Is Bernard Hopkins the Greatest Fighter of this ERA?

Question

Lets see:

20 Successful Consecutive Title Defenses of the Middleweight (160) Crown (the record)

KO wins over 2 great fighters who were able to move up in weight (Oscar De La Hoya & Felix 'Tito' Trinidad the former WBA Middleweight Champ). These guys were apart of the 20 titles defenses. If Hagler gets credit for beating Hearns & Duran (Hearns a natural WW & Duran a natural LW) then Hopkins should get credit for KOing Oscar & Tito.

Embarrassed AntonioTarver which is regarded the best Light Heavyweight of his time. Tarver is the guy who KO'd the invincible Roy Jones Jr. & beat him by decision. Even Sugar Ray Robinson failed at beating the best Light Heavyweight of his time.

Beat a crafty almost impossible fighter to beat (Ronald 'Winky' Wright). Wright is a guy who beat Felix Trinidad, beat Shane Mosley twice, and drawed with Jermaine Taylor (which I really think he won).

48 Wins

32 KOs

4 Losses (Ali has 5 losses)

1 Draw

1 No Contest

And NEVER been Knocked Out!

Answer 1

No sorry to answer it that way but he has beaten 2 great SMALLER guy in tito and oscar roy beat him with one hand  so no he isnt.

Answer 2

dude floyd is the best he will be the best fighter in this era and 4ever floyd mayweather 4 life

Answer 3

Bernard Hopkins is a great fighter who has got to be considered the best middleweight of his era, and ONE OF the best pound for pound fighters of his era.  However, as much as I like Hopins, he is not the best of his era- Roy Jones, Jr. is.  Look at how long each was number one pound for pound: Roy was the pound for pound best for the majority of the 1990's and he was voted as best fighter of the decade during that timespan as well.  Hopkins was ruling the middleweight division during the same timespan and he dominated as well, but not the way Jones did- Roy put on a clinic EVERY TIME out, while Hopkins would sometimes make a fight a bit boring because he was so good defensively.  Plus, Jones beat Hopkins when they were both in their prime, and Jones won titles at 160, 168, 175, and heavyweight.  Hopkins was only champ at 160 and 175.  Jones was also the best pound for pound fighter up until 2004, and it was only AFTER a past his prime Roy got beat by Tarver, did Hopkins ascend to number one in the pound for pound rankings.  B-Hop also did not stay there no where near as long as Jones did, he was only there for a few months, because then he got beat twice by Jermain Taylor.  Hopkins is an all -time great fighter and he is one of the best middleweights of all time (and THE best middleweight of his era). Today, Hopkins is better because he is currently still one of the top 5 pound for pound fighters, but Jones was better than him in his prime and since they ruled their respective divisions at the same time, it is only fair to say that Jones was the best of that era.

Answer 4

ONE of the greatest? Defiantly. The Greatest? No

You cant base something like that on a guys record. Hopkins is great at picking opponents. Remember he did not want the fight with Taylor originally because slick boxers beat him. Hopkins prefers to fight strait forward punchers who offer up no angles.

But when faced with slick boxers Hopkins Philly shell defense tactics and counter punching don’t work, so he avoided them as much as possible. Only when Taylor became his mandatory did he agree to fight him, but still tried to price himself out of the fight much like he did with Jones.

Now im taking away nothing from Hopkins he is indeed a great fighter. Tito was too small, Tarver was filming Rocky,DeLaHoya took a dive and Winky Wright is almost like Hopkins in that he counters and has a tight defense and is boring to watch. He was bested twice by Taylor, and once by a Jones Jr who had a broken hand.

Hopkins is great, but to say the greatest??? your talking about a really talented list.

Lennox Lewis,Julio Cesar Chavez, Floyd Mayweather,Jones Jr,Erik Morales,Ricardo Lopez (50 fights without a loss.)Ray Leonard,Duran,Parnell Whitaker, and last but certainly not least Commander Vander the Real Deal Evander Holyfield. Vander ruled the Cruiserweight division to become the best cruiserweight of all time, Won the heavyweight title 5 times, had some of the greatest heavyweight battles of all time, Beat Mike Tyson when everyone though Tyson was invincible and even a 40 year old Vander gave Lewis a handful. He had one of the most successful and inspiring comebacks in boxing history.

Hopkins is most certainly in there somewhere.

Answer 5

yes he is the Greatest Fighter of this ERA and he should have won against jermaine taylort

Answer 6

LOL- go back to holding Jordan's nuts in the basketball section. Boxing is beyond you!

Answer 7

If Bernard isn't the dominate fighter of his era, it is because both Roy Jones Jr. and James Toney both won middleweight titles, and took it all the way up to winning HEAVYWEIGHT titles.  You have to give credit where credit is due, Bernard dominated the middle weight division during his era, but only because Jones moved up and he avoided Toney.  I think both Jones and Toney edge Bernard on the dominance scale, but without a doubt they were the three best of the era.  

I rate Bernard Hopkins ahead of both Toney and Jones as far as middleweight domninance, but on the over all accomplishment as far as career success goes, B Hop never conquered the Heavyweight division.  Few middleweights in history have, unfortunately for Hopkins, two from his era did win heavyweight titles.

I have B Hop as number four all time on the middleweight list behind Robinson, Hagler and Monzon.   Not bad company.  Bernard is certainly a great fighter, but the greatest of his era?  

No, that belongs to Roy Jones Jr.

Answer 8

Yes without a doubt the only other great fighter of this era would be a guy like floyd mayweather or joe calzghe, one of those quiestions will be answered this saturday.  Hopkins had 20 defenses which is the 3rd most all time, that is a unbelivable mark, he went up and beat up the best light heavyweight in antonio tarver easily and beat another great fighter winky wright.  His resume is the best in this era, beating tarver, wright, KO'ing de la hoya, trinidad, and only losses when he had to make weight against taylor in close decisions, and a loss to a much better boxer then jones.  He is the best i think of this era the top 5 middleweights ever, along with hagler adnd carlos monzon.  So yes he is the best fighter of this era maybe one of the best fighters ever if he can convincingly beat calzaghe.

Answer 9

Yes.

You look at his sucess... and there is absolutely no denying it.

Answer 10

Only if he will beat Joe Calghaze. Which I think he will but you never know in boxing anything can happen. I thought he would beat Jermaine Taylor but he lost twice to Jermaine so anything can happen.

Answer 11

Dude you have to stop pointing to numbers to try and show this - you have to think about HOW he did it.  

Roy has higher KO percentage, a win over Hopkins, Toney, Virgil Hill, McCallum, Tarver, and others, none of which came in at an unnatural or strained weight, titles from 160 to heavyweight, and he did it without cherry picking.

There are too many reasons to list why Roy is better than Hopkins, I'll just say, WATCH the two guys, then honestly tell me who is better.

As far as the best of this generation its Roy then everyone else (Whitaker is second).

Answer 12

You obviously are a B-Hops fan...nothing wrong with that.  He certainly was/is one of the more significant fighters of the last 10-20 yrs.

Here are some things to consider.....

1.  The middleweight division was pretty hollow during B-Hops reign in large part due to the house cleaning performed by his predecessor....Roy Jones.  Don't forget Jones beat a young B-Hop's.

2.  Is anyone really impressed with B-Hop's wins over DLH, Wright  or especially Tarver.  Tarver has never been anything to brag about.  B-Hop's win really just punctuates how bad the lt heavy division is.  And the B-Hop's vs Wright fight...well I was just embarrassed for the both of them.  Looks like they forgot the Geritol that night.

3.  His 20 defense record is during a massive lull of talent in the MW division.  He most certainly would not have reached that number if he faced the same guys that Hagler fought.

4.  He has less losses than Ali.  People seem to focus on losses way too much.  Back in the day, fighters wanted to fight challenging opponents that made them better.  B-Hop's spends quite a bit of effort gaining contractual advantages over his opponents.  That Ali lost more than B-Hop's is irrelevant...Ali was a better fighter.

5. When Robinson fought Maxim, he weighed in under 160 lbs.  Maxim was over 170 lbs at the weigh in.  The fight lasted 13 rds and he just didn't answer the bell.  We are talking about Maxim and not Tarver........Robinson's feat is unmatched by any modern MW.  This is defintely more significant than B-Hop's beating Tarver.

I do rank him high, but I just cannot ignore guys like Holyfield, Chavez, Whittaker, Jones and some of the lighter weight guys.  While B-Hop's was creating difficulties with his management approach, these guys were in the mix.