Lately, boxers are in the habit of emerging for fights accompanied by deafening music from their homelands. In this respect American boxers have something of a cultural advantage — in hip-hop they have a brawler's overture, entrance music that might have been created for the sport, what with its flow and flurries and self-aggrandizement.

Bernard Hopkins has only recently pressed this advantage. He likes rap, but through much of his career he has preferred to appear for fights to "My Way." The song, first recorded 44 years ago, is a personal anthem. He has it committed to memory. Asked during a segment of the HBO show Real Sports to answer accusations that he's a paranoiac who's betrayed trainers and managers and promoters over the years, Hopkins didn't exactly deny the charge, but said, "I've done it the Old Blue Eyes way." Flashing the interviewer with a feline proto-grin that almost seemed an invitation to join in, Hopkins then went into song: "I crossed the bridge ... I took the blows ... I've done it my way." The grin had by this point turned, imperceptibly, into a glower. "Frank Sinatra," he said. "It's a bad piece."

In 2010, when he entered the Mandalay Bay arena for a long-awaited rematch with Roy Jones Jr., Hopkins was accompanied by "My Way" and by a 68-year-old Bronx garment magnate, his friend Artie Rabin, who walked alongside him purring new lyrics written for Hopkins into a cordless microphone. Harmonizing from the ring were The Sweet Inspirations, a trio that in its day, which was not recently, backed up Wilson Pickett. One could feel the Las Vegas crowd wondering — not of Rabin, but of Hopkins — how old is he? "And yes, Bernard Hopkins is 45 years old, but no one has been more disciplined, more of a committed professional," the ringside announcer acknowledged, notes of apology and pride in his middle-aged voice. "And however much you look in the rear-view mirror, it isn't needed. Lauding his past is so easy, but his current status is s...