Chad Dawson Did Prove He Was Bernard Hopkins Worst Nightmare Saturday Night

Just days before the light heavyweight title fight between Bernard Hopkins and Chad Dawson, Dawson was seen on ESPN stating that he was Hopkins' worst nightmare.

Many criticized Dawson for his unfocused and inconsistent performances inside the ring, most notably his one and only loss to Jean Pascal—where it appeared he was never in the fight and would rather just do a rematch then try to win on that night.

Jean Pascal's stock skyrocketed after taking away Dawson's 0, but when Jean took on the experienced and cagey veteran Hopkins, his stock sunk. He was over matched and did not have the stamina to compete with a 46-year-old man, losing his belt to the old man in the rematch.

Back to Dawson, he has claimed that he has been calling out Hopkins, and that Hopkins had been ducking him for the past three years. One may have thought this was untrue, until the two finally stepped into the ring last Saturday night and saw why Hopkins may have been ducking Dawson this whole time.

As in most of his fights, Hopkins started off slow and cautiously. He held, hugged and, in this case, constantly pushed down Dawson to avoid any punches that Chad could throw.

Prior to the fight, the HBO announcing team mentioned how much Hopkins is known to cheat in his fights and that the referee often misses these illegal tactics, claiming that this may be a factor against Dawson.

The HBO announcing team was dead on, as it was Hopkins' dirty tactics that probably caused Chad to react the way he did.

Hopkins was doing his signature short right hand followed by his headbutt in the first round several times. It is ridiculous how everyone just allows him to do all of these sneaky illegal moves to the point that has become accepted, as if we are saying "hey, it's Hopkins, let him get away with about 30 fouls cause that is how he fights."

The first round was close as many rounds often are whenever Hopkins fights, he is a defensive minded fighter who often neutralizes his opponents rather than attacking them.

Dawson seemed to have Hopkins backing up, but he was blocking most of the punches thrown by the much younger challenger.

The second round had Hopkins doing what many would view as an Emmanuel Steward move. Steward would have his champion fighters, such as Lennox Lewis and Wladimir Klitschko, push down on their opponents and apply their full body weight, meaning that their opponents not only couldn't throw any punches, but they also became tired out by the weight pressing upon them.

Wladimir Klitschko would often do this in his fights until the referee began to warn him, he would then stop but the damage would already be done. Just imagine Wladimir shoving his 245 lbs body of solid muscle on you repeatedly.

Dawson, unlike Wladimir's opponents, was not going to wait for the referee to do something about this dirty move and took matters into his own hands. He showed Hopkins that his dirty tactics will not work against him by tossing Hopkins off his shoulders and onto the canvas.

Hopkins fell very exaggeratedly and dramatically as he has done before in fights, most notably against Antwun Echols where he miraculously got up to win the fight.

As soon as it was clear Hopkins was going to put on a show on the ground, Max Kellerman pointed out that he faked a similar situation against Joe Calzaghe in their 2008 fight. However, Hopkins has been known to pull the same fake injury act to buy time repeatedly throughout his career. These are all consistent patterns that many often overlook whenever Hopkins fights.

It was clear that Hopkins was looking for a way out of the fight. He knew that, both mentally and physically, he was in way over his head this time. His opponent was bigger, stronger and faster, a young technically sound fighter who did not get intimidated by Hopkins' underhand tactics.

Ultimately, the referee Pat Russell determined it a highly controversial TKO win for Dawson since Hopkins was unable to continue. The crowd at Staples Center began to boo extremely loud, expressing their disgust at the outcome of the fight.

Most of the boos were against Hopkins, as many felt he was faking an injury to get out of the fight in attempt to make it a no-contest ruling.

Fight forums and Twitter lit up with all fans weighing in on what they just witnessed, and almost everyone was upset with the outcome—and felt let down by the main event on every level.

Fans Tweeted everything from: "This is why boxing is dead" to "Hopkins just retire already".

Should we lose all respect for a 46-year-old man who realized he was just too old and over matched this time? No of course not.

But, if that same 46-year-old man did the same disgraceful tactics all throughout his career the way Hopkins did? Then, yes, all respect goes out the window.

Hopkins has screwed over the fight fans fight after fight. I could list all of them, but this article would be another 10 pages long, so let's just keep it short and sweet and say that Hopkins should just retire, please!

You are killing the sport of boxing all by yourself.

Look at the numbers for your PPV on Saturday, look at the ticket sales at Staples Center. You never did strong numbers in your career outside of the two welterweights you fought at middleweight. 

If you have any respect for the sport and your very few remaining loyal fans, please just hang them up, you have nothing else left to prove in the sport.

I was going to end this piece on a more positive note, praising Hopkins for what he should be respected for. However, I just came across an article in USA Today that states Hopkins will continue to fight on, despite what happened on Saturday.

In the article, Hopkins expressed that he won't retire and that he felt Dawson was the one who wanted out of the fight by intentionally fouling him.

He claims Dawson was scared to fight on into the later rounds. Hopkins' promoting team have filed with the WBC to motion a protest to reverse the outcome of the fight.

"

Hopkins stated:

"Of course you don't want to fight me," Hopkins said. "Of course you know I'm a slow starter and I'll figure you out and I'll take you apart. He knew that time was coming."

"I think the referee got caught up in the moment and didn't know what to do," Hopkins said. "I don't want to sound like I'm whining. The bottom line is, the referee either doesn't know the rules or dropped the ball."

"Boxing is so outdated," he said. "We're living by the rules and technologies of the day of 1929. 1929! They do it in football and they make the right call."

"I'm not going to give this guy the opportunity to have this be the last highlights of a storied career," Hopkins said.

"

Fight fans, will you pay PPV or for live tickets to a 46-year-old Bernard Hopkins fight after most of you finally saw the light on what Hopkins has been doing his entire career?

The answer is no, most of you who did see this fight Saturday saw it via an illegal FREE live stream and the numbers reflect that.

Chad Dawson did prove he was Bernard's worst nightmare on Saturday, but Hopkins is still the fight fans worst nightmare.

If he chooses to fight on, it not only makes him and his fans look bad, it makes everyone look bad. If he continues to win at the age of 46, doing what he has been doing, then it shows how pathetic the current state of boxing is.

When a 50-year-old man, who cheats and cries to the referee and fakes injuries, is still on top of the ranks, it shows how weak the current elite fighters are.

Maybe Dawson does not exactly deserve that belt because he won it in a very controversial manner, but Hopkins won many of his fights by cheating and being dirty. Most of his fans said: "Hey it's the referee's job to catch all the fouls, if Hopkins can get away with it then he does".

So after fouling his opponents fight after fight, without the referees ever seeing or doing anything about all those fouls, maybe this is karma?

Karma is a B-Hop.

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