Ring Magazine on the Road to Sanity

[Kev]

They have their entertainment value Bilbo. Sort of like watching a pig farmer wear a blindfold & sort random heads then demand the 1st lb. In fantasy land the orginizations would keep it literal and have number one meet the champ and rankings below meet in eliminations to earn way to top. If your ranked # 10 for Christ sake you should at least defeat a SINGLE guy ranked ahead of you to earn a shot. But the networks would hate that and its not like we fans actually want to see fighters we've never heard of more than once on HBO anyway. I think HBO and Showtime have tunnel vision, and we drink the kool aid.

They 'can' matter but yes, having a belt used to mean something. As it should. Just because its common now to hand them out like door prizes doesn't mean fans aren't right to call bullshit on it when they see it.

With 4 belts you simply can't have the best ranked fighters fighting for each belt as it would be the same guys ranked the same in each organisation.

I think of each organisation seperately, just like in MMA. So Cain Valesquez is the UFC world champ whilst Allister Overeem is the Strikeforce world champ. Actually I think he just got injured and stripped but the point remains. Two world champs, two different organisations.

Well boxing's roster is probably 100 times bigger than the UFC. There are probably 250 UFC contracted fighters and maybe 100 in Strikforce versus maybe 10,000 pro boxers so as the contention rate is much lower 1:1500 per weight class vs maybe 1:100 in the UFC and Strikeforce they have 4 orgainisations instead of two.

It's no problem to me. Considering the welterweight division has 1483 boxers in it (boxrec) and the UFC has maybe 63 fighters in it's welterweight division then even with 4 belts it's still far harder to win a world title in boxing than it is in the UFC.

Fans seem to ignore this. A sportsman who is dedicating his life to his sport wants to have belts, trophies, etc to aim for. Having 4 organisations gives hope to more pro's that one day they can fight for and win a world title and probably keeps them in the sport.

They are not bad for boxing, rather they are necessary for boxing.

Laughing

Necessary? Hardly. The sport thrived with TWICE as many fighters in only eight divisions with only eight belts.

Now? The sport is on a respirator.

Maybe the fans were loving it, but how many boxers were thriving as a result of entertaining you?

How many great fighters of the past were rewarded for their greatness by becoming incredibly wealthy men? Most of them quit broke because they didn't see jack shit of the revenue back then. They had to fight every few weeks and that was the champions!

Good luck with trying to convince today's fighters to give up their belts and 4/5ths of their income because you want only one of them in each weight class having the honour of being called champion.

Sport has evolved since the 40's and 50's and now it's big money. Now the sportsmen are properly rewarded in all major sports and expect to be so.

Why would somebody take up boxing if there was no chance of winning anything and thus earning anything?

You say people turn up to football and hockey matches for games that don't mean anything, that's ridiculous? In the UK football is life and death for some people. A teams position in the league, and progress in the FA cup, to say nothing of the progress in the European cups is literally the most important thing in many British men's lives. Every game is for a title, the premier league, championship, league one, league two etc. Not a single team from premiership down to amatuer pub 5 a sides does not compete for a title of some sort, it's the exact opposite of what you are arguing. Likewise with American football and hockey. All the teams are competing for something!

Your viewpoint is totally selfish just thinking of your perpspective as a fan. If you cared about the fighters you'd be happy to see them rewarded for their efforts, the same way professionals are in other major sports.