Mike Samuels

03.08 - If you don't know who Bernard Hopkins is, well, that's not entirely shocking. But let's say you've never witnessed him fight, you don't order pay per-view telecasts, and you stopped watching boxing after Larry Holmes pummeled Muhammad Ali. The best way to get a grasp on the mug of Bernard Hopkins is to pull out a new edition dictionary and look up the world stubborn.

Hopkins defines the word. Hell, he does more than define it - he lives it.

All his life Bernard Hopkins has said that he never got the respect he deserved. He grew up livin' the hard-knock life, preying on others for survival, and doing everything to make sure he came out on top. What make's his story more significant than the million other "Joe Thug" stories out there is the fact that Bernard Hopkins went to jail for a costly mistake on his part and came out to change his life around. Hopkins couldn't use his 'celebrity status' to get a cheap sentence, or hire a Johnny Cochran type lawyer to elude the system. All because he wasn't famous, nor was he rich.

He was just a regular guy.

Coming out of lockup Hopkins started to put some actual work into boxing (he picked up a little from the slammer). After turning professional and losing his very first fight, Hopkins went on winning spree, losing only to Roy Jones Jr. (heh, who beats him anyway?). And even after the loss Hopkins put himself in some wars with other great fighters, but his name never got thrown into the big leagues. His style was rough and dirty. A sort of "Do anything to win" attitude followed him into the ring and proved to be correct during his bouts with Antwon Echols and Keith Holmes, to name a few.

With over a dozen championship defenses in his name, Hopkins still couldn't get the glitz and glamour that most fighters have gotten with just one career defining win in their careers. But Don King - love him or hate him - came to the rescue last year when he decided it was best to clean out the middleweight division. A tournament that consisted of Bernard Hopkins, William Joppy, Keith Holmes and a heavier than usual Felix Trinidad was put into place and fought out, only to crown Bernard Hopkins champion after his career defining moment against Puerto Rico's own, Felix "Tito" Trinidad.

Even though Trinidad's move to 160lbs was his third major weight class, Hopkins won in such a spectacular fashion that none of that mattered. He was slicker, quicker, more elusive, and hungrier than Felix Trinidad. He out boxed the then undefeated superstar (who had gone on to dethrone De la Hoya, Vargas and Reid at previous weight classes) for eleven rounds. And he didn't cut it short, either. He finished Trinidad in grand fashion with a vicious combination that sent him to the canvas and Pappa Trinidad to the ring apron.

Alas, Bernard Hopkins finally got the recognition (as he broke Carlos Monzons defense streak) as a true champion and pound for pound one of the best in the sport. Hopkins had been for real since day one, and now everyone who didn't know it was left without doubt.

The stubborn ended ways of X have shown in high amounts since his win over Tito nearly a year ago. Hopkins and Roy Jones have been jawing at each other for the longest time - each with a different story on who challenged whom, who offered who, etc - and nothing has been remotely close to getting a rematch in the works. Perhaps Roy Jones Jr. is scared to get in the ring with someone legit. After all, why fight Hopkins a second time after he has momentum on his side, when you can just fight the Glen Kelly family and make five million dollars a pop?

Most people see it as Hopkins's fault for not facing Jones. Roy made an offer of six million dollars, even brought it up to ten million and then Hopkins began demanding that the Jones camp find some way to pay for his fees to Don King. Is The Executioner on X? Seriously. The guy acts as though his one win over a blown up middleweight should set the tone for the boxing world. Fighters get beat by better fighters every day, but that doesn't mean one win should justify boxing getting on its knees and performing oral activities to please a champion. Hopkins acts as though he has boxing by the balls when it's the other way around. And lately it's been making me sick to my stomach.

All this talk: blah, blah, blah freakin' blah. No action.

If that's not stubborn enough for you, how about the idea that Hopkins decided to piss on HBO and their demands that he fight Roy Jones Jr or get lost. Yeah, that's right. The fearless Executioner appears to be ducking at every chance he gets to get in the ring with Jones. Now I'm not a big Roy Jones fan (I sometimes wonder if I will ever see my mother in the ring with him, because that's about the level of competition he faces lately), but there is no way that Hopkins deserves more money than Jones in a rematch (anyone who begs to differ, puhlease!). A 60/40 split was offered and Hopkins laughed at it. The only thing I ever found funny about Hopkins and Jones was the night Jones came in and slapped the taste out of X's mouth with one hand.

I'm still laughing to this day.

So with HBO out the door Hopkins decides to move on to Showtime. That's a great idea. If you're not going to face Jones, guys like Harry Simon and Joe Calzaghe are fine alternatives. I would, as well as anyone who watches boxing, love to see some excitement brought back into the middleweight division. Especially now that Trinidad is supposedly finished. And when I heard this news I was excited, and now it's been twisted every which way and the deal with Showtime is apparently falling through.

Know what sucks even more?

HBO doesn't want Hopkins back. They are sick of dealing with his stubborn "Gimme, gimme, gimme" attitude. I would be, too and soon boxing will as a whole. There is no problem with Hopkins facing mandatory guys (Roy Jones does it everyday), and it's wrong for publicists and fans to jump to the conclusion that Hopkins doesn't want to fight anyone.

Doug Fischer of Maxboxing.com summed it up best when he mentioned that a year hasn't even gone by since Hopkins big win over Tito, so there's no reason to hit the panic button thinking he will become the next coming of Roy Jones Jr --- only slightly older.

I agree totally with that theory. I have no problem lettin' X kick back and beat Carl Daniels, or take his mandatory in Philly against some guy boxing has never heard of. Let him take a few easy fights. That's okay with me. But it's a bad idea to sit on a ranking in boxing, and if Hopkins doesn't at least make strides to get in position to face some championship fighters, then he might as well hang the gloves up or he will be seeing a similar reflection of Roy Jones when he looks in the mirror at night. And so far he is stalling big time.

Age definitely isn't on his side, and I'm not sure he's as hungry as he was with Trinidad. His outlook was to break Monzon's record and go down in history as a great middleweight.

He will.

And if not anything else, he sure as hell will go down as the most stubborn middleweight champion of our era.

Mike Samuels can be reached for comment at Tyson180@aol.com