Is boxing currently in a bad place?

[Enlightened-One]

I’ve put together a list of some of the top fighters that haven’t fought since the first wave of COVID-19, with the vast majority of them being inactive for more than a year, without having any future confirmed bouts in the pipeline:

• Canelo
• Gennadiy Golovkin
• Deontay Wilder
• Manny Pacquiao
• Sergey Kovalev
• Callum Smith
• Keith Thurman
• Mikey Garcia
• Dmitry Bivol
• Artur Beterbiev
• Josh Warrington
• Andy Ruiz Jr.
• Chris Eubank Jr.
• Rey Vargas
• Gilberto Ramirez
• Michael Hunter
• Gary Russell Jr.
• Jean Pascal
• Joseph Diaz
• Junior Makabu
• Ryota Murata
• Maxim Vlasov
• Jessie Vargas
• Marcus Browne
• Kid Galahad
• Michel Soro
• Brian Carlos Castano
• Tevin Farmer
• David Avanesyan

Have we forgotten about these guys?

And would it be an exaggeration to claim that boxing is currently in the worst state it's ever been in?

Thoughts?

[Onetimeonly]

Of course it is.

[DrDuke]

A half of the year without decent fights is surely a mark of a bad year for the sport.

[H8Usernames]

Out of this list I only think that its notable that the following fighters arent more active:

Canelo - But his lack of popularity and contract problems explain it.
Gennadiy Golovkin - totally bizzare. He must have some seriously incompetent promoters that think that this mans career has to be limited to being a Canelo opponent.
Mikey Garcia - the guy can fight and has some potential. Again his promoters seem incompetent that they couldnt do anything better with him the sacrifice him to Errol Spence who was able to make full use of his size advantage.
Andy Ruiz Jr. - talk about losing momentum. His promoter should just have gotten him straight back into the ring against anyone after the AJ loss. Now the AJ win just seems a distant memory.

Manny Pacquiao - putting Manny into the ring would probably not be in his best interests. We are talking about the next president of the philipines here a 100+ million people country. A fignt at this point is too risky to take place since losing a fight could mean losing the elections.

[milpool]

It's not going to go down as a vintage year for the sport but there are exceptional circumstances. I would like to think that most, if not all, in that list would have been active at some point in 2020.

We can only hope that things get better for the sport and I'm sure things will pick up once we're out of this pandemic. What I do worry about is the amateur side of the sport. I hope we don't end up losing a generation of young kids lacing up the gloves.

[gilgamesh]

So far down in the dumps that one wonders if it'll ever be up again.

[DrDuke]

Anyway, the year had memorable fights.

Fury-Wilder II, Helenius-Kownacki, Povetkin-Whyte, Zepeda-Baranchyk, Lopez-Lomachenko, Estrada-Cuadras II, Usyk-Chisora.

Some good ones are also set, hopefully nothing goes wrong.

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

Not a great place but will improve as the malinvestments are pushed out of the market

[Enlightened-One]

Out of this list I only think that its notable that the following fighters arent more active:

[Canelo, Gennadiy Golovkin, Mikey Garcia, Andy Ruiz Jr. and Manny Pacquiao]

I can understand your perspective if you considered yourself a casual mainstream fair-weather fan, that's only interested in watching bouts involving the biggest names in boxing.

However, the purpose of this thread is to discuss the overall state of the sport itself.

The boxers I listed account for roughly 50% of BoxRec's top-sixty pound-for-pound list. I could have dug deeper and easily found many more names of good fighters that have been inactive for a considerable length of time (just by going through ESPN's and The RING's top-ten divisional rankings).

And I feel it's notable that almost half of boxing's best fighters haven't fought for roughly a year or more and also don't have any fights lined-up?

[Ruthless-RKO]

Some did fight earlier in the year. But JUST before national lockdowns began.

Like Russell Jr. And he usually fights once a year anyway..

Most of these guys are with Top Rank but might not be in the states at the moment. And some that with PBC, have no excuse.

The DAZN guys, fair enough..

Some have had to cancel or postpone due to Covid. Or they would have fought by now.

[Enlightened-One]

Some did fight earlier in the year. But JUST before national lockdowns began.

I agree. And that's precisely what I wrote in the first sentence in this thread. Take another look.

I’ve put together a list of some of the top fighters that haven’t fought since the first wave of COVID-19, with the vast majority of them being inactive for more than a year, without having any future confirmed bouts in the pipeline...

I feel it's notable that almost half of boxing's best fighters haven't fought for roughly a year or more and also don't have any fights lined-up, regardless the reasons.

[gilgamesh]

Out of this list I only think that its notable that the following fighters arent more active:

[Canelo, Gennadiy Golovkin, Mikey Garcia, Andy Ruiz Jr. and Manny Pacquiao]

I can understand your perspective if you considered yourself a casual mainstream fair-weather fan, that's only interested in watching bouts involving the biggest names in boxing.

However, the purpose of this thread is to discuss the overall state of the sport itself.

The boxers I listed account for roughly 50% of BoxRec's top-sixty pound-for-pound list. I could have dug deeper and easily found many more names of good fighters that have been inactive for a considerable length of time (just by going through ESPN's and The RING's top-ten divisional rankings).

And I feel it's notable that almost half of boxing's best fighters haven't fought for roughly a year or more and also don't have any fights lined-up?

The overall state of the sport itself is this year, it chose to take a gigantic sh*t on it's greatest Legacy. The Legacy of the Heavyweight Championship.

That is the death knell of the sport.

[cormack]

I cant help but feel the reason some of those fighters listed do not have fights is down $$$$

other fighters have been willing to make big concessions to keep the momentum going and provide something for the fans .

and they deserve the respect for that , but the likes of canelo clearly put money above absolutely everything else ..

[littlepug]

Not really as everything is in a bad place at the moment, considering the circumstances we’ve had some decent fights from all corners of the globe.

[Enlightened-One]

Canelo clearly put money above absolutely everything else ..

What you've written is silly lazy uneducated nonsense!

According to the lawsuit documentation, Canelo agreed to take a pay cut to continue fighting.

However, DAZN insisted on paying Canelo less than half the sum that they'd contractually agreed, because they didn't regard Danny Jacobs, Sergey Kovalev, Billy Joe Saunders or Callum Smith as "premium" opposition.

DAZN did say they would consider Jorge Masvidal, Khabib Nurmagomedov, or even Oscar De La Hoya as premium opponents for Canelo. Even though two of these guys aren't even boxers and the GBP boss is almost 48 years of age and hasn't fought since 2008.

And that is the main issue between DAZN, GBP & Canelo – not the purse size, nor greed. It's because DAZN thought they could force Canelo to fight anyone they damn well want, but that's not mentioned in the Mexican's contract!

What I've written may seem utterly preposterous, but if you spent five minutes performing some research, you'll immediately realise that what I've written is true!

[Onetimeonly]

So far down in the dumps that one wonders if it'll ever be up again.

It won't here.

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

Make good fights and people watch. Even here. Look at those loma v lopez numbers

[Onetimeonly]

Make good fights and people watch. Even here. Look at those loma v lopez numbers

Great for now, when boxing was big 4 times that were watching boza Edwards on Saturday afternoon.

The loma/Lopez numbers likely less than figure skating.

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

Its all relative. There wasnt much competition given limited channels or the internet

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

World series had 60mm viewers in the 1970s and now it gets 13mm.

There are many more things to watch nowadays.

[squiggy]

People also know they can wait and catch almost anything online anytime they want to.

[Evander]

Boxing is in good shape.
Yes there is a delay in putting together big fights because of the live in person revenue and all the streams connected to it.
Fury v Joshua with a potential 90 Thousand crowd in attendance is a lot different to Eddie Hearn's lawn isn't it.

[cormack]

Canelo clearly put money above absolutely everything else ..

What you've written is silly lazy uneducated nonsense!

According to the lawsuit documentation, Canelo agreed to take a pay cut to continue fighting.

However, DAZN insisted on paying Canelo less than half the sum that they'd contractually agreed, because they didn't regard Danny Jacobs, Sergey Kovalev, Billy Joe Saunders or Callum Smith as "premium" opposition.

DAZN did say they would consider Jorge Masvidal, Khabib Nurmagomedov, or even Oscar De La Hoya as premium opponents for Canelo. Even though two of these guys aren't even boxers and the GBP boss is almost 48 years of age and hasn't fought since 2008.

And that is the main issue between DAZN, GBP & Canelo – not the purse size, nor greed. It's because DAZN thought they could force Canelo to fight anyone they damn well want, but that's not mentioned in the Mexican's contract!

What I've written may seem utterly preposterous, but if you spent five minutes performing some research, you'll immediately realise that what I've written is true!

So by your pathetic logic anyone with a different point of view to you re the motivations of Canelo must be uneducated ! whatever keep believing in your own self esteemed point of view .

by the way my responce was quite general even though only 1 name was written , you managed to miss that

[Enlightened-One]

Canelo clearly put money above absolutely everything else ..

What you've written is silly lazy uneducated nonsense!

According to the lawsuit documentation, Canelo agreed to take a pay cut to continue fighting.

However, DAZN insisted on paying Canelo less than half the sum that they'd contractually agreed, because they didn't regard Danny Jacobs, Sergey Kovalev, Billy Joe Saunders or Callum Smith as "premium" opposition.

DAZN did say they would consider Jorge Masvidal, Khabib Nurmagomedov, or even Oscar De La Hoya as premium opponents for Canelo. Even though two of these guys aren't even boxers and the GBP boss is almost 48 years of age and hasn't fought since 2008.

And that is the main issue between DAZN, GBP & Canelo – not the purse size, nor greed. It's because DAZN thought they could force Canelo to fight anyone they damn well want, but that's not mentioned in the Mexican's contract!

What I've written may seem utterly preposterous, but if you spent five minutes performing some research, you'll immediately realise that what I've written is true!

So by your pathetic logic anyone with a different point of view to you re the motivations of Canelo must be uneducated ! whatever keep believing in your own self esteemed point of view .

by the way my responce was quite general even though only 1 name was written , you managed to miss that

You’ve accused “Canelo of placing money above everything else”, but you can’t prove that accusation.

You have also previously admitted to disliking Canelo.

So you’ve made a completely false derogatory accusation based on a whim... and you can't prove otherwise.

[Jeff_lacy_ko]

Its his health and life and hes the cash cow - he should put money above all else. What an odd accusation hes a prizefighter