Quote Originally Posted by SweetPea
Quote Originally Posted by bilbo


Well defending them would be a good place to start.

If the top fighters defended their belts and held onto them, then there would be no 'paper' champs and the belts would mean more than they do now.

I'm not against people ignoring the belts to go after the big fights, but Hatton just takes the piss. He's won 4 world title belts now and made a grand total of 0 defenses.
This philosophy would be great if there were one belt in each weight class. But there isn't. There's 4. Beltholders don't get ranked by the other commissions. So theoretically, if the 4 belt holders always "respected" their belts and fought the #1 ranked contenders, then the beltholders would never face it each other.

Why should fighters honor their belts and fight the #1 ranked contenders, when those #1 contenders are rarely the best out there? Would Ricky hatton prove that he's a real champ by beating N'Dou? Does that prove more than beating Castillo?
Why should a fighter respect a belt, when the commission that owns the belt shows no respect to it at all?
Yeah I hear what your saying, and the governing bodies are equally to blame but the point is that you CAN hold a belt and fight other champions as well.

Not every fight has to be a mandatory, I think they only have to fight one mandatory a year so it's really no big deal.

He fought for the title against Urango, when Urango was supposed to fight the winner of N'Dou Rabbah. Urango got the Hatton fight on an exemption as the mandatory date was already overdue, so Ricky knew that should he win he had an immediate mandatory obligation.

He signed that fight against Urango KNOWING that.

Now he decides not to play fair with the IBF and drop the belt.

Thats just not fair to the IBF or to the N'Dou who is the mandatory for the title shot.