A date of 31.12.08 has been listed, i pressume this means Calzaghes next fight must happen before this date or your bet becaomes invalid.
Bet365
Calzaghe - 2/7
Roy Jones Jr - 5/2
SkyBet
Calzaghe - 1/5
Roy Jones Jr - 10/3
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Bet365
Calzaghe - 2/5
Tarver - 7/4
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Bet365
Calzaghe - 4/11
Hopkins - 2/1
I'm going to have to hunt around for some footage of Roy Jones recent fights, but i am seriously surprised to see him put in as such a big underdog. This fight is all about how much Jones Jr has left and i'm not going to give my opinion on the outcome until i've analyzed his most recent performances, but 10/3 against just seems a bit wide of the mark IMO!
Calzaghe won on Saturday night, but not convincingly. Hopkins, in rare spurts, made him look rather average IMO and probably only age lost him the fight!
I think we can safe'ly forget about any Hopkins rematch!
Odds up for Calzaghe's next potential fight
Roy Jones Jr said that in order to beat Calzaghe you have to knock him out, didn't he?
It was interesting that Jones Jr was at the Hopkins-Calzaghe post-fight conference and asked Joe about the first round knockdown. He wanted to know how badly Joe was hurt and he told Joe he'd be happy to fight him. He's obviously trying to weigh up his chances of a KO.
It was interesting that Jones Jr was at the Hopkins-Calzaghe post-fight conference and asked Joe about the first round knockdown. He wanted to know how badly Joe was hurt and he told Joe he'd be happy to fight him. He's obviously trying to weigh up his chances of a KO.
A few days ago in Las Vegas, Welshman Joe Calzaghe punched out a split decision over American Bernard Hopkins in an audacious debut at light-heavyweight. His reward could be a showdown with the magnificent Roy Jones Jnr in November at the magnificent Millennium stadium, the site of Calzaghe's pro debut in October 1993 (a first-round dismissal of Birmingham's Paul Hanlon at Cardiff Arms Park on the Lennox Lewis-Frank Bruno bill). The Newbridge boy, unbeaten in 15 years and 45 fights since, has come a long, long way.
He insists this will be his last fight. "I don't want to push it too far," said the 36-year-old Calzaghe, who intends to go into promoting. "One more fight from me and then that is it, I'm done. What a way to finish off your career against the former pound for pound No. 1. That would be an amazing way to finish off."
Calzaghe climbed off the floor in the first round and kept faith with the speed, desire, workrate and stamina that made him one of the best super-middleweights of all time to outhustle Philadelphia great Hopkins, who held the Ring light-heavyweight belt as the No. 1 in the division and proclaimed beforehand he would never lose to a "white boy". At the end of 12 earnest rounds, the canny 43-year-old Hopkins got it by 114-113 on one official scorecard but the other two read 115-112 and 116-111 for Calzaghe (despite the 10-8 first round against him). It explains why Florida's Jones gambles on his first trip outside the United States since he was horribly robbed in Korea against a Korean in the 1988 Olympics. Joe is suddenly the man at the top of the light-heavyweight pole. The belt. The money.
This is a showdown promoter F rank Warren has tried to make several times in the past, but Jones - 'Fighter of the Decade' for the 1990s as voted by the American Boxing Writers' Association - picked up millions of dollars for fighting at home. "I was the draw," said Jones. "I would have been crazy to box him in Britain before." Indeed, Jones ruled supreme at light-heavyweight for seven years between 1996 and 2003 and even picked up a major version of the world heavyweight title when he bulked up and trounced the disappointing John Ruiz over 12 rounds for the WBA title in Las Vegas in March 2003. He then boiled back down (dropping two weight classes) against Florida rival Antonio Tarver and scraped home on a majority decision. A fight later, Tarver flattened him in two at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Really flattened him. They met a third time and Jones went 12 to lose unanimously. Jones also lost to Jamaican throwback Glen Johnson during this terrible time (nine rounds).
It was thought Jones had drained his athletic well, rejoining the light-heavies after Ruiz, but (somehow) he reinvented himself in the boxing hinterlands of Idaho and Mississippi and came good again when he picked off Puerto Rican icon Felix Trinidad for 12 rounds in Madison Square Garden in January, although Trinidad is only a blown-up middleweight. Now nearly 40, his aura of invincibility diminished, Jones at least comes over with confidence and with something left. After losing three in a row, he's won three in a row. His last three.
"This could be the toughest fight of Roy's career," reckons Warren. "Jones is a wonderful fighter who licked Richie Woodhall in the Seoul Olympics and crushed Sheffield's Clinton Woods in the States in 2002 (Clinton's corner tossed in the towel in the sixth round). He has proved himself over and over again, but with Joe on a high, I believe he would really fancy the fight and prove too strong, too fast, too powerful for Jones, and knock him out."
Added Warren: "Watching Roy's fights over the years, the guys that give him trouble are southpaws - like Joe. (Jones twice lost to southpaw Tarver, of course, while New Yorker Lou Del Valle dropped him with a southpaw left in the eighth round of their 1998 encounter, although Roy recovered to win a clear decision.) Calzaghe is a quick, heavy-handed southpaw who hasn't lost since his teenage amateur days in 1990. He's won more world title fights than any British fighter in history (22) and proved his greatness with unification wins at super-middleweight over the previously unbeaten duo of Denmark's Mikkel Kessler and American Jeff Lacy (another Florida fighter), the latter of whom soaked up 1006 punches on the way to a landslide points defeat in Manchester in 2006.
And with the win over Hopkins.
Jones is a great fighter himself, of course, or at least was. The winner of 23 world title fights, the man who has beaten Hopkins (yes, he too), Trinidad, James Toney, Tarver, Ruiz, Woods, Jorge Castro, Del Valle, Montell Griffin, Eric Lucas, Otis Grant, Julio Gonzalez, Jorge Vaca, Sugarboy Malinga, Virgil Hill, Mike McCallum, Reggie Johnson and Vinny Paz in 19 years as a pro - world champions all - is good but not great these days and horribly unfamiliar to fighting abroad. Make no mistake, a packed Millennium Stadium bouyed up to welcome Joe back after Hopkins will prove no stroll on a basketball court (a few hours before his fight with Canada's rugged Lucas in 1996, Jones played a United States Basketball League game).
Calzaghe is probably past his best himself but not by much and still retains the ability to maintain a constant head and body attack for 12 rounds. Bottom line reads, if Calzaghe can beat an aging Hopkins in America, he can beat an aging Jones in Cardiff.
Joe's two-handed bursts take him to the points.
He insists this will be his last fight. "I don't want to push it too far," said the 36-year-old Calzaghe, who intends to go into promoting. "One more fight from me and then that is it, I'm done. What a way to finish off your career against the former pound for pound No. 1. That would be an amazing way to finish off."
Calzaghe climbed off the floor in the first round and kept faith with the speed, desire, workrate and stamina that made him one of the best super-middleweights of all time to outhustle Philadelphia great Hopkins, who held the Ring light-heavyweight belt as the No. 1 in the division and proclaimed beforehand he would never lose to a "white boy". At the end of 12 earnest rounds, the canny 43-year-old Hopkins got it by 114-113 on one official scorecard but the other two read 115-112 and 116-111 for Calzaghe (despite the 10-8 first round against him). It explains why Florida's Jones gambles on his first trip outside the United States since he was horribly robbed in Korea against a Korean in the 1988 Olympics. Joe is suddenly the man at the top of the light-heavyweight pole. The belt. The money.
This is a showdown promoter F rank Warren has tried to make several times in the past, but Jones - 'Fighter of the Decade' for the 1990s as voted by the American Boxing Writers' Association - picked up millions of dollars for fighting at home. "I was the draw," said Jones. "I would have been crazy to box him in Britain before." Indeed, Jones ruled supreme at light-heavyweight for seven years between 1996 and 2003 and even picked up a major version of the world heavyweight title when he bulked up and trounced the disappointing John Ruiz over 12 rounds for the WBA title in Las Vegas in March 2003. He then boiled back down (dropping two weight classes) against Florida rival Antonio Tarver and scraped home on a majority decision. A fight later, Tarver flattened him in two at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Really flattened him. They met a third time and Jones went 12 to lose unanimously. Jones also lost to Jamaican throwback Glen Johnson during this terrible time (nine rounds).
It was thought Jones had drained his athletic well, rejoining the light-heavies after Ruiz, but (somehow) he reinvented himself in the boxing hinterlands of Idaho and Mississippi and came good again when he picked off Puerto Rican icon Felix Trinidad for 12 rounds in Madison Square Garden in January, although Trinidad is only a blown-up middleweight. Now nearly 40, his aura of invincibility diminished, Jones at least comes over with confidence and with something left. After losing three in a row, he's won three in a row. His last three.
"This could be the toughest fight of Roy's career," reckons Warren. "Jones is a wonderful fighter who licked Richie Woodhall in the Seoul Olympics and crushed Sheffield's Clinton Woods in the States in 2002 (Clinton's corner tossed in the towel in the sixth round). He has proved himself over and over again, but with Joe on a high, I believe he would really fancy the fight and prove too strong, too fast, too powerful for Jones, and knock him out."
Added Warren: "Watching Roy's fights over the years, the guys that give him trouble are southpaws - like Joe. (Jones twice lost to southpaw Tarver, of course, while New Yorker Lou Del Valle dropped him with a southpaw left in the eighth round of their 1998 encounter, although Roy recovered to win a clear decision.) Calzaghe is a quick, heavy-handed southpaw who hasn't lost since his teenage amateur days in 1990. He's won more world title fights than any British fighter in history (22) and proved his greatness with unification wins at super-middleweight over the previously unbeaten duo of Denmark's Mikkel Kessler and American Jeff Lacy (another Florida fighter), the latter of whom soaked up 1006 punches on the way to a landslide points defeat in Manchester in 2006.
And with the win over Hopkins.
Jones is a great fighter himself, of course, or at least was. The winner of 23 world title fights, the man who has beaten Hopkins (yes, he too), Trinidad, James Toney, Tarver, Ruiz, Woods, Jorge Castro, Del Valle, Montell Griffin, Eric Lucas, Otis Grant, Julio Gonzalez, Jorge Vaca, Sugarboy Malinga, Virgil Hill, Mike McCallum, Reggie Johnson and Vinny Paz in 19 years as a pro - world champions all - is good but not great these days and horribly unfamiliar to fighting abroad. Make no mistake, a packed Millennium Stadium bouyed up to welcome Joe back after Hopkins will prove no stroll on a basketball court (a few hours before his fight with Canada's rugged Lucas in 1996, Jones played a United States Basketball League game).
Calzaghe is probably past his best himself but not by much and still retains the ability to maintain a constant head and body attack for 12 rounds. Bottom line reads, if Calzaghe can beat an aging Hopkins in America, he can beat an aging Jones in Cardiff.
Joe's two-handed bursts take him to the points.
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Eraserhead
- Heavyweight
- Posts: 554
- Joined: 14 Dec 2007, 18:46
It's partly true that Jones struggles with southpaws. But Calzaghe is the most un-southpaw southpaw ever. He drains all the awkwardness out of his southpaw style but fighting aggressively, throwing lots of shots and squaring up in close. I don't think his southpaw style would be a problem for Jones. The main problem he'll have is that he's 40 years of age and gunshy.
Prime for prime? Jones wins with absolute ease. Probably even stop him.
Prime for prime? Jones wins with absolute ease. Probably even stop him.