The Silliness of the Alphabet Gangs

[Jimanuel Boogustus]

1) Ring Magazine only recognizes six champions at the moment. Wlad, BHOP, Sergio, JMM, Wonjonkam and Segura. Exclusivity is a plus in my view!

I never knew that! Actually, that is a great idea which makes a LOT of sense.

2) Ring has ZERO financial interests in who is a champion or that there are champions at at all. They don't make money by sanctioning fights. So they have no built in incentive to create BS champs.
3) While it is owned by Oscar, thus far there is ZERO reason to believe Golden Boy's financial interests have imposed a view on Ring's editorial content. It is something to keep an eye on. But they also have an awfully good advisory group.

Again, I'm merely saying that I am uncomfortable with the idea of using a magazine which is just as corruptible (not corrupt) as any other body. I have no problem with the Magazine at this present moment but If the ring magazine comes to represent the overall ruling opinion of boxing then that is a huge worry for me simply because the Ring Magazine is still at a safe distance from boxing and so there really is no way of knowing if their could or would be any financial/ promotional interests.

4) How exactly are Ring's p4p rankings "a popularity contest?"

Simply because they are far to subjective with no definitive criteria to be even remotely credible. The fact that a semi-shot fighter like Marquez is still ranked no.4 yet Robert Guerrero isn't even in the top 10 kinda speaks for it's self.

And p4p doesn't carry any real weight in any case nor do they infringe on Ring's divisional rankings.

I think that P4P 'carries weight' were promoting a fighter is concerned. Fighters seem to REALLY give a shit where they are ranked. And as far as I can see, it just seems to be a fancy collection of champions. Nothing to do with celebrating skill that transcends weightclass.

If the Ring becomes boxing's overall ruling opinion, then this becomes a concern for me.