When did you jump on the Joe Calzaghe bandwagon?

2-3 years ago, this guy was dismissed regularly on this forum (and others, probably) an over-protected Warren fighter who never fouhgt outside of Wales, usually fought total bums and had a reputation of pulling out of fights.

Now's he's considered one of the world's best at one weight.

Where do you stand on Joe Calzaghe?

 

I've never liked him much, but after a while I had to admit he was a truly excellent fighter.

I am still not a fan per se, but I acknowledge that he is a great fighter. When he's on form I don't mind watching him fight either. The Kessler fight was good, and the lacy fight was a mighty impressive beating.

For me it's been gradual. I used to dislike him, think he was overprotected and wanted him to lose, but as the years have gone by his greatness is undeniable, and he's now beaten a prime A class fighter.

 

Don't you think his 'legacy' will be questioned for:
a) not fighting Bernard Hopkins 5 years ago
b) not fighting Roy Jones 5 years ago
c) not stepping up to 175lb

 

i chose the last option


he's a bum...was never the undisputed #1 boxer at 168 while Otke was around
and he'll get no credit for beating old man Hopkins

 

Thing is, Roll....the Hopkins fight....it's being so hyped here in the UK and the media will be totally beside themselves if he beats Hopkins.

They won't see a 50 year-old man - they'll just see 'Bernard Hopkins'. :dunno:

 

But surely...the clues were in the opposition's nickname: 'Left-Hook'.

Boxing isn't that complicated for the Calzaghe Camp to work out what game-plan to use.

 

When he beat Lacy. I figured he would never step up before that fight. He was always injured when he was scheduled to fight anybody good before that fight.

 

Though I think Joe comes across as an arrogant and generally unpleasant individual, I thought he was a bit underrated for quite a long time, especially by his own management who clearly thought he needed to be over-protected for way too long.

However, there should be no doubt that he has stepped up to the mark over the last couple of years. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, of course, but most people expected Lacy to beat Joe, and the one-sided, career ending beat-down Joe gave him was one of the most brilliant performances of modern times. Joe didn't just beat Jeff, he completely stripped him apart and effectively destroyed his entire career.

Even after that, many people picked Kessler to beat Joe, especially after Kessler took apart practically all of those guys people accused Calzaghe of ducking (Beyer, Andrade, Mundine et al). For me, the performance against Kessler was better than the Lacy performance, because the opponent was clearly better and because Kessler gave Joe major problems early on and Joe had to adapt to win comfortably in the end.

Joe's apparent unwillingness to move up to 175 may well be to his detriment, but the question should be asked: "why does a fighter have to move up in weight anyway?". If Hopkins wanted to fight Joe five years ago, why didn't he fight at 168? And if memory serves, it was Hopkins who fucked that fight anyway by demanding twice the agreed asking price after the fight had been principally agreed.

Jones would probably have beaten Joe five years ago, but they were in different weight classes anyway at that time. How can that affect the legacy of a man who has fought for 15 years at 168?

And any comparisons to Ottke are just plainly wrong. If Calzaghe was an over-protected 'homer', then what the hell was Ottke? ::

MTF

 

At least Calzaghe is actually good and wins his fights legit.

Otke fought hand picked guys and still needed judges to give him gifts.

 

I picked the last option,

he is an over-rated, over-protected fast handed, slapping BUM who is going to get schooled.

 

Calzaghe and Ottke were both over-protected homers, regardless of Calzaghe being a superior fighter. Anyhow, I wouldn't blame it all on warren, Joe seem quite happy to defend against the mcintyres, podwills and jimenez in front of his Welsh audience. I think the two pivotal moments were Warren losing the Sky contract and Calzaghe getting dropped against Salem. Lacy was meant to be a cash out fight I reckon.

 

I picked the option "when he defined his career by destroying the 168 lbs Mike Tyson in Jeff Lacy"

 

what is funny is some give him so much credit for whupping Jeff "left BUM" Lacy. as if Lacy was some awesome fighter than Joe whupped ::

 

Precisely.

Ottke's single impressive win was his KO of Anthony Mundine.

Other than that, what the hell else did he do? Take Tocker Pudwill the full 12 rounds? :: Get two SD's against Brewer? :: Win an SD against Byron Mitchell? :: What about his UD against Reed after Robin was deducted points for throwing punches at Ottke? ::

Sven Ottke...:laughing:

 

the fact that "many predicted he would lose" shows you what people thought of Joe C::

 

Exactly.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but most expected Joe to be KO'd by Lacy. Now, after taking Jeff to school, Lacy is simply a 'bum'.

Revisionist BS

 

There is no doubt that Joe was over-protected for a long, long time, and it is possible that Lacy was the cash out fight. But at least he stepped up to the mark and took on that sort of risk in the end. Ottke never did anything of the sort.

And as RJJP4P rightly notes, at least Joe wiped his ASS with almost all of the bums Werren put in front of him. Ottke struggled on a number of occasions and needed gifts to get by guys Calzaghe had already whipped.

 

The problem with calzaghe was, for me anyway, not a question of his ability.

it was simply a case a heinous milking the fans of money and refusing to step up. i mean, the tocker pudwils and evans ashiras of the world went on for far too long.

calzaghe brought it all on himself by continually fighting these poor fighters in his nest and was rightly viewed as a complete joke before the lacy fight.

hatton was guilty of the same thing with his 40-0 WBU shit. People were expecting him to step up 3 full years before he did. And he crammed in about 12 fights in that time. Fighting NOBODIES.

How could anyone have been on the calzaghe bandwagon before the lacy fight? only the brits were on it and thats only because calzaghe is british.

impossible to be on the bandwagon of a guy refusing to step up and fight the best for years.

 

He DID try to fight Hopkins 6 years ago, but the loveable 'Nard' pulled out and did so without any criticism, so that's a question that needs re-direction I'm afraid.

 

Ottke destroyed Glen Johnson years before Glen outclassed Roy Jones and embarassed Chad Dawson. Ottke also had more title defenses and better resume than Bernard Hopkins who is pretty highly regarded

 

Admittedly, the win over Glen was decent (he hardly destroyed him, mind. He won a tight UD), but to claim he has a better resume than Bernard is just daft, Ugo.

Who did Ottke fight in the class of:

Trinidad
De La Hoya
Taylor
Tarver
Wright

The answer, of course, is no-one.

 

to say Okie-dokie has a better Resume than Hopkins is silly

Okie-dokie is a bum, a couple levels lower than Joe C who is a talented and fasted handed bum

 

Ottke had, at the time of his retirement, a better resume than Calzaghe. He may have beaten Mitchell by SD (as if the calzaghe stoppage wasn't eary anyhow) but he did it first, he unified when calzaghe was still milking the title and making promises. Mundine, Brewer twice (one disputable, one not so, 2 years before Calzaghe), Larsen in a close one, Tate twice, Mitchell, Johnson etc. Most of their common opponens, Ottke beat them first. I don't doubt that this was a factor in them being chosen for Calzaghe.

Lol at Ottke never stepping up as opposed to calzaghe

 

When did Ottke step up, then?

Of course, it would be foolish to argue that Joe was NOT protected for a long time. He was. But at least he came out of his comfort zone in the end.

Ottke and Calzaghe had a similarly poor resume at the time of Sven's retirement, but that is irrelevant, because there is no-one on Ottke's resume as good as Kessler or Eubanks and arguably Lacy.

The fact remains that Ottke was a bum-beating, over protected fighter his entire career. Joe WAS one, then he decided to start fighting live opponents. That, along with a hefty gap in class, is the difference between the two.

 

What do you mean, step up? He beat a fellow titliest and partially unified, does that qualify? Fact is he beat a lot of the prominent challengers of the time outside of Calzaghe. Lacy wasn't on the horizon at that point, nor was Kessler. Really, the ony thing calzaghe did over Ottke to this point was beat the established #2 guy in the division. Ottke never did, but then neither did Calzaghe during bot their reigns.

 

I said this same thing prior to the Lacy fight, but he tore Lacy to pieces. I don't think it is right to still call him a BUM at this point. He has a done a lot in boxing.

 

Trinidad, De La Hoya and Wright, is the equivalent of Margarito beating up Morales, Barrera and Pacman, ... and I dont regard Tarver as much chop to be honest, especially burning off all that movie muscle in his advanced age, Roy tried to do the same thing with evidently bad results, arguably career altering results. Taylor ofcourse kicked Hopkins arse twice.

Bernard is an overrated piece of weight welching shit, Feebs. Please dont fall for that "p4p" sensationalist trap when it comes to these 'name' midgets,..any other fighter, especially if foreign,..would be chastized for beating up smaller opponents.