Every time you think Bernard Hopkins is done, he does something to prove you wrong.
Such was the case two weeks ago when Hopkins rebounded after a lackluster showing in a decision loss to Joe Calzaghe with one of the most dominating performances of his career annihilating current Middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik—unbeaten before the fight—a man seventeen years younger than Hopkins when they met in Atlantic City.
The fight itself was a mismatch in every sense of the word right from the beginning as Hopkins was able to find Pavlik whenever and however he wanted looking to be a fighter of 33 and not 43 starting off red hot staggering Pavlik in the second round and keeping the Youngstown native off of his game until it was too late.
The main things that created the slaughter were the overwhelming difference in hand speed, movement, and effectiveness of punches all in favor of Hopkins. Hopkins was able to dance around Pavlik with ease through the first half of the fight and his defense was in such crisp form that even with the old man’s legs began to tire and slow down, he could still dodge Pavlik to the point where nothing the 26 year-old threw would prove effective.
Since his demolishing of Antonio Tarver back in 2005 and subsequent retirement announcement, Hopkins has demolished Ronald “Winky” Wright and Pavlik in similarly dominant fashion with the loss and lackluster performance against Calzaghe being the only blemish in his comeback and—other than the Taylor fights—his only blemish in the last fifteen years.
Hopkins would land 172 punches to Pavlik’s 108 during the fight and would land 148 power punches to Pavlik’s 55, but again both of Pavlik’s numbers proved to be deceiving as just about nothing he threw through the first nine rounds meant anything and in the final few rounds when Pavlik did finally get going, he was only able to win a round or two on the judge’s scorecards based on Hopkins slowing down more than him picking up the pace.
Each man lost a point during the fight, Pavlik in round 8 for hitting Hopkins in the back of the head—something he had been warned about throughout the fight—and Hopkins in round 9 for clinching, even though the legitimacy of Hopkins’ penalty was called into question as few beside the ref saw the penalty as warranted and many at ringside did believe it was a small measure to stop this rout from getting too embarrassing.
The crowd in Atlantic City was pro-Pavlik at all times until the opening bell ring. Almost from the moment the fight began, the crowd turned and the “B-Hop!” chants could be heard throughout, something Hopkins relished in after the fight due to the strong opinion against him going into the fight. So much was Hopkins’ desire to prove everyone wrong, he appeared to rub it in—rightly so when almost all of the media covering the fight picked Pavlik during fight week—as he stared down all of press row after his triumph letting everyone know that The Executioner was not done yet.
Hopkins’ celebration may have been too much for Pavlik and his camp to take as the two fighters and their corners nearly came to blows after the final bell ring with pushing and shoving in the middle of the ring. The two camps continued to jaw at each other through the decisions, but Hopkins in a surprise twist his personality considered, was the one to put out the fire offering Pavlik a post-fight pep talk to assure the young fighter that he can be the great middleweight that Hopkins had been—something Hopkins seems to want out of Pavlik considering their dialogue—and giving him the quote of the fight as he told a beaten Pavlik, “Don’t let this fight destroy you man.”
For Pavlik, this fight shouldn’t destroy him. Pavlik is still the Middleweight champion, a title that was not on the line as this fight was fought at 170 pounds. That very fact may have done Pavlik in right from the onset. Pavlik has fought his entire career within the middleweight division exceeding 160 pounds only on a few occasions and the first time he went past 160 against a fighter of great stature and ability—the second fight against Jermain Taylor was fought at 164-lb—Pavlik fought a slower fight than people are used to seeing out of him as the second Taylor fight took a much slower pace than the first with Pavlik appearing to have almost lost all of the fire that propelled him to the seventh round win that gave him the title last September. Adding ten pounds to 170, while not the definitive reason for the loss, may have been a contributing factor as Pavlik just appeared out of his element against a man who has spent the last few years at this weight. Again, Pavlik should be distraught about blowing a big opportunity to become a big star and to knock off a legend, but he still has his title and has a lot more of something that Hopkins doesn’t: time.
In this slaughter, it was the slower Hopkins the final rounds that really captivated people and got the crowd going with his flurries in the seventh, eighth, and final round the symbolized the apparently forever young ability this man possesses and appeared to be his coronation into legend as Hopkins himself would say after the fight that this was his best performance—in his mind eclipsing his recent beat downs of Tarver and Wright as well as big wins over Trinidad and De La Hoya—and it would be hard to argue considering the age difference and Pavlik’s recent success compared to Hopkins’ recent failure made the younger fighter a clear favorite. It was Hopkins channeling Sugar Ray Leonard with that famous windup and beating Pavlik bloody in the final round nearly forcing the ref to step in that may have be the defining moments in a long and storied career.
Hopkins 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 10 9 10 9 10 118
Pavlik 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 10 9 107
