BoxRec

Tarkus wrote: Now you suggesting then if Fury decided not to fight for 20 years and also will not retire, he stays a lineal champion. There is no way around the fact that you need to defend the title to be a champion. And in a reasonable time frame.

You people are victims of dogmatic reasoning. Lineal Champion is not a magic term. To be a "lineal champion", first you have to be a "champion". Not defending title makes you a former champion, regardless of belts and governing bodies. Quite simple seems to me.

Where would the term lineal come from if your system was in operation?

The lineal title has pretty much zero obligations once won. Someone could duck every decent challenger and literally keep it by fighting 0-20 professional losers once every year. If Fury is just sitting on the sidelines while other HWs rack up good wins, I'm not going to accept him as the man of the division just because of the lineal title.

It was more relevant back in the days of one title, where the best were less likely to swerve good opponents and more likely to stay active against high-level competition.

pablothunder wrote: The lineal title is a history of fighters. I understand what you are saying but that is how businesses which require income look at the belts. Being the lineal champion is where it's really at. It throws up its own questions and issues but keeps those to a minimum, which the alphabet titles can't do.

It throws up same problems as all the other systems and ranking. In a sport with no single authority and where best dont compete against the best no system can be relied blindly. To me lineal title is only meaningful in those situation when there are several belt holders and all have comparable resumes. Unified champion is better then lineal champion in most cases.

From the historical view much better way to think about the linage is to look at the recognized number one fighters of the day. Obviosely in that line of great champion there is no place for Tyson Fury or Buster Douglas.

pablothunder wrote: Where would the term lineal come from if your system was in operation?

When someone beats the recognized number one he becomes a lineal champion. Cotto became lineal champion when he beat Martinez but in my view lost it when refused to fight Golovkin. Some call Canelo the lineal MW champ even today. You can see on this example how ridiculous this idea is.

'Lineal' champion is just a vague concept, it's not worth arguing about.

Boxerbeetle wrote:'Lineal' champion is just a vague concept, it's not worth arguing about.

Actually it's quite straightforward

peter barlow wrote:

Boxerbeetle wrote:'Lineal' champion is just a vague concept, it's not worth arguing about.

Actually it's quite straightforward

Yes it is straightforward, but there's clearly disagreement about it. But I don't think it's worth arguing about, because a lot of the time it doesn't really mean anything. (e.g. Canelo might have been the lineal MW champion, but Golovkin is undisputed number 1.)