Middleweight great Hopkins knocked out of ring in career finale

LOS ANGELES : Bernard Hopkins’s bid to add a last chapter to a storied ring career ended Saturday with the 51-year- old former world champion spent sprawling out of the ring by Joe Smith.

In a fight that Hopkins vowed would be his last the 27-year- old Smith -- who wasn’t born when Hopkins launched his career in 1988 -- ended proceedings with a series of blows that included one of his punishing right hands.

Hopkins, who sagged against the ropes and then through them as Smith landed a final left, fell backwards, hitting his head and twisting an ankle.

When Hopkins was unable to make it back into the ring within the mandatory 20 seconds referee Jack Reiss called a halt, making it a technical knockout for Smith at 53 seconds of the eighth round.

“The fighter got hit with a legal punch, went out of the ring and was injured. It’s over,” Reiss said.

The result was booed by some of the 6,513 at the Forum in Los Angeles, and Hopkins insisted he was pushed, not punched out of the ring.

“I’m really still in shock,” said Hopkins, whose resume includes some of the biggest names of his generation and an astonishing 20 straight middleweight title defenses beginning in 1994.

Hopkins became the oldest boxer in history to win a major title when defeated Tavoris Cloud in 2013. In 2014 he beat Beibut Shumenov by split decision to become the oldest to unify world titles.

After a two-year layoff, Hopkins looked all of his 51 years in the early going, but he said he believed he was on his way to turning the tide. — AFP