Once again, Joe Calzaghe has something to say about Carl Froch. It's not nice. It never is. And soon enough, Carl Froch will have something to say in return about Joe Calzaghe. It won't be complimentary.
In an interview with City A.M., Calzaghe had this to say about Froch:
"He won a title that I gave up and hasn’t stopped bitching about everybody. Because he’s not making as much money and not getting on TV I think he’s bitter against the whole world. He’s like a spoilt little bloody bitch. I don’t mind saying that either, that’s OK, keep that in there. He’ll like that one."
Froch, of course, has been calling out Calzaghe for years. The two UK stars never even got close to arranging a fight, though it would have done a good house in Wales or England, even before Froch became the level of star he is now. Part of it would have been because I think Calzaghe-Froch would have generated a ton of casual buzz, at least in the UK.
When two fighters truly don't like each other, it's usually pretty obvious. And Calzaghe and Froch truly do not like each other.
They're also probably never going to shut up about it, because with Calzaghe seemingly comfortably retired and turning 38 next month, there's never going to be a fight, not unless the pair wind up on the white collar boxing circuit someday as a special attraction.
It's too bad, really. Maybe if they fought now, with Calzaghe old and rusty, Froch would even have a prayer of beating him. Maybe.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
One other thing I found very interesting about the interview, and have always found very interesting about Calzaghe, is his true obsession with not losing. Many will still criticize the level of opposition he faced, right until the very end when he decided to take on a shot Roy Jones Jr. in what turned out to be Calzaghe's final fight (at least for now).
About never losing, and about his hesitance to return, Calzaghe says this:
"It’s a big difference between 47-0 and 46-1. If I did lose, that one loss would destroy everything I’ve done; I’d never forgive myself. Why would I want another fight? It’d mainly be for money – that’s the wrong reason."
He also said this about his last loss:
"I tried to visualise, if I lost, how it would affect me. And it would really affect me. I remember my last loss, as an amateur, when I was about 17. It bugged me for months. I used to cry and I was really angry."
Joe Calzaghe was a unique, tremendous talent, and stands for now and the foreseeable future as the greatest super middleweight in that division's still-short history, but can you imagine if he'd have happened to lose a close fight at some point in his career, as happens to just about all fighters at some stage?
Would his fragile (and quite big) ego have even allowed him to become half as accomplished as he was?
Calzaghe's obsession over his "0" sometimes makes Floyd Mayweather Jr. look indifferent about his. To say that a single loss would "destroy everything [he's] done" in boxing is insane.
Then again, thinking that way is one of the reasons Calzaghe was so successful, I suppose.