Holyfield Ring CW Belt?

JC · Post by JC » 27 Feb 2007, 17:48

According to wikipedia holyfield was never the Ring Cruiserweight champion anyone know why? I would have though he would have be given the belt after beating Carlos De Leon in 1988.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Th ... _champions

The_Real_Deal · Post by **The_Real_Deal** » 02 Mar 2007, 18:13

Becuase back then they didnt really consider The Ring Magazine belt as anything it wasnt until Kellerman got his job with ESPN that Ring started to hold water. in fact Kellerman basicly plugged Ring Magazine to be honest with you

RiddickBowe · Post by **RiddickBowe** » 07 Mar 2007, 10:30

Ring magazine has given away championship belts since the 1920's, and for most of boxing's history they were emblematic of the "true" champion in the division. Starting with the rise of the sanctioning bodies, especially in the 1970's, and the decline in Ring's readership, their belts began to carry much less weight. Ring gave out belts into the 80's, but it wasn't quite the big deal as when Nat Fleischer gave them out.

In the 80's Ring also experimented with revising their rankings. At some point (and this could have been when Holyfield held the cruiserweight title) they only ranked fighters in the 8 traditional weight classes.

After Ring changed ownership in the 90's (and maybe before, I'm not sure), it stopped giving out belts. It ony started again a few years ago.

JC · Post by JC » 07 Mar 2007, 13:30

Thanks guys