regular fighting

[beenKOed]

why dont top fighters fight anywhere near as regularly now as they used to?

Don't have to anymore, they're making much better money.
Let's say you really enjoy your job and make an excellent wage. Are you going to get an additional job because you enjoy working. 95% of us will say no.
Training (pro athlete training) is hard on the body. Making weight is very hard for some fighters. More fights mean more time away from family and friends and more chances to get hurt.
INCOME TAX…enough said.

Boxing fans (me too) can be real pricks, we want meaningful, deep cards every weekend. Some of us (me too) could watch boxing, almost every night. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that, I'm just saying we're insatiably greedy bastards when it comes to fighters time.

[greynotsoold]

I read years ago that, at that point in time, there were fewer pro boxers in the US than there had been in the city of New York in 1925. Also, a lot fewer shows for guys to fight on. Back before tv, NYC had something like 15 shows every week. LA had just as many. It isn't easy to make money doing live boxing when everybody wants $400 for a 4 round fight, and you have to book a lot of fights due to no-shows, fallouts, and fights that end early. If you can sell tickets for $10 and get 1000 people, you'd make money. But good luck with that when you're only running 4 round fights. If you pull 200 it would be astounding. You'd only make money (break even?) if you kept the beer concession.

[Master]

Money, tv scheduling, keeping their 0 and boxing politics have a large part in fighters not fighting as often.

[Beanflicker]

It would be impossible for a top-ranked fighter to fight as many times as they did in the olden days because there simply aren't enough credible opponents for that kind of pace.

The athletic commissions of today wouldn't sanction a lot of the horrendous mismatched record padding that went on in years gone by.

[erics44]

I read years ago that, at that point in time, there were fewer pro boxers in the US than there had been in the city of New York in 1925. Also, a lot fewer shows for guys to fight on. Back before tv, NYC had something like 15 shows every week. LA had just as many. It isn't easy to make money doing live boxing when everybody wants $400 for a 4 round fight, and you have to book a lot of fights due to no-shows, fallouts, and fights that end early. If you can sell tickets for $10 and get 1000 people, you'd make money. But good luck with that when you're only running 4 round fights. If you pull 200 it would be astounding. You'd only make money (break even?) if you kept the beer concession.

I like this, I'd have been at a fight every weekend