BoxRec

Got to love this little maniac.

Came over on a TOMATOE boat from Italy to Britain.

Sleeping rough - on the streets - playing his guitar.

Pulled some down to earth Welsh lass working in Wimpy Restuarant of all places

Had some daughters with her and a son - and trained him up to be undefeated boxing legend - - Super Joe Calzaghe - 46 fights - 46 wins - 0 losses

Build up a World Champion gym from a old tin shed and produced Champions and Contenders.

Had entertaining ego clashes with big name boxers like..........

David Haye - "Drop early or you will never box again"

and

Bernard Hopkins - "Boring twat" and all up in his face at the press conferences shouting him down - Bernard said he was more scared of Joes father than of Joe

Enzo Calzaghe - this thread is a tribute to you.................

When Enzo said to Hopkins "I already know how to beat you............."

You never heard the reason, but it would have said "Because your way past your best and approaching 80 years of age..........." 8)

Calzaghe was a good champ, his best win was against Kessler, but his no losses record means very little when you consider the quality of fighters that he faced. Jones and Hopkins would have beaten him pretty easily if those fights had happenned even 5 years earlier.

Manny Steward once said that it was only great fighters that made great trainers and i think it's true. Enzo and Joe had a good relationship and it worked for them, but he was no legend as a trainer and made his name off the back of Joe, who like i said earlier was a good champ, but not in the leagues of Toney, Hopkins, Jones, McCallum etc

in all fairness to calzaghe v jones/hopkins ... calzaghe of 5yrs previous would have been able to put more beef in his punches also..

I rate jones jr as the best middle and s-middle of all time .. Hopkins i think calzaghe would have beaten anytime.

tonyevs wrote:in all fairness to calzaghe v jones/hopkins ... calzaghe of 5yrs previous would have been able to put more beef in his punches also..

I rate jones jr as the best middle and s-middle of all time .. Hopkins i think calzaghe would have beaten anytime.

I think that Jones had lost way too much speed by the time he fought Calzaghe and was a shadow of the man who fought Toney etc. I don't think that the hardness of Calzaghe's punches would have come into it at all. I feel that the Hopkins who faced De La Hoya, Trinidad etc, would have beaten Calzaghe quite easily. Hopkins had the perfect game plan to beat Calzaghe, but just ran out of steam from the 7th or 8th round onwards. Even then, i still scored that fight for Hopkins by a round. A lot of those rounds were hard to score and whilst Calzaghe had the volume of punches, a lot were not landing and Hopkins was doing the better quality work.

I agree with what you say about Jones though

Quixall wrote:

tonyevs wrote:in all fairness to calzaghe v jones/hopkins ... calzaghe of 5yrs previous would have been able to put more beef in his punches also..

I rate jones jr as the best middle and s-middle of all time .. Hopkins i think calzaghe would have beaten anytime.

I think that Jones had lost way too much speed by the time he fought Calzaghe and was a shadow of the man who fought Toney etc. I don't think that the hardness of Calzaghe's punches would have come into it at all. I feel that the Hopkins who faced De La Hoya, Trinidad etc, would have beaten Calzaghe quite easily. Hopkins had the perfect game plan to beat Calzaghe, but just ran out of steam from the 7th or 8th round onwards. Even then, i still scored that fight for Hopkins by a round. A lot of those rounds were hard to score and whilst Calzaghe had the volume of punches, a lot were not landing and Hopkins was doing the better quality work.

I agree with what you say about Jones though

I totally agree with you about Jones Jr.
Roy Jones would have had too much for Calzaghe in every dept. Joes Stamina, speed and non-brittle hands would not have been enough even back then..

Whilst as Hopkins ... the two names you mentioned (De La Hoya and Trinidad) were a million miles away and hardly compare to calzaghe at 12stone.
Hopkins legacy is well over-hyped as far as I`m concerned. He made his name beating smaller guys.

and yet at 44 years of age was still good enought to in some folks eyes to drop and beat Joe...sorry but 5 years prior he would have fooked JC like he was his daddy.
If anyone is overated on here and in this discussion its Joe.

J wrote:and yet at 44 years of age was still good enought to in some folks eyes to drop and beat Joe...sorry but 5 years prior he would have fooked JC like he was his daddy.
If anyone is overated on here and in this discussion its Joe.

X2

I also think that Hopkin's legacy is overhyped and as you say, De La Hoya and Trinidad were both smaller fighters..........

But i still belive that Hopkins lost to Calzaghe because he tired down the stretch. As i said, i feel that Hopkins had the perfect game plan the night he fought Calzaghe and a Hopkins in his mid 30's would have shut out Calzaghe for the full 12 rounds IMO.

I often wonder why Hopkins never fought Toney ?

toney lost to jones and got fat.

J wrote:and yet at 44 years of age was still good enought to in some folks eyes to drop and beat Joe...sorry but 5 years prior he would have fooked JC like he was his daddy.
If anyone is overated on here and in this discussion its Joe.

Good point
Some people also had Fury beating McDermott

I do not dispute Hopkins aged better than Joe .. infact, he has aged better than almost every other boxer..

But Hopkins was allowed to get away with quite a bit in that fight. And yes he did drop Joe early, just like Jones jr. but neither came close to doing so again.
Whichever way you look at it .. Hopkins and Calzaghe were at the end of their careers. If they fought 5yrs earlier it would have been s-middle .. Calzaghe would have won another messy fight over Hopkins, who would have done his best to make it scrappy like he always does when he knows he doesn`t have enough..

J wrote:toney lost to jones and got fat.

Yeah, that could very well be the case.........

Pity they never fought at middleweight or even super-middle !!

Hopkins had the chance to fight Joe 5 years earlier, don't forget, but he accepted the fight and then asked for twice the money.


As for Enzo, yes Joe was such a talented fighter that he'd have been a success under anyone. But Enzo did well with the likes of Rees, Price and Maccarinelli as well.

so what? perhaps he didnt like the deal. Joe also wanted the fight in england as he was still scared of flying as i recall....(he got rid of that particular phobia though somehow hey)

Joe also had the cance 3 times to fight glen johnson and shit his pants and feigned injury.

states wrote:Hopkins had the chance to fight Joe 5 years earlier, don't forget, but he accepted the fight and then asked for twice the money.


As for Enzo, yes Joe was such a talented fighter that he'd have been a success under anyone. But Enzo did well with the likes of Rees, Price and Maccarinelli as well.

Enzo did well, but i don't believe that he was any better then Brendan Ingle and i certainly would'nt put him as a top trainer

J wrote:so what? perhaps he didnt like the deal. Joe also wanted the fight in england as he was still scared of flying as i recall....(he got rid of that particular phobia though somehow hey)

Joe also had the cance 3 times to fight glen johnson and poop his pants and feigned injury.

I'm not judging, I'm just saying the fight could have happened. Hopkins liked the deal enough originally, I think it was something like a $3 million payday for him.

Joe was guilty of pull-outs, like you say. That one was on Hopkins though.

states wrote:

J wrote:so what? perhaps he didnt like the deal. Joe also wanted the fight in england as he was still scared of flying as i recall....(he got rid of that particular phobia though somehow hey)

Joe also had the cance 3 times to fight glen johnson and poop his pants and feigned injury.

I'm not judging, I'm just saying the fight could have happened. Hopkins liked the deal enough originally, I think it was something like a $3 million payday for him.

Joe was guilty of pull-outs, like you say. That one was on Hopkins though.

Hopkins has been notorious for using other fighters to gain an increased purse against someone else.......

It happenned an awful lot with Roy Jones, who he finally decided to fight when he was well and truely sure that Jones was shot to pieces

as did JC.
quote jones has lost he is shotunquote

two years later
Im a legend killer

gimme a break.

J wrote:as did JC.
quote jones has lost he is shotunquote

two years later
Im a legend killer

gimme a break.

This may sound harsh.........

But in many respects, Calzaghe's victory over Jones was similar in terms of respect and reputation to Pacquaio beating De La Hoya.

It means and mean't virtually nothing

I AGREE!

Quixall wrote:
Enzo did well, but i don't believe that he was any better then Brendan Ingle and i certainly would'nt put him as a top trainer

Brendan Ingle is one of - if not - the best British trainer Enzo comes nowhere near him.

Joe Calzaghe, like Hatton - will always have their knockers on this site

Calzaghe beat a faded Jones - but its the way he beat him - he dominated him - beat him by a landslide - went to Madison Square Garden stood in front of a legend and put his hands on his hips and gave a wiggle of his waist.

With Hopkins - when Hopkins was on the floor - Calzaghe pretending he was shafting up him the bum - like he use to get in jail

Say what you like about Calzaghe - but this Welsh Valley Lad - went to Amercia and clowned 2 Amercian Legends.

tonyevs wrote:

Quixall wrote:
Enzo did well, but i don't believe that he was any better then Brendan Ingle and i certainly would'nt put him as a top trainer

Brendan Ingle is one of - if not - the best British trainer Enzo comes nowhere near him.

Joe Calzaghe, like Hatton - will always have their knockers on this site

I'm not knocking Joe, i'm just saying at as it is.............

He was a good champion, but he is nowhere near the likes of Jones, Hopkins, Toney, McCallum and no wins over a fadad Hopkins and Jones will change that. Wins over Eubank, Lacy and Kessler don't amount to very much and his no losses record means Jack in light of this......

The "good" Joe Calzaghe........Yeah

The "Great" Joe Calzaghe........Forget it

FLINT ISLAND wrote:Calzaghe beat a faded Jones - but its the way he beat him - he dominated him - beat him by a landslide - went to Madison Square Garden stood in front of a legend and put his hands on his hips and gave a wiggle of his waist.

With Hopkins - when Hopkins was on the floor - Calzaghe pretending he was shafting up him the bum - like he use to get in jail

Say what you like about Calzaghe - but this Welsh Valley Lad - went to Amercia and clowned 2 Amercian Legends.

With that representation, you should go into PR

Quixall wrote:
I'm not knocking Joe, i'm just saying at as it is.............

He was a good champion, but he is nowhere near the likes of Jones, Hopkins, Toney, McCallum and no wins over a fadad Hopkins and Jones will change that. Wins over Eubank, Lacy and Kessler don't amount to very much and his no losses record means Jack in light of this......

The "good" Joe Calzaghe........Yeah

The "Great" Joe Calzaghe........Forget it

Aside from Hopkins .. who I think is even more over-hyped than Calzaghe .. then I totally agree

In the wider aspect of things .. Joe Calzaghe was a good world champion
Was he a great world champion? No. Simply because he didn`t put it on the line enough times for us to really be sure.

Then again. Here in Britain we have never had a truly GREAT world champion who could ever be realistically spoken about on a level of the Jones jr, Holyfields, Chavez`s or even the De La Hoya`s :(

Jimmy Wilde's family might disagree, although I understand what you're saying.