Exclusive: Bernard Hopkins' last fight likely to be in London

IF ALL GOES according to plan, Philadelphia's ageless wonder, Bernard "The Alien" Hopkins, will end his 27-year career as a professional boxer by challenging IBF super middleweight champion James DeGale, in a bout that probably will be fought in October in London, and be televised by HBO.

In an exclusive interview with the Daily News, Hopkins said: "I'm interested in beating a guy up - the same guy that beat up [Andre] Dirrell."

DeGale (21-1, 14 KOs) claimed the vacant IBF 168-pound title by scoring a unanimous, 12-round decision over Dirrell on May 23 in Boston.

Hopkins, (55-7-2, 32 KO), a world champion in both the middleweight and light-heavyweight divisions, last fought on Nov. 8, when he yielded his IBF and WBA light-heavyweight belts in a unanimous-decision loss to WBO champion Sergey Kovalev, of Russia, in Atlantic City's Boardwalk Hall. At the postfight news conference, Hopkins - then 49 and the oldest man ever to win a widely recognized world boxing title - said he likely would retire, "unless something comes along that was interesting enough and big enough to bring me back for a final fight in 2015."

Hopkins, who turned 50 on Jan. 15, had a notion that that swan song might come against three-time former super middleweight champion Carl Froch (33-2, 24 KOs), of England, or WBA middleweight titlist Gennady "Triple G" Golovkin (33-0, 30 KOs), of Kazakhstan, a devastating puncher who has won his last 20 bouts by knockout. But Froch has expressed no interest in facing Hopkins.

Hopkins' attention only recently turned to another British 168-pounder, DeGale, 29, who made history against Dirrell by becoming the first Olympic gold medalist from the UK to also capture a world professional title.

DeGale's promoter, Eddie Hearn, promotes both DeGale and Froch, and has a good relationship with Golden Boy Promotions, for which Hopkins holds an executive position. A DeGale-Hopkins fight likely would fare very well, from a business standpoint, in England.

"I have to make my decision before the end of June," Hopkins said of the deadline for HBO to pick up the option for televising his presumed farewell fight. "I'm glad that HBO wants to exercise that option, and, of course, I would want to do it if the right opponent is there and it makes sense to both sides."

Hopkins has been preparing himself for life after boxing, or at least for life after boxing as an active fighter. In addition to his promotional responsibilities, he has impressed as an expert commentator for HBO, beginning with Kovalev's eighth-round stoppage of Jean Pascal on March 14 in Montreal.

"I'm passionate about it," the always-chatty Hopkins said of his excitement about being paid to talk about the sport he loves and knows so well. "It keeps me relevant in a way that goes beyond throwing a punch."

Longtime HBO blow-by-blow announcer Jim Lampley said Hopkins has demonstrated as much dedication to broadcasting as he has in extending his career far beyond the time frame when even elite fighters cease to perform anywhere near peak efficiency.

"In spending time with him, I know Bernard wakes up every morning with a curious mind," Lampley said. "He's energized by his own natural drive. That's not easily going to go away in him. He's never going to be finished learning about the horizons that he can conquer. It's just that we're getting to the point where those horizons no longer will be carved out in the ring, but at ringside.

"But a fight with DeGale, if it comes to fruition, makes sense for him. He'd be matching his skills against another technician with a legitimate pedigree, and who is coming off a very impressive victory. It'd be youth against antiquity. There's a lot of appeal there."

A precondition for the match besides agreement on the purses would be for the IBF to rank Hopkins as a super middleweight, a division in which he never has fought. Without a ranking, he likely could not be approved to participate in a sanctioned championship bout. But, given Hopkins' status as a living legend, that would seem to be a formality.

"There's a few things that would need to fall into place," IBF president Darryl Peoples said. "But, given what he's accomplished, we would give Bernard due consideration if he petitioned to be reclassified as a super middleweight. To date, nothing formal has been presented to us."