007 Winky Wright - Winky spent most of his career fighting at 154. He was coming off a great winning streak and had never fought over 159 pounds before fighting Bernard Hopkins. Again, Hopkins defeated Winky at a weight Winky was not comfortable at, 170lbs.

06.10.2006 Antonio Tarver - Bernard Hopkins wins a decision over Antonio Tarver who made a name for himself by beating a shot Roy Jones Jr. Bernard beats someone at their best weight. Too bad it was a C+ fighter.

09.18.2004 Oscar De La Hoya - Oscar De La Hoya who's prime weight was at 147 suffered a 9th round KO by Bernard Hopkins who had spent the last year at 160 and slimmed down four pounds to fight Oscar who by the way is 6-3 at fights above welterweight. 1 of those win being a robbery against Felix Sturm.

09.29.2001 Felix Trinidad - This sadly is the greatest win of Bernard Hopkins' career. Anyone who followed Trinidad knows that like Oscar, his best weight was 147. Bernard Hopkins beats Trinidad at middleweight, which is two classes above Trinidad's prime weight.


Key Losses:

4.19.2008 Joe Calzaghe - Joe Calzaghe moves up one weight class from Super Middleweight to Light Heavyweight. This time it backfires on Hopkins as Hopkins is dealt a schooling at the hands of Calzaghe after saying he'd never lose to a white boy.

12.03.2005 & 7.16.2005 Jermain Taylor - Jermain Taylor beats Hopkins twice in what Hopkins' fans called a robbery, x2. The truth is when Hopkins decides to fight elite fighters his size, Taylor has his number.

05.22.1993 Roy Jones Jr. - Roy Jones wins a very decisive decision over Bernard Hopkins. Hopkins' fans will tell you this was a green version of Hopkins, but fail to mention it was a green version of Jones who even admitted before the fight that Hopkins was his toughest opponent to date. The weird thing is while Hopkins was "green" he was older than RJJ. This is important because when Hopkins rematched Jones 17 years later his fans cry that Hopkins is older than Jones implying that it was even. So his age has nothing to do with being green against Jones, but it is a factor in the rematch? Which is it?

Bring out the gimp

epic fail........silly troll..

[MarcusArkane]

Record number of Middleweight title defenses. Oldest Middleweight. Fought anybody and everybody

Why is it OK if Hopkins jumps up 15 lbs to fight Tarver yet not OK if Trinidad and De La Hoya come up 6 lbs tp fight him even though they are title holders in the division.

Theres a differnece between peaking late and fighting your forties which is peak for nobody.


Lets forget the fact that Trinidads one of those losses comes at 175 lbs and right at the end of his career. A.
His other loss was to Wright. Wright couldn't have possibly won down to his superior boxing ability and the ability to neutralise Trinidads left hand. Lets forget that Trinidad was also heavily favoured in that fight. No that was all down to weight.

[pistol whip]

I hear this kinda talk all the time but my question has always been, who exactly was good enough in his division or super MW, or LHW to have challanged him during his prime?

[Darth Sidious]

Record number of Middleweight title defenses. Oldest Middleweight. Fought anybody and everybody

Why is it OK if Hopkins jumps up 15 lbs to fight Tarver yet not OK if Trinidad and De La Hoya come up 6 lbs tp fight him even though they are title holders in the division.

Hopkins had been slimming down to 160 during his middleweight reign. The guy's debut fight was at LHW and didn't start campaigning at MW until a few years later.

Theres a differnece between peaking late and fighting your forties which is peak for nobody.

So Hopkins wasn't prime when he fought Jermain Taylor? I've heard it all now.

Lets forget the fact that Trinidads one of those losses comes at 175 lbs and right at the end of his career. A.

I didn't even count the RJJ loss.

His other loss was to Wright. Wright couldn't have possibly won down to his superior boxing ability and the ability to neutralise Trinidads left hand. Lets forget that Trinidad was also heavily favoured in that fight. No that was all down to weight.

Finally we can agree.

[street bully]

Middleweight has always been a division connecting WW to LHW, and all past great MW champs have had to fight former WW's who move up. Hagler did so, Monzon did so, and Hopkins did so. However, they are also supposed to fight lightheavyweights, and this is somethign Hagler never did, since he would never accept Michael Spinks numerous challenges to meet at a catchweight and make the fight happen.

[street bully]

Hopkins had been slimming down to 160 during his middleweight reign. The guy's debut fight was at LHW and didn't start campaigning at MW until a few years later.



So Hopkins wasn't prime when he fought Jermain Taylor? I've heard it all now.

He was 40 when he foguht Taylor, how the hell was he prime? He wasn't even at his peak when he fougt Joppy let alone Taylor.