Who will kill the boxing ?

[ValMar]

Unfortunately, I can not see the bright future for our favorite sport. What do you think ?

[victor-romeo]

I think boxing will be fine, now lets see spence vs crawford..now..

[Perkin Warbeck]

All of the above are hurting the sport.

- Promoters need to make better match-ups, not try to keep everything in-house.

- Dishonest or incompetent officials should be fired (examples: Terry O'Connor and Julie Lederman)

- The WBC needs to change their mind about adding yet another unnecessary division to the sport.

[Onetimeonly]

It's already dead in my country. Has been. Certainly not close to my favorite sport anymore. Maybe top 10.

[Jason Calara]

Greedy promoters.

[Fightnight Scores]

All of the above are hurting the sport.

- Promoters need to make better match-ups, not try to keep everything in-house.

- Dishonest or incompetent officials should be fired (examples: Terry O'Connor and Julie Lederman)

- The WBC needs to change their mind about adding yet another unnecessary division to the sport.

All the below surely?

Loads of factors hurting the sport.....

- Promoters protecting number 1 and their cash cows precious 0,
- Multiple governing bodies with of dozen titles per division
- The boxies unfathomable ratings and rules regarding other recognised champions
- TV companies exclusivity with promoters & PPVs
- Incompetent and corrupt judges
- Fighters doing their talking on social media and out of ring antics
- Fighters demanding money requiring unworthy events to be PPV.


Take your pick.....there's plenty more...

[gregregegg]

Its like getting getting your head kicked in by 5 guys. They all contributed to killing you, but hard to know who landed the fatal blow...
Throw franchise champs, Dog shit rankings, rematch clauses, and the UFC into the mix..

[H8Usernames]

1650 BC (Before Christ) on Crete. One Minoan to another: Boxing, feels like the sport is dieing. And people still discuss the matter.

[lazboy]

Fighter entitlement will also contribute to its death. If you're not prepared to fight the best and not prepared to be active to build your brand...less and less intriguing fights and names will be apparent.

[tdogg]

I think the obvious answer, in my mind anyway, is the UFC. As a fan of both sports, the UFC frequently puts on more competitive fights and you don't have 10 "champions" per weight class. The champ in a given division is generally considered the best guy at that weight class.

Boxing may very well never die, but I don't see much growth in the near future. Fortunately for me, boxing has a very rich history and that's one of the main things that keeps me interested.

[Best Coast]

1650 BC (Before Christ) on Crete. One Minoan to another: Boxing, feels like the sport is dieing. And people still discuss the matter.

Good one!!

[DrDuke]

The boxing is getting terrorized by all these factors and all of them are related to each other. However, promoters and sanctioning bodies are the key factors.

[Enlightened-One]

An interesting quote:

“Boxing has a nostalgia problem. Any discussion about the fight game is really a discussion about the past and all arguments are really just variations on the barbershop scene in (Eddie Murphy's) Coming to America.”

[littlepug]

Boxing is fine, bad decisions, controversy, changes in rules, multiple titles and guys not fighting each other have always been a moaning point from day 1, as long as we get good fights at all levels of the game it’s fine. Oh and the UFC is no threat in any way shape or form because, well...it’s not boxing is it?

[mcrow42]

I think the thing that is hurting boxing isn't the quality of fighters, not the appeal of boxing in general, or what the sanctioning bodies are doing. It's promoters. Now if you look at the rise of the UFC and compare it to boxing, what's the difference? Well, in the UFC you pretty much always get the fights you want to see eventually. In boxing there's too much grooming of prospects, protecting champions from fights they might lose. Too much petty crap between promotors keeping the fights people want to see from happening.

The other thing, which is changing to some degree, is there was a long period of time in boxing where 90% of interesting fights were on PPV. UFC has championship fights on many free cards. Yes, for the top handful of UFC guys pretty much fight on PPV cards but you can see a lot of great fights for free too. Now with ESPN and other streaming platforms, this is changing to some degree for boxing, Lopez vs Loma and Fury fights for instance.

If the promotors/managers don't get it together they're the ones that will kill boxing. Make fights the fans want to see, things will be OK.

[Verdi]

Covid.

https://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/news ... ym-4619643

A boxing club near me has just gone under. It'll be one of many.

[conan_the_cribber]

What will kill boxing? The two biggest dangers are not even on the list.

1) The number one threat to boxing's existence is how the value of children has changed in recent times. People are delaying having children and producing less kids. Therefor each kid is super valuable. People will not introduce kids to such a dangerous sport as boxing. Hell, even in soccer now, there is a ban on executing headers for younger children. Brain damage is a huge topic in the NFL these days and hence, at schools and colleges. It is only a matter of time that the cry to stop athletes giving each other brain damage will be too large and today's nancies will want boxing banned. It's already happened in some countries.

2) The second major threat is MMA. Today's young adults have been brought up in a world of video games and short attention spans. "Entertain me now". MMA offers more paths to victory (kicks, chokes, boxing, arm-bars) and is over in less time than a boxing match. I can easily see MMA continuing to grow and boxing staying stagnant or declining.

Another threat may be eSports. I'm not sure if it's an overlapping audience or not, but it's pretty easily to imagine some eSport boxing game world championship going on.

[RScarf1]

I agree that less children being born is a factor. This also affects other sports too. There will be less world-class athletes in all sports because of that. I think any sport that is popular is a competitor to boxing. In the old days, boxing only had to compete against baseball and horse racing to being the most popular sport. Now there is American football and basketball. However, the growth of MMA is a major reason why boxing has declined.

I think boxing will always be corrupt because of how the sport is conducted. You have promotional companies and sanctioning bodies which are separate entities. In MMA, companies such as UFC and Bellator are promoters who have their own belts. They don't need a sanctioning body to sanction a fight in order to decide who is a world champion. They just need the boxing/combative sports government commission to sanction it. Because UFC fighters are working for the company, the UFC wants to just have good competitive fights. They don't want incompetent or corrupt (intentionally incompetent) judges. That's why you rarely see bad decisions in MMA. Because UFC has the best fighters, they can make the best matchups. Bellator has a few in the top 10 of a division, but usually they are near the bottom. Bellator is basically the minor league of MMA.

I know that some fans of sports have been boycotting the sports they used to watch frequently because of athletes not standing for the national anthem. I think they should stand because I think it's a distraction if they don't. That's not a major concern for me though. I am most unhappy with the corrupt officials. I cannot watch the NFL anymore because of the referees and the agenda in the playoffs to be biased in favor of one team over another. I first noticed this in the Super Bowl for the 2005 season. The Pittsburgh Steelers won, but I think the Seattle Seahawks suffered because of bad calls. More recently in the playoffs, there was no call on what should have been pass interference and that helped the Rams beat the Saints. Some people think that because Los Angeles has a bigger television market than New Orleans that the NFL wanted the Rams to win. With boxing, the judging has been sometimes horrible. I don't think Canelo Alvarez is the best boxer in the world. If there is a close fight, you know who is going to win depending on the promoter.

Because there are less marriages now and less kids being born, there will also be less fans because there are less people. I think the Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW) movement is growing. Going to football games is often a family affair and eating outside the stadium before the game. I think the younger generation would rather play video game football than watch a game for three hours. There is an agenda by governments to emasculate men and to transfer money and wealth to women through family and divorce court, especially in the very liberal and feminist countries such as Canada and Australia. Men are opting out of marriage and even relationships with women because of this.

Boxing cannot afford to have rampant corruption anymore. In the old days, it could be corrupt because there were a lot less options for entertainment. Now you have free entertainment with videos and social media. It's a different world now and boxing better adapt or else it will be even more of a niche sport than it is now. Boxing is not attracting enough younger fans. There used to be a lot of boxing events where I live in South Florida. We had world title fights. It's not like that around here anymore.

[NateJR]

Promoters and the boxers themselves will ultimately kill the sport.

Fighters need to demand the big fights and the promoters and networks need to be more willing to work things out to make the big fights.

Although I know it's unlikely the sport takes this route across the board. But one can dream.

[maverick23]

For me the biggest issue is the sanctioning bodies looking to maximise their take. Not only do we have 4 major belts but we have the frequent WBA interims, WBA regular (as well as the Super), now the WBC franchise, WBC gold, occasional WBC interim, frequent WBO interims.

Conceivably could have 7-8 fighters claiming to be the world champion in the same weight division. Boxing will never be main stream whilst that’s the case. I follow boxing very closely and go to (pre Covid) a lot of shows and even I struggle to name the champs in certain divisions.

I also think the pay scale has gotten out of hand with boxing. Some of the amounts fighters have got for one-sided predictable fights are crazy and aren’t sustainable.

[Thomastearns]

I agree that less children being born is a factor. This also affects other sports too. There will be less world-class athletes in all sports because of that. I think any sport that is popular is a competitor to boxing. In the old days, boxing only had to compete against baseball and horse racing to being the most popular sport. Now there is American football and basketball. However, the growth of MMA is a major reason why boxing has declined.

I think boxing will always be corrupt because of how the sport is conducted. You have promotional companies and sanctioning bodies which are separate entities. In MMA, companies such as UFC and Bellator are promoters who have their own belts. They don't need a sanctioning body to sanction a fight in order to decide who is a world champion. They just need the boxing/combative sports government commission to sanction it. Because UFC fighters are working for the company, the UFC wants to just have good competitive fights. They don't want incompetent or corrupt (intentionally incompetent) judges. That's why you rarely see bad decisions in MMA. Because UFC has the best fighters, they can make the best matchups. Bellator has a few in the top 10 of a division, but usually they are near the bottom. Bellator is basically the minor league of MMA.

I know that some fans of sports have been boycotting the sports they used to watch frequently because of athletes not standing for the national anthem. I think they should stand because I think it's a distraction if they don't. That's not a major concern for me though. I am most unhappy with the corrupt officials. I cannot watch the NFL anymore because of the referees and the agenda in the playoffs to be biased in favor of one team over another. I first noticed this in the Super Bowl for the 2005 season. The Pittsburgh Steelers won, but I think the Seattle Seahawks suffered because of bad calls. More recently in the playoffs, there was no call on what should have been pass interference and that helped the Rams beat the Saints. Some people think that because Los Angeles has a bigger television market than New Orleans that the NFL wanted the Rams to win. With boxing, the judging has been sometimes horrible. I don't think Canelo Alvarez is the best boxer in the world. If there is a close fight, you know who is going to win depending on the promoter.

Because there are less marriages now and less kids being born, there will also be less fans because there are less people. I think the Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW) movement is growing. Going to football games is often a family affair and eating outside the stadium before the game. I think the younger generation would rather play video game football than watch a game for three hours. There is an agenda by governments to emasculate men and to transfer money and wealth to women through family and divorce court, especially in the very liberal and feminist countries such as Canada and Australia. Men are opting out of marriage and even relationships with women because of this.

Boxing cannot afford to have rampant corruption anymore. In the old days, it could be corrupt because there were a lot less options for entertainment. Now you have free entertainment with videos and social media. It's a different world now and boxing better adapt or else it will be even more of a niche sport than it is now. Boxing is not attracting enough younger fans. There used to be a lot of boxing events where I live in South Florida. We had world title fights. It's not like that around here anymore.

An excellent and informative post.

Maybe it could also be argued that the general public has never really followed boxing for itself. There's always been far too many parasites leeching off the blood of brave and desperate men and giving the sport a bad smell.

Right now the parasites are threatening to suck out the very life force of this sport.

It's those once in a generation superstars, those special fighters that capture the imagination - Dempsey, Louis, Robinson, Marciano, Patterson, Ali, Leonard, Duran, Tyson, Chavez, Pacquiao etc - and all their various rivalries.

Boxing certainly has more competition nowadays but I'm still hoping we're due a new genuine superstar any time soon.

As opposed to an overly protected and carefully guided one. All eyes on Ryan Garcia.

[Enlightened-One]

Boxing is less popular today in the US than it was twenty years ago or so.

Boxing is more popular today in Europe and Eastern Asia than it was twenty years ago or so.

[RScarf1]

An excellent and informative post.

Maybe it could also be argued that the general public has never really followed boxing for itself. There's always been far too many parasites leeching off the blood of brave and desperate men and giving the sport a bad smell.

Right now the parasites are threatening to suck out the very life force of this sport.

It's those once in a generation superstars, those special fighters that capture the imagination - Dempsey, Louis, Robinson, Marciano, Patterson, Ali, Leonard, Duran, Tyson, Chavez, Pacquiao etc - and all their various rivalries.

Boxing certainly has more competition nowadays but I'm still hoping we're due a new genuine superstar any time soon.

As opposed to an overly protected and carefully guided one. All eyes on Ryan Garcia.

Thanks. I just realized that there will be a world title fight in South Florida on November 7th with Devin Haney vs. Yuriorkis Gamboa. It has been a while though since there was one.

There was a poll recently released about why there has been a drop in views and fan interest for some pro sports. Athletes taking political stances is one reason, but it's just one of many. The coronavirus is also a factor because some people are concerned with being around others to watch sports. Boxing and MMA are often shown at sports bars or people sometimes get pay per view and have their friends and family come to watch. The virus is adversely affecting that.

Besides those two issues, the other reasons people gave were having other programming options besides live sports events, being more interested in the U.S. Presidential election (which is of course temporary), and having less free time. My belief is that the people being out of work and the fear of the unknown is making them not in the mood to watch sports, especially a whole game or event.

I forgot to mention this in my other post, but I believe that the talent pool of athletes is decreasing for all sports because of the increase in autism. There has been a significant increase in vaccines given to babies which began in the 1990s. Before 1990, there were much less children being diagnosed with autism. More autistic children means that they will be autistic adults and therefore unlikely to become pro athletes. I know some people don't believe that there is a link between vaccines and autism. Some women get very offended and I know that they don't want to admit that is what caused their child's autism. However, I used to tutor a young woman who could not finish high school because of her autism. Both her and her brother had autism and the mother told me that the vaccines did this to her children. The immense stress that the mother had was almost unbearable. Now the government wants us to take the coronavirus vaccine. I am never taking it.

[gilgamesh]

Unfortunately, I can not see the bright future for our favorite sport. What do you think ?

It's been dead for 7 days now. Mauricio Sulaiman and the WBC killed it

[RScarf1]

Unfortunately, I can not see the bright future for our favorite sport. What do you think ?

It's been dead for 7 days now. Mauricio Sulaiman and the WBC killed it

I receive emails from the WBC. Mauricio Sulaiman says boxing is doing great. For example, this week he mentioned the Lomachenko vs. Lopez fight and other notable fights. He usually mentions the best recent fights that the WBC sanctions.