Ring Magazine on the Road to Sanity

[marbleheadmaui]

I could be all wrong about this, but as flawed as they are, for the most part I don't have a problem with the "alphabet titles". It gives more Pugs a chance to pick up a strap, and titles translate to money and prestige getting spread around.

I also don't like the idea of "Ring" being able to call all the shots, sorry Marb, I disagree with you on this one, and agree more with Bilbo.

Damn, I was really getting into this and ready to go another 12 rounds

That is a big point though. One champ, one weight class is an incredibly small allocation of reward for success. It means of the 10,000 or so current pro boxers 9900 will never have a chance at anything.

With those odds, I'd pick a different sport to participate in.

If professional MMA continues to grow they will experience the same problem down the line too. When there are a few thousand pro MMA fighters the UFC will lose its monopoly as most fighters will be unhappy to be fighting for nothing and new organisations will be formed and become more appealing.

Maui believes alphabets are responsible for a decline in boxing I disagree. I think they are a necessary response to an increased number of professionals in the sport. Maybe PPV has damaged boxing as the big fights are't on terrestrial tv any more. You can't be household names when you aren't being showcased in the household, and that means terrestrial free tv available to all.

Also I take issue with the idea the big fights are prevented from being made because of the alphabet titles. Do we have any examples of this? I think they are make the big fights MORE likely to happen as one guy has something to offer the other guy.

Maui is living in an imagined past and has totally lost touch with boxing reality.

We have HALF as many active fighters as we had fifty years ago. And they are divided amopng twice as many divisions. Here are some numbers. We have roughly 1500 active welters. I went through Boxrec for ten randomly chosen pages of the 45,000 welterweights they have registered across time. I found on those ten pages a little over 20% were active in 1940. That implies there were 9,000 active welters in 1940. Cut that in hald just to be conservative. That means in 1940 THREE TIMES as many fighters were batlling for a single title. I did the same exercise for 1970. That came in a little over 10%. Nor surprising as the sport has shrunk considerably. Again, cut that in half just to be conservative. Even THAT means 50% MORE fighters were battling for a single championship.

The numbers demonstrate today we have fewer fights between contenders than 30 or 50 years ago. Significantly so. I did a quickie on the heavyweights. In the last three years there have been a total of nine fights between ranked hevy contenders outside of Wlad's title fights. In 1973 (first random year picked) there were nine fights among ranked contenders excluding title fights. Then I checked another down year for the sport. 1958. That year had ten fights among ranked contenders. In other words in eras with one championship, fights between contenders were THREE TIMES as common.

[marbleheadmaui]

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.

[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.

[Mars_ax]

I could be all wrong about this, but as flawed as they are, for the most part I don't have a problem with the "alphabet titles". It gives more Pugs a chance to pick up a strap, and titles translate to money and prestige getting spread around.

I also don't like the idea of "Ring" being able to call all the shots, sorry Marb, I disagree with you on this one, and agree more with Bilbo.

Damn, I was really getting into this and ready to go another 12 rounds

That is a big point though. One champ, one weight class is an incredibly small allocation of reward for success. It means of the 10,000 or so current pro boxers 9900 will never have a chance at anything.

With those odds, I'd pick a different sport to participate in.

If professional MMA continues to grow they will experience the same problem down the line too. When there are a few thousand pro MMA fighters the UFC will lose its monopoly as most fighters will be unhappy to be fighting for nothing and new organisations will be formed and become more appealing.

Maui believes alphabets are responsible for a decline in boxing I disagree. I think they are a necessary response to an increased number of professionals in the sport. Maybe PPV has damaged boxing as the big fights are't on terrestrial tv any more. You can't be household names when you aren't being showcased in the household, and that means terrestrial free tv available to all.

Also I take issue with the idea the big fights are prevented from being made because of the alphabet titles. Do we have any examples of this? I think they are make the big fights MORE likely to happen as one guy has something to offer the other guy.

Maui is living in an imagined past and has totally lost touch with boxing reality.

Well I don't agree with you there at all, Marble makes a good case and his heart is in the right place, I just disagree with him that the "alphabets" are necessarily a bad thing. Few boxing fans on this or any other forum care about or know as much about boxing as Marble does, and I completely respect his well thought out and researched, contemporary views on boxing.

[NuthaPug]

Where would unification be without alphabet soup?

[Jimanuel Boogustus]

My head hurts. Seriously, I'm between a rock & a hard place on this one.

I mean, the ABC's 'in theory' are fine yet their ranking systems and multi interim straps are so corrupting and toxic. Who's to say a Magazine can't go the same way?All they are doing is offering yet another alternative albeit via collusion/ monopoly/ slander whatever you wanna call it.

Am I the only one who realises that it doesn't take a magazine to establish lineage

So then surely it's another load of crap smothered in crap

[VictorCharlie]

I think getting rid of the alphabets and having one champion and one set of rankings per weight class would do phenomenal good for the sport. Hard to see how anyone wouldn't see it that way.

It's totally unrealistic and unfair. Do you also belive that the banking elite should be paid millions in bonuses whilst the cashiers get a minimum wage?

Your view relates purely to the perspective of the fan and takes no account of those actually getting inside the ropes and fighting, or their trainers, managers, promoters etc.

If you were a promising young athletic youth considering which sport to get into why would you choose boxing if their was only one title per weight class? With over 10,000 current pro boxers and one title per weight class what would be the realistic chances of you fighting for titles? Now contrast that with all other sports that offer a myriad of competitions and events, then what is the appeal of boxing exactly?

The way to look at it is this. The belts are not there to reward you, the fan. Rather they are there to ensure that more fighters can fight for something meaningful, get television exposure and earn some money in the sport they have dedicated their life to.

It seems so bizarre to me that when it comes to society people are aghast at the disparity between rich and poor and deplore the fat cats and those taking everything.

Yet in boxing you want to take away the livelihoods of most of those who practice the sport you love, and whose blood and sweat entertains you.

The belts are functionally necessary.

How comunist of you Bilbo. Seriously you have been trading barbs with Miles too long win you make some lame analogy that every boxers deserves their own special title so they feel good about themselves to "evil" capitalist bankers. And yeah I am looking at it purely from a fan's perspective. I want to see the best fights between then best fighters in each division. I don't need some trinket of a belt to be on the line to be interested in two top tier fighters getting in the ring together. I also don't really buy that a single belt/ranking per weight class is some how going to impoverish boxers. Honestly considering the declining state of boxing I think the opposite is true. Better fights and better credibility would probably mean more fans and more money for fighters. If you are so concerned with boxer's self esteem then have multiple belts but only one world champion and have one set of rankings so that world champion has to face the #1 contender at least once a year or be stripped. As it is today we have a watered down system with shoddy rankings where "champions" would rather fight bullshit mandatory contenders than unite the belts. Hell lets just start with the different belts ranking the other guys champion.

[VictorCharlie]

My head hurts. Seriously, I'm between a rock & a hard place on this one.

I mean, the ABC's 'in theory' are fine yet their ranking systems and multi interim straps are so corrupting and toxic. Who's to say a Magazine can't go the same way?All they are doing is offering yet another alternative albeit via collusion/ monopoly/ slander whatever you wanna call it.

Am I the only one who realises that it doesn't take a magazine to establish lineage

So then surely it's another load of crap smothered in crap

Rankings are purely subjective but when have you read the Ring rankings and thought that their #1 contender was in no way even close to being a top 10 fighter? Now think of how many garbage mandatory defenses we have seen over the years. I am not beholden to the Ring rankings but I can't really think of anyone currently that provides a better set.

[Mars_ax]

Just wanted to add to this thread: As long as there's money to be made, the "alphabets" are here to stay, and I doubt that anything can be done to change it, so why worry about it one way or the other.

P.S. if boxing were going to "die" it would have done so a long time ago.

[Fenster]

Bilbo makes a great point about what the belts actually mean to fighters.

I was reading a brief twitter argument between Sergio Martinez and Peter Quillin the other week. Martinez proudly cited he was a three time IBO champion in England. This made me laugh. The LINEAL middleweight champ of the world was citing the IBO title as one of his proud achievements.

Four world champions per division is utterly pathetic. However, has winning an alphabet ever caused harm to a fighters career? Silverware only boosts it.

[Rantcatrat]

You are hung up on one single word, 'world'.

Titles are essential in sport. You're completely missing the point about Wimbledon. The whole two weeks is Wimbledon, the entire competition is the final. It's a knockout competition and so one single event.

Your preferred idea would be to scrap Wimbledon as an exciting knockout competition which allows even unrated players a chance to challenge for the title and just have the two highest seeded players play each other for the title of world tennis champion, with the 3 and 4 seeds battling for the right to play the champion next time.

That would be shit.

In tennis there are 4 grand slams, an official tour ranking and dozens of minor competitions. So somebody can be the US Open champion, or the Wimbledon champion, or be the number one rated player on the tour or the Rogers Cup champion.

Every time these guys play, it's in a competition for a prize of some sort.

Imagine they called the open winners world champions, and your little nose was put out of joint so you wanted them scrapped and the champion determined by who was the highest ranked player on the tour. Would that improve tennis? Of course not, it would ruin it.


Boxing is no different. You have fourmajor titles in each weight class, the IBF, WBC, WBA, WBO and a lot of minor ones, IBO, British, Commonwealth etc.

It's the same structure as any other sport, only you object to the word used 'world'.

Let me ask you, if instead of the world champion tag the belts were called 'IBF Major champ', or 'WBA Open champion' would that be better? My guess is that you don't mind the belts themselves, rather it's just your constant focusing on the single word 'world' that gets you all worked up.

A division with no belts would be shit. What would people be fighting for? There would be only two, at most 3 championship fights a year, sometimes none if the champ is inactive and a couple of eliminators.

How would you reward the best challengers? What would they have to distinguish them from everybody else? Currently they get a belt, which marks them out as one of the best fighters in the division, and someone a fighter must beat if they wish to claim the title of Ring champ. It's a good system.

Let's look at your Martinez argument. First of all, what fans are confused about whether he's the best fighter? It's a straw man argument because everyone knows Sergio Martinez is the best fighter in the division, which is why the Ring have him rated at one.

What about Sturm? Well his belt clearly marks him out as the best challenger, a man Martinez must beat if he wants to unify and become the Ring champ. Of Sturm also knows he must beat Martinez if he wants to be regarded the same.

It's not confusing, you know the true status of fighters in the middleweight division as well as I do. The idea that fans can't understand and think Chavez Jr is the best fighter is false.

What about Chavez Jr. Well as the son of a legend, and a very popular and undefeated fighter himself with a huge following, especially in Mexico, his belt marks him out as one of the best fighters too. That's a good thing. Guys like Chavez Jr and Saul Alvarez are GOOD for boxing. Ticket sellers, popular fighters who fans want to see. Giving them a belt helps market them and gives significance and context to their fights. It's entirely normal and how it is in every sport where any top sportsman is a champion of some sort. You need titles otherwise it's just people playing sport.

Do you object to the World Series by the way? Do you write and complain to your favourite baseball magazine that they stop it because world only means American and that the whole world thing is a sham? Should they scrap the world series to save baseball?

I think your argument is simply outdated, still living 30 years ago. We have moved on, IBF World champion doesnt' mean best fighter in the world and hasn't for decades. Just regard them as similar to being the US open champ or the US Masters champ and all is fine. Stop getting hung up on a single word, that hasn't meant what you believe it does in more than a generation.

There is only one champion per year in baseball, basketball, and football. Those sports are extremely successful with only one champion.

Titles are essential in sport, but I don't understand the why there should be more than one title per division division? Is your argument strictly based on marketing (a la it makes fighters easier to sell)? Are Canelo and Chavez Jr. not as marketable without titles or do their titles make them more marketable? Shouldn't titles convey the idea that the holder is the best? If not, aren't they wastes of time if a fan would know the difference?

Why is tennis a good comparison? I'm not too familiar with tennis, but is there a ranking organization?

Does UFC have multiple titles per division? Not too familiar with UFC.

[fan johnny]

You are hung up on one single word, 'world'.

Titles are essential in sport. You're completely missing the point about Wimbledon. The whole two weeks is Wimbledon, the entire competition is the final. It's a knockout competition and so one single event.

Your preferred idea would be to scrap Wimbledon as an exciting knockout competition which allows even unrated players a chance to challenge for the title and just have the two highest seeded players play each other for the title of world tennis champion, with the 3 and 4 seeds battling for the right to play the champion next time.

That would be shit.

In tennis there are 4 grand slams, an official tour ranking and dozens of minor competitions. So somebody can be the US Open champion, or the Wimbledon champion, or be the number one rated player on the tour or the Rogers Cup champion.

Every time these guys play, it's in a competition for a prize of some sort.

Imagine they called the open winners world champions, and your little nose was put out of joint so you wanted them scrapped and the champion determined by who was the highest ranked player on the tour. Would that improve tennis? Of course not, it would ruin it.


Boxing is no different. You have fourmajor titles in each weight class, the IBF, WBC, WBA, WBO and a lot of minor ones, IBO, British, Commonwealth etc.

It's the same structure as any other sport, only you object to the word used 'world'.

Let me ask you, if instead of the world champion tag the belts were called 'IBF Major champ', or 'WBA Open champion' would that be better? My guess is that you don't mind the belts themselves, rather it's just your constant focusing on the single word 'world' that gets you all worked up.

A division with no belts would be shit. What would people be fighting for? There would be only two, at most 3 championship fights a year, sometimes none if the champ is inactive and a couple of eliminators.

How would you reward the best challengers? What would they have to distinguish them from everybody else? Currently they get a belt, which marks them out as one of the best fighters in the division, and someone a fighter must beat if they wish to claim the title of Ring champ. It's a good system.

Let's look at your Martinez argument. First of all, what fans are confused about whether he's the best fighter? It's a straw man argument because everyone knows Sergio Martinez is the best fighter in the division, which is why the Ring have him rated at one.

What about Sturm? Well his belt clearly marks him out as the best challenger, a man Martinez must beat if he wants to unify and become the Ring champ. Of Sturm also knows he must beat Martinez if he wants to be regarded the same.

It's not confusing, you know the true status of fighters in the middleweight division as well as I do. The idea that fans can't understand and think Chavez Jr is the best fighter is false.

What about Chavez Jr. Well as the son of a legend, and a very popular and undefeated fighter himself with a huge following, especially in Mexico, his belt marks him out as one of the best fighters too. That's a good thing. Guys like Chavez Jr and Saul Alvarez are GOOD for boxing. Ticket sellers, popular fighters who fans want to see. Giving them a belt helps market them and gives significance and context to their fights. It's entirely normal and how it is in every sport where any top sportsman is a champion of some sort. You need titles otherwise it's just people playing sport.

Do you object to the World Series by the way? Do you write and complain to your favourite baseball magazine that they stop it because world only means American and that the whole world thing is a sham? Should they scrap the world series to save baseball?

I think your argument is simply outdated, still living 30 years ago. We have moved on, IBF World champion doesnt' mean best fighter in the world and hasn't for decades. Just regard them as similar to being the US open champ or the US Masters champ and all is fine. Stop getting hung up on a single word, that hasn't meant what you believe it does in more than a generation.

There is only one champion per year in baseball, basketball, and football. Those sports are extremely successful with only one champion.

Titles are essential in sport, but I don't understand the why there should be more than one title per division division? Is your argument strictly based on marketing (a la it makes fighters easier to sell)? Are Canelo and Chavez Jr. not as marketable without titles or do their titles make them more marketable? Shouldn't titles convey the idea that the holder is the best? If not, aren't they wastes of time if a fan would know the difference?

Why is tennis a good comparison? I'm not too familiar with tennis, but is there a ranking organization?

Does UFC have multiple titles per division? Not too familiar with UFC.

Now that is not true at all. You have the American League East, West and Central Champions, who battle to be The American League Conference Champion. Then there is the National League champions. Both Conferences are divided up by geographic regions. Basketball and Football follow the same type of conferences and divisions. You could easily relate it to minor belts and major belts.

[Rantcatrat]

You are hung up on one single word, 'world'.

Titles are essential in sport. You're completely missing the point about Wimbledon. The whole two weeks is Wimbledon, the entire competition is the final. It's a knockout competition and so one single event.

Your preferred idea would be to scrap Wimbledon as an exciting knockout competition which allows even unrated players a chance to challenge for the title and just have the two highest seeded players play each other for the title of world tennis champion, with the 3 and 4 seeds battling for the right to play the champion next time.

That would be shit.

In tennis there are 4 grand slams, an official tour ranking and dozens of minor competitions. So somebody can be the US Open champion, or the Wimbledon champion, or be the number one rated player on the tour or the Rogers Cup champion.

Every time these guys play, it's in a competition for a prize of some sort.

Imagine they called the open winners world champions, and your little nose was put out of joint so you wanted them scrapped and the champion determined by who was the highest ranked player on the tour. Would that improve tennis? Of course not, it would ruin it.


Boxing is no different. You have fourmajor titles in each weight class, the IBF, WBC, WBA, WBO and a lot of minor ones, IBO, British, Commonwealth etc.

It's the same structure as any other sport, only you object to the word used 'world'.

Let me ask you, if instead of the world champion tag the belts were called 'IBF Major champ', or 'WBA Open champion' would that be better? My guess is that you don't mind the belts themselves, rather it's just your constant focusing on the single word 'world' that gets you all worked up.

A division with no belts would be shit. What would people be fighting for? There would be only two, at most 3 championship fights a year, sometimes none if the champ is inactive and a couple of eliminators.

How would you reward the best challengers? What would they have to distinguish them from everybody else? Currently they get a belt, which marks them out as one of the best fighters in the division, and someone a fighter must beat if they wish to claim the title of Ring champ. It's a good system.

Let's look at your Martinez argument. First of all, what fans are confused about whether he's the best fighter? It's a straw man argument because everyone knows Sergio Martinez is the best fighter in the division, which is why the Ring have him rated at one.

What about Sturm? Well his belt clearly marks him out as the best challenger, a man Martinez must beat if he wants to unify and become the Ring champ. Of Sturm also knows he must beat Martinez if he wants to be regarded the same.

It's not confusing, you know the true status of fighters in the middleweight division as well as I do. The idea that fans can't understand and think Chavez Jr is the best fighter is false.

What about Chavez Jr. Well as the son of a legend, and a very popular and undefeated fighter himself with a huge following, especially in Mexico, his belt marks him out as one of the best fighters too. That's a good thing. Guys like Chavez Jr and Saul Alvarez are GOOD for boxing. Ticket sellers, popular fighters who fans want to see. Giving them a belt helps market them and gives significance and context to their fights. It's entirely normal and how it is in every sport where any top sportsman is a champion of some sort. You need titles otherwise it's just people playing sport.

Do you object to the World Series by the way? Do you write and complain to your favourite baseball magazine that they stop it because world only means American and that the whole world thing is a sham? Should they scrap the world series to save baseball?

I think your argument is simply outdated, still living 30 years ago. We have moved on, IBF World champion doesnt' mean best fighter in the world and hasn't for decades. Just regard them as similar to being the US open champ or the US Masters champ and all is fine. Stop getting hung up on a single word, that hasn't meant what you believe it does in more than a generation.

There is only one champion per year in baseball, basketball, and football. Those sports are extremely successful with only one champion.

Titles are essential in sport, but I don't understand the why there should be more than one title per division division? Is your argument strictly based on marketing (a la it makes fighters easier to sell)? Are Canelo and Chavez Jr. not as marketable without titles or do their titles make them more marketable? Shouldn't titles convey the idea that the holder is the best? If not, aren't they wastes of time if a fan would know the difference?

Why is tennis a good comparison? I'm not too familiar with tennis, but is there a ranking organization?

Does UFC have multiple titles per division? Not too familiar with UFC.

Now that is not true at all. You have the American League East, West and Central Champions, who battle to be The American League Conference Champion. Then there is the National League champions. Both Conferences are divided up by geographic regions. Basketball and Football follow the same type of conferences and divisions. You could easily relate it to minor belts and major belts.

Wait a minute. Explain that to me a little more.

At the end of the year in baseball, basketball, and football, the two best teams play eachother to be champion (e.g. the Steelers may have been the AFC champs, but there is no debate that the champs last year were the Packers). There is only one champion every year. No one cares who the division champ was unless to say that the Steelers were in second place of the league at the end of the year. In those sports, the best play the best for the ring at the end of the year. The point of the divisional and league champion is only to aid in determining who will be in the final contest, and, thus, the complete champion at the end of the season.

Comparing them to boxing is difficult. There is no system to determine who the champion is for each weight class. The WBA and WBO super middleweights aren't competing for the ultimate boxing championship (the S6 was an attempt at doing something like that by the way). After the Andre Ward v. Carl Froch fight, who is the champion of the super middleweights? The winner or Lucian Bute? What if Lucian Bute fights Kessler and Pavlik? Ward loses to Glen Johnson. What then? For example, who is the champion at 140 right now? Amir Khan or Tim Bradley (err Eric Morales since the WBA stripped Tim Bradley). Who was the champion at heavyweight before Haye fought Klitschko? Vitali, Wladimir, or Haye? Moreover, the WBA (or WBC, I can't recall which) frequently strips fighters of their belts if they unify.

Boxing in the Olympics is much more comparable to american baseball, football or basketball. Geographic champions compete to the best at the end of every four years. There is a first, second, and third place.

[marbleheadmaui]

Weekend Review: WBC reminds us of why we hate sanctioning bodies | RingTV

[Kev]

Weekend Review: WBC reminds us of why we hate sanctioning bodies | RingTV

Quote from your article

Bradley could’ve avoided the WBC’s ax if he had fought Amir Khan on July 23. He had a chance to unify the junior welterweight titles and earn a seven-figure payday in the process but chose to walk away. Mistake. That doesn’t mean he deserved to lose his title,

I didn't realise this is why he lost it, but to be honest if they stripped him for refusing to unify against Amir then good for them! Isn't this the exact OPPOSITE of what you are arguing?

You say alphabet belts stop the meaningful fights from happening and yet here we have an alphabet belt stripping their champion because he refused to take the big fight. Surely thats the kind of action you would approve of? Make the best fight the best and if they don't they lose their right to be called champ.

Well done WBC