+42

I ask this question to get opinions from other places.

Here where I am, we went through the MMA craze, but it seems to be ending. Our boxing club is new in our city, and is comprised of a lot of former MMA fighters and martial arts related people. All of them have left it to study boxing exclusively. In the short time we have been opened we have already seemingly overtaken the long standing local boxing club with quality of fighters, having just competed against them in a local rivalry match up.

I see that the MMA is starting to fade away, as fads often do, and that traditional boxing is resurging and people's mindsets are going back to dreams of Olympics and going pro, or just thriving in amateurs, from what it shortly ago was with making it to MMA pro status. I think what has propelled our club so quickly is the training mindsets of many of our members, who already were into learning combat sports, understood the value of extensive training, and now have just decided to put those efforts into boxing and only boxing.

So, is this happening elsewhere?

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+13

I can only hope....I can't stand the MMA fans/fighters...such idiots.

I just don't see much honor in kicking or punching someone when they are down.....or foot stomping or rolling around on the ground with the judo moves.

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Our club this year;

27 county Titles
12 Provincial Titles
7 Nationals

Thats our country's best amateur club and there's not one mma guy in it.

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so ignorant. You make us boxing fans look bad.

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+38

In the UK and most of europe things like UFC, MMA etc are still virtually unknown compared to the sport of boxing which has rightfully always mantained its place as the only true form of combat sport.

Think its only really asia and north america that pay attention to these forms of combat competitions.

Kimbo slice apart i can honestly not name one UFC fighter and the only reason people know of him is through youtube!

Another interesting point to the new insurgance of MMA fighters coming to the sweet science, is where to put them class wise.

The Amateur Boxing Association of Canada is now looking into this and are likely making amendments to classifications. For eg. an MMA fighter who has had a number of bouts, is it really fair for him to be deemed a Cadet or a Novice fighter? Does his experience really reflect that of a 0-0 brand new inexperienced amateur boxer? The boxing commision tends to think not. It is already in the works to put these people into higher classes, such as open and so on, depending on their experience.

+38

Contender I'd say that boxing vs mma popularity is probably based alot on region and age group. That being said MMA has grown tremendously in popularity, but anyone that says it rivals boxing yet is just silly. All it takes is to look at the top salaries of each respective sport. As a fan of both I'd say that boxing has held steady where mma has grown alot. As an infantryman in the United States Army I can attest that the bulk of my soldiers, whos ages range from 18-26 are more interested in MMA. When I spend time with my brother and his friends (35-45 age group) many of them know little of MMA and still watch boxing regularly. I don't think MMA is even close to fading out though. If CBS is getting ready to start televising MMA cards on free TV then that says quite a bit. Boxing is still king and will be for the future, but I don't think we have yet to see MMA reach its peak much less the beginning of its demise.

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I encountered this myself a couple of years ago. Myself and a friend who have boxed for the last ten years were classed as novice kick boxers and muay thai fighters.

An amateur MMA fighter usually has years of training in one discipline or another. A top BJJ/Wrestling/kickboxing participant can do well at the lower levels with moderate cross training. My opinion is that it takes much longer to be skilled enough as a boxer to fight competitively even at the amateur ranks. Top MMA fighters like Fedor, GSP, Quinton Jackson, Couture etc are very skilled at multiple skill sets but many of the mid tier to lower level fighters are only trained well in one facet of the game. Im not familiar in the classification system of novice/amateur boxers but I'd say while they have many of the tools for boxing a MMA fighter doesn't have the polished boxing skill set to rank very high in boxing class system.

+38

I like MMA and boxing, although i am still far more of a boxing fan.

MMA will never replace boxing in popularity IMO. Mainly because of the negative connotations that the cage has, and the way UFC markets itself. The UFC still portrays itself as slightly thuggish (which is an insult to the dedication and skill of many of its fighters) and also encourages fighters to act like arseholes. All of which alienate a certain percentage of the public.

A Novice Boxer is considered as a boxer with under 6-8 amateur fights.

It is usually one - two years in the gym before the first amateur contest although that varies greatly.

Thats ironic...Most of the MMA fighters that are said to have backgrounds in boxing usually have only 6-10 fight to their name.

I can say that I don't really have/carry the stigma of the thuggish tattoo clad opinion of MMA fighters that so many have. Likely because I am surrounded by a number of them who are now entirely focused on boxing. And as of now I see that some of them have incredible hand speed. Mind you, they have now been training in strictly boxing for a few years now, and are now racking up wins heading into double digits.

Some of them are still doing some teaching of BJJ, Muay Tai and other forms, but it is more just to earn some extra $$ for our club and finance our shows and travel.

I trained in an MMA gym for a while because I get very little training in my actual gym.
They thought I was some sort of freak throwing 5 punch combinations!

Ha, well there was this one time. Bear in mind some folks just aren't meant for fighting. Dude was sparring, got smashed in the face...dropped to the floor, covered his face and started kicking at the air. Everyone started laughing. He got up, rinse, repeat. Everyone started rolling with laughter. He then jumped out the ring, grabbed his bag, and headed out the door shouting "F*&% You all!'" haha. hilarious stuff.