Quote Originally Posted by Rantcatrat View Post
Pugilistic - I believe the thing you are not taking into consideration is that a prime Bernard Hopkins was a middleweight. A prime Joe Calzaghe was a super middleweight. Hopkins' best wins in his prime were against smaller men. The Tito and Oscar fights were at 158 and 156 or are you referring to earlier? Maybe you are referring to p4p, which is all subjective anyway. Was Hopkins in his prime when RJJ beat him? My opinion is that between prime Roy/Bernard/Joe, on any given day, any of them could beat eachother. To be fair, it's a blemish on their records that they didn't face eachother in their primes. Scoreboard though: after the dust settled, only Joe is 2 & 0, Roy is 1 & 2, and Bernard is 1 & 2.
Exactly and a very important point. Hopkins best wins are over a bunch of tiny men who didn't belong anywhere near middleweight and then beyond more men who didn't belong at LHW. Hopkins is a lot of smoke and mirrors and he is canny and aware of that. He rarely chooses an opponent lightly.

Calzaghe was always bigger and only once Hopkins had moved up and adjusted was Calzaghe called upon and Hopkins was forced to resort to laying down to buy time against the workrate. The only thing I give Hopkins in his prime is more chance of being hurt and less laying on the canvas.