Quote Originally Posted by Dark Lord Al
Yes Joe Luis great man /great fighter had The bum of the month club - but made 25 defences of his WORLD crown , which try as people have to beat still stand . which i have to say I'm pleased about.
However we can all take qualities from past greats , not a bad thing at all ,but a curtain boxer has taken this to an extream.
Joe Calzaghe has held the weakest of the 4 major belts for 10 YEARS !!!! ( although in resent times he has won other belts).
He took Joe Luis idea but kinda changed it to the extream.
Joe with the help of Frank Warren have made 20 DEFENCES of the SM title , this is a hard feat , unless you adopt the ................
"THE BUMS OF THE DECADE CLUB" which is exclusive to all Warren fighters i may add.
So we have defences againest- HAS BEENS-NEVER WERES - etc. 2 mandatories in 10 years ?
this is a waste as Calzaghe is not a bad fighter ,
but i hope for boxing's sake if he beats Kessler , he doesn't go on to beat the record for 25 defences as this will be a total insult to boxing and the GREAT Joe Luis.
So there it is id like to hear other views from my other POSTERS

Joe Luis regarded as a true GREAT , as a fighter and will always be rememberd.
Joke Calzaghe even if he beats Kessler , will never be mentioned in the same breath as the GREATS !!!!
I cant agree with that..although its a great post good points and all. Calzaghe,if he beats kess will be mentioned along with the ATG...Boxing is just different today as it was back in Joe ' Louis day...there was only 1 belt to defend, so fighting the the number 1 is pretty simple... with something like 4major boxing belts and god knows how many other small belts there are,it just gets hard to tell who is the number 1... and dont forget with Calzaghe all the people he was fighting were considerd top contenders at the time...Veit for example gets so much stick for being S*** just because Joe hammered him but at the time he was considered the best fight for Calzaghe.

Basically i think its just hard to compare fighters from completly different era's..When Joe Louis fought max shleming this was in the world war he was basically fighting for the pride of an entire country. So of course no matter how many people want to compare him to the fighters of today its hard because S*** like that wont happen anymore.

So taking things like that into account the ATG are great for boxing skill..and not just because of the things they did like make 25 defences or his world title back in the glory days of boxing. or make 20 defences of his WBO version of the world title and fight the poeple who were considered the best at the time.