{"id":350558,"date":"2026-01-03T20:44:07","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T20:44:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/350558\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T20:44:07","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T20:44:07","slug":"bernard-hopkins-says-one-fighter-thumped-him-harder-than-any-other-in-historic-career","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/350558\/","title":{"rendered":"Bernard Hopkins says one fighter ‘thumped’ him harder than any other in historic career"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bernard Hopkins<\/a> faced a selection of serious punchers, including Sergey Kovalev and Felix Trinidad, throughout his decorated career, but only one man stands out as the hardest-hitting fighter he ever locked horns with.<\/p>\n

The former two-weight world champion amassed 65 professional outings<\/a>, spanning across 28 years, and therefore came up against an incredibly diverse range of styles.<\/p>\n

When it comes to those who built their identity around being a prolific knockout artist, though, it must be said that Kovalev and Trinidad are the two that immediately spring to mind.<\/p>\n

In addition to them, Hopkins also discovered that Roy Jones Jr, who generated considerable power through his remarkable speed, was no feather-fisted customer, either.<\/p>\n

The pair collided for the first time in 1993, with Jones, despite sustaining a hand injury, claiming the world middleweight title<\/a> with a clear unanimous decision victory.<\/p>\n

For Hopkins, though, it was not until 1999, when he fought the then-leading middleweight contender, Antwun Echols, that he encountered the most heavy-handed puncher he ever faced.<\/p>\n

During their 12-round contest, Echols floored his durable opponent with a right hand but, due to the punch arriving while the referee was administering a break, he was ultimately not awarded the knockdown.<\/p>\n

Instead, Hopkins eventually claimed a unanimous decision victory, before once again defending his IBF title with a 10th-round stoppage in their rematch the following year.<\/p>\n

After that, Echols became something of a gatekeeper in the middle and super-middleweight divisions, but was nonetheless named by Hopkins as the biggest puncher he faced in an interview with Ring Magazine.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Antwun Echols] was clubbing, not swift. Thumping. Also, Felix Trinidad, but that\u2019s all. He was really one dimensional. He had great success fighting one-dimensional people.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not a knock on him but when you run into a Bernard Hopkins, who\u2019s more than one dimensional, then you got a problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cKovalev was a big puncher but I\u2019m going to stick with Antwun Echols \u2013 he could crack.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bernard Hopkins faced a selection of serious punchers, including Sergey Kovalev and Felix Trinidad, throughout his decorated career,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350559,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2560,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-350558","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-boxing","8":"tag-boxing","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350558"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350558\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}