Why is MMA a threat to boxing?

[rjj tszyu]

Yes I understand your point, I don't forget that Brock made 450.000$ the last time he fought which is ridiculous compared to Mayweather or Pacquiao.

nonetheless, I agree with you that if Dana doesn't increase the salary of the fighters, the show won't attract the next "athletes" of tomorrow.

May I just draw your attention to the fact that it IS the case with boxing. Boxing doesn't have the best athletes, they go in NFL or NBA period.

As far as I am concerned the UFC is what is making MMA so popular, but also IMO they will be what breaks MMA in the longrun. They can't afford to pay huge wages and have stacked cards, so at the minute they are getting away with low wages (in comparison to elite boxers) but having very stacked cards. But ODLH has already shown interest in putting MMA cards on and if promoters like that start dishing out boxing money then the UFC will lose the stars.

Another thing that will be a downfall for the UFC is all this "you must work exclusively for the UFC" that Dana insists on. They could have signed Fedor last year if they had just let him continue his Sambo career outside of MMA but they wouldn't and in turn missed out on what would be the biggest HW fight in MMA history between him and Lesnar. Now that Fedor has lost too it will not have the same appeal even though I think he would destroy Werdum in a rematch.

I think in the longrun boxing will make a comeback and become the sport it was in the 90's again although it may never be the force of the 70's. It is back as the second most watched sport in the world again believe it or not too just not in the U.S or the U.K.

In an ideal world the likes of Mayweather and co could do with losing some of the greed for the good of their sport. I heard reports that there was the potential for Mayweather and Pac to make £60 million each if they fought this november. Now why not just accept a mere £25 million each and leave the extra £70 million to having an extra 7 world title bouts on the card? Hell, there is certainly enough world titles in boxing to have that capability.

As for the best athletes being in the NBA and NFL, I know nothing about either but I believe you probably right. Why would they come to boxing at the moment? The HW division is a mess and if you do beat the top men right now you've only done it in a "weak era". And then there is the fact that stepping into a boxing ring you are risking your life whereas in Basketball and football it would take a freak accident for someone to die and that could happen with any job.

I do feel that boxing will comeback though, it will just take a young, hungry, in shape and probably American HW to get the juices flowing again like Tyson did in the mid 80's after the dire early 80's and then the likes of the Evanders, Lennox's and Bowes will follow. We just need that fuel injection of excitement in the HW division and then the rest will follow.

[0james0]

I've come to the conclusion that boxing is just very special, very different from any other sport. No other sport could get away with what boxing does.

From the facts people have quoted, wrestling is the most popular pastime and people get bought up with it, yet boxing still outshines MMA, in both money made and the number of fans.

The money in boxing is simply incredible and the more exclusive it becomes, the more money there will be. Vegas will always love boxing and sponsors will always love to spend a fortune on it.

MMA won't overtake boxing and even if it did in terms of fan numbers, it still wouldn't be a threat to boxing as they could operate side by side.

[SEB]

Yes, we share the same hope...

[Niko's Girl!]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

[rjj tszyu]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

My god this person is insane lol.

[:::PSL:::]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

Who's Niko?

[El Kabong]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

Who's Niko?

From other posts I've read I'm guessing....Valuev

[rjj tszyu]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

Who's Niko?

From other posts I've read I'm guessing....Valuev

Frightening really isn't it

[generalbulldog]

It's not. Simple. Not in the long run. MMA will never have a Joe Louis, Muhammad Ali or Sugar Nicky V.

Who's Niko?

From other posts I've read I'm guessing....Valuev

I can feel a little bit of bile rising up in my throat after just figuring that Niko's girl meant Valuev.

[Poom]

i've almost completely switched to watching and following MMA now, too sick of the theatrics of boxing and right matchups not being made,

UFC gives me the fights i want to see

Boxing has fights i want to see which don't happen.

[Drago]

Mma is no threat to boxing at all. No more than the ping pong people are worried about tennis. This whole mma vs boxing thing is simply retarded and a bunch of crap dana white and mma fans started to stir up buisness for themselves. Than being said ....boxings problem is that no matter what they do, how bad they screw us, how dumb they make us look as fans they rely on the true fans sticking with them no matter what. And sadley they are absolutly right. Mma is making an effort to gain new fans on top of the ones they already have while boxing says screw the fans yall ain't goin no where anyway. Look at all the catchweights, stupid belts, margo cheat supporters etc.....boxing can do no wrong and people will always dump thier money into thier pockets. In mma i doubt you would even see such garbage as jones/hopkins, chavez jr on ppv, margo/pac, haye/harrison etc.....and if you did it would be on free spike tv if anything. I don't see the dislike between the two sports really. I don't like mma but i definatly can see why those that do, do. (mma do do ? lol) ok bad joke. But do baseball fans constantly downgrade softball ? Football fans soccer ? Breakdancers talk shit about ballet ? So on and so forth.

if mma is no threat then why are boxing fans on this thread already saying they prefer it

[Drago]

if mma is for the younger audience than it stands to reason that boxing will lose out, as i have already stated its easier for a boxing fan to turn to mma than vice versa.

check this out for value for money!

just watched UFC 92

rampage jackson vs wandelirli silva
frank mir vs antonio rodrigo nogueira
Rashad evans vs forrest griffin

i mean what would that card be equivilant to in boxing terms?

[El Kabong]

....you can go back in history and find great boxing cards, hell Manny Pacquiao fought on the Lewis-Tyson undercard.

MMA will have big success early and begin to fade a bit, it won't go away but it's peaked right now IMO and it's going to have to use more gimmicks, expand their stable of fighters, pay their fighters more money....eventually the economy of the sport will end up hurting the product given to the fans....more will be at stake for the fighters, they may be less likely to engage, they'll have more fights in Texas (which means shitty decisions and poorly run shows) and the product is not always going to be perfect.

Boxing can still rely on 1 big match to sell a card right now....maybe the economy of our sport gets gut checked to where we're able to put some big time cards together and maybe Don King dies or retires or something and better matches start getting made.

Boxing won't go away...it's hibernating right now in the divisions north of 168 but it'll come back with a vengence.

[generalbulldog]

GBP is the new King and Arum combined. There will always be a new King or Arum on the horizon.

What boxing needs to do is go back to network tv to reach a massive audience, for this massive audience will have young kids wanting to participate in the sport or new fans that are drawn to the sport. As I've said before, HBO and Showtime killed boxing as a mainstream sport in America.

[Drago]

....you can go back in history and find great boxing cards, hell Manny Pacquiao fought on the Lewis-Tyson undercard.

MMA will have big success early and begin to fade a bit, it won't go away but it's peaked right now IMO and it's going to have to use more gimmicks, expand their stable of fighters, pay their fighters more money....eventually the economy of the sport will end up hurting the product given to the fans....more will be at stake for the fighters, they may be less likely to engage, they'll have more fights in Texas (which means shitty decisions and poorly run shows) and the product is not always going to be perfect.

Boxing can still rely on 1 big match to sell a card right now....maybe the economy of our sport gets gut checked to where we're able to put some big time cards together and maybe Don King dies or retires or something and better matches start getting made.

Boxing won't go away...it's hibernating right now in the divisions north of 168 but it'll come back with a vengence.

i hope your right man cos i am pretty low on boxing @ the moment, man not one of my friends knows anything abt boxing & if i am @ the pub fkin know one knows abt boxing, if it was on uk free tv it could be big once again!