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having played against and marked Hinphey before I'd say it would have been stranger if Hinphey hadn't been at him! TO be honest don't remember the theatrics, recollection was of a dig in the ribs. A lot of Tyrone boys on quickly re that yet over hte last three years viewing this board I've never seen one condemn Jordan's antic in AIF. May have missed it of course. and before i get accused of anything, I'm Tyrone born, but cannot stand to see the sh*t they get up to - over the last couple of years they have taken the game to previous unreached levels of cyncism

had originally read that Hopkins-Wright was being made at catch weight of 170lbs, but recent report I read said it was fulle light heavyweight, ie 175lbs.

unlikely to be a fight for the casual fan to enjoy but from technical point of view it's likely to be as good as it gets. Can't remmeber the last time two such gifted tacticians/technicians fought

not sure I see Dunne really making it as world class, the competition in and around his weight class is ferocious. As someone mentioned Duddy seriously needs to tighten up his defense. Talk of him fighting Taylor is ridiculous, this is a guy with just about hte best jab in boxing and he'd have it in Duddy's face all night. He definitely needs more experience against a higher class opponent of opponent before any more of that talk (I'm thinking 5-6 fights as opposed to 2-3). In all likelihood by the time Duddy reaches that level if he gets there, Taylor will have moved up in weight as he his already a monster at 160lbs.

In relation to Duddy being the next big thing in Irish boxing, he may be further along the line than Andy Lee but from the little I have seen of the two of them Lee seems to be the better boxer but Duddy can be good to watch. What odds on an All Irish World middleweight championship fight in 2-3 years?

Passedit, meant to comment earlier on some of that ESPN stuff. De La Hoya ahead of Whitaker and RJJ? Not a chance. More titles in different weight classes but at light middle and middle weight he beat the worst champion in recent memory (Castillejo) and was thoroughly thumped by Sturm yet somehow got a decision. Great fighter none the less but certainly not better than the best defensive fighter of the last 25 years (and from what i read, a helluva a lot longer than that) nor probably the greatest boxing athlete of the last 25 years. Guys who know a helluva a lot more about boxing than me might criticis his technique as being less than perfect but RJJ was just so fast and had such good reflexes it didn't matter - he made good fighters look crap. His destruction of Montell Griffin in one round after he lost his perfect record against the same fighter by DQ was something to behold. Griffin went on to beat James Toney twice.

In other more depressing news, have jsut read that Wayne McCullough is to return to the ring. He says that othe rfighters who turned pro at the same time as him had twice as many fights and that he has only had 33 fights. He almost hasn't been involved in a fight that wasn't a war since winning the world title in '95. He has shipped a ridiculous amount of punches over the years to some of the best punchers in and around his weight class, and lost numerous world title fights since he first lost to Daniel Zaragoza. Incredibly stubborn and with an incredible chin and seemingly endless stamina, he has shown freakish determination and will power over the eyars to consistently come back from hellacious beatings, but why he feels the need to do so one more time I don't know. Some of those close to him should tell him home truths - unfortunately he hasn't been good enough for the last 10 years to regain a world title, he aint gonna do it now considering he was virtually always the lighter puncher in any fight. Hang them up once and for all and enjoy retirement.

beaten tonight and put on his arse for the first time in his career. Think two judges only gave him a round which was a disgrace as he won nine, ten and twelve for my money (11 was when he wa sput down by a peach of a short right hook). At the most the points difference should have been four i thought yet somehow the minimum "official" difference was seven.

most of Barrera's fights have been featherweight or super featherweight/junior lightweight.

Barrera was fantastic but isn't even the best Mexican in and around that weight class never mind the best in the world. And it's not Morales either, but Salvador Sanchez. Hard to call possibly given he died in accident at age of 23, but watch his fights against Wilfredo Gomez and Azumah Nelson. The one with Nelson is jsut unreal, non-stop for virtually every second of 15 rounds until it was stopped one minute from the end. Nelson was at this stage largely unknown but went on to becomeprobably one of the top 10-15 of the last 25 years

terribly sad news about Corrales - initially when I saw the headline I assumed it was fas a result of some the beatings he took in the ring - -involved in absolute wars with Castillo, Casamayor and Freitas not to mention being knocked down five times by the Pretty Boy. Unbelievable blood and guts courage.

stew you obviously know nothing about boxing - please refer to my earlier post on Duran. As I think someone else said, he wasn't nearly the most skilled boxer of the "Famous Four" but he was some blood and guts fighter hence the nickname the "Scrapper from Panama". For a picture perfect knock out, watch the Hitman knock him clean out (2nd round I think)

I haven't really seen enough of the "Famous Four" to comment on each of them or rank them. Hagler was an absolute beast with a rock like chin and for my money he beat Ray Leonard. His fight with the Hitman is still the most exciting 8 minutes in boxing history - there have been many better rounds than the famous round 1, even quite a few of them over just the last 10 years - but no better three rounds, certainly that I can remember

The fights involving the British (super)middles around the early 90's were great to watch. I think Watson was the only one to fight McCallum of the three top Brits and if I recall correctly he was beaten quite handily. The McClellan-Benn fight was tragic but a real humdinger of a fight - Benn knocked clean out of the ring within a minute and somehow hung on to win.

McCallum would probably be in my top 10 of the last 20 years.

Tyrone's Own. Not sure if you're suggesting Tyson was better than Lewis and in their respective peaks i'm not sure. The fact however is, Lewis fought better names, the best on Tyson's win list being Spinks, Witherspoon and Bonecrusher Smith.

Like GalwayBhoy not keen on including people have barely seen fight so here are my top five from last 20 odd years in no particular order:

Pernell Whitaker
Roy Jones Jr
Floyd Mayweather Jr
Julio Cesar Chavez
Ricardo Lopez

Galwaybhoy DLH threw more punches but didn't land more - punch stats show Mayweather landed about 210 to DLH's 130. I know you can talk about lies, damned lies and statistics but this bears out what I thought - Mayweather was just much more economical hence his greater stamina down the stretch. I'd hazard a guess at saying that DLH probably only landed about 20-30 punches in the last four r0unds combined.

I hope Mayweather doesn't retire and fights Mosley and Cotto. Have never been that big a fan of DLH to be honest as he has gotten some very dodgy decisions in the past particularly against Whitaker, but also against Quartey (admittedly not an outright robbery) and  Sturm. I know there's a lot of debate about the Trinidad fight, but for me he lost it. Haven't seen the second Mosley fight where an awful lot of people say he was robbed, so can't comment on that. End of the line for him anyway, first ballot Hall of Famer no doubt, who deserves great credit for fighting the best out there

I had Mayweather by one in what was a much closer fight than I thought it would be. He initially had trouble keeping DLH off him which meant he lost the first half of the fight but I had him win four of the last five rounds as DLH tired - was very similar to the Trinidad fight in that respect.

Neither fighter really hurt the other at any time during the fight and I think it would have been a shame if DLH had won on aggression alone when the better boxing was virtually all Mayweather - as I mentioned given the disparity in size he was always going to have to fight from the outside. That said I thought Floyd could and should have been busier at times to make things more clear cut.

Very unfair comment on Duran Stew as I'm sure you're aware. Much the smaller man when he fought any of the other three you mentioned, he fought them between 10 and 20lbs above his best weight - he isn't after all widely recognised as the the best lightweight ever for nothing

Agreed Corn with all they hype it really is setting the fight up to be a real let down. Fingers crossed that won't be the case - hope it turns out that Mayweather can take DLH's best punches with relative ease, because if he cant we could have him backpedalling into a defensive shell very quickly - something that no one is better than him at.

Mayweather's chin hasn't been tested by anything like De La Hoya's power, the biggest puncher that I can think of that he has faced was Judah, but De la Hoya is a whole different animal. He may well only have outweighed Mayweather by 4lbs at the weigh in but i'd be surprised if it wasn't between 10-15lbs come fight time - he was on the limit and will bulk up considerably whereas if Floyd was going to bulk up any more he wouldn't have come in so low ie I expect Mayweather to enter the ring at or around the 150lbs he weighed for the weigh in.

Mayweather does not have the power to stop De La Hoya unless it's on cuts, and I don't recall Oscar ever cutting that badly. Oscar has been in with the biggest punchers at or around this weight level for the last 6-7 years including Quartey and Tito who are both much more powerful than Mayweather and also Mosley and Mayorga.

I'll go for Mayweather on points. If it's a KO then there is only one winner.

whatever about him beating De La Hoya, he would destroy Hatton. De La Hoya is considerably bigger than Mayweather and has one of the best left hooks in the business, if he can simply outmuscle Mayweather we might be in for an interesting fight as I don't think Mayweather has anywhere near the power to cause a stoppage. That said, bullying Floyd will be no easy task as his ring generalship is just about the best there is.

Hatton's not fit to lace his boots, and his face would be cut up as badly as Gatti's by the end of the fight - probably worse actually as I'm not sure Mayweather could stop him, which would mean slicing him up for a full 12 rounds.

If Mayweather keeps fighting the biggest fight out there for him after this is Shane Mosley. I think he has more of a chance than De La Hoya as he is as strong, if not stronger than De La Hoya and as fast if not faster than Mayweather himself.