WHY DO THE ALPHABETS THRIVE WHEN EVERYONE HATES THEM?
Pittsburgh, PA– How often do you hear nice things about the sanctioning bodies? The ratio of negative comments over positive ones has to be 1,000 to one, but yet, they’re as a whole stronger than ever. How did this happen? According to ShoBox analyst and former Ring editor Steve Farhood, “The growth of the alphabets coincided with the boxing boom on network television in the late-’70s and early-’80s. It was thought that title fights drew higher ratings than non-title fights, and that was true. But back then, titles meant more than they do now. The proliferation has been dreadful.” Noted boxing author Tom Hauser didn’t mince words about boxing declining popularity, saying the fractured championships and lack of a unified championship structure have hurt the sport “a lot.” Anyone who knows boxing agrees, so why don’t things change?
BOXERS ARE EASY MARKS FOR THE ALPHABETS
Listen to Farhood: “I’ll never forget something Doug DeWitt said to me many a title belt ago. Doug had just won the WB) (inaugural) middleweight title (after getting stopped challenging Sumbu Kalambay for the WBA strap only five months earlier), and he had done so in an era when the WBO was clearly the fourth and least-respected alphabet body. ‘Doug,’ I said, ‘no offense, but it’s only the WBO middleweight title.’ And he answered, “All I know is that before I won this title, I was fighting for $10,000. Now that I have it, I’m fighting for $100,000. Argue against that.” HBO’s legendary analyst Larry Merchant agreed: “Boxers like belts. They’re security blankets. ‘I’ll get them another fight.’”
SHOULD WE JUST GIVE UP THEN?
Let’s not forget the other side of this equation: Belts in fact do bring boxers greater recognition and more money, as Steve Kim recently pointed out in a provocative column, “Belts Do Matter” on MaxBoxing.com. As Merchant said, “Titles have always been used to promote events.” And Farhood is correct that “fighters love titles and belts. Have you ever watched a fighter win one-fourth (or one-fifth or one-sixth) of a world title and parade around the ring as if his entire career has been validated? Well, in his mind, it has.” But, as Merchant notes, “everybody is a world champion. That’s the problem…. I knew this was crazy when I read in a boxing publication years ago about 17 British fighters calling themselves world champions…. I can’t tell you what titles most of these guys have, and I’m in the business.”
CAN WE CHANGE, OR GET RID OF, THE ALPHABETS?
They give lip service to unification of titles and strip their belt holders for choosing more marketable, and often better, opponents. And they’re all (the WBA, WBC, IBF and WBO) equally terrible. The WBA, WBC and WBO all recognize, on a regular basis, multiple title holders in the same weight classes within their own organizations. The IBF holds out against that, but perpetuates another fraud by stripping its champs (see Antonio Margarito and Verno Phillips, to name just two) for selecting excellent opponents (Miguel Cotto and Paul Williams), then it holds “championship” bouts for those vacant belts, which in these cases were won by fighters who Margarito and Phillips had just beaten (Joshua Clottey and Cory Spinks). WBC welterweight (147) titlist Andre Berto, Merchant mentioned, “hasn’t beaten a really significant fighter yet.” The fact is, in this dysfunctional system, Berto can get away with calling himself a champion while avoiding the Shane Mosleys, Cottos and Margaritos of the world, and that’s just how his promoter Lou DiBella wants it. The sanctioning bodies allow those who should be contenders to call themselves champs while making the real number ones share the spotlight.
THE SILVER LINING ABOUT THIS CHAOS
Showtime analyst and boxing historian Al Bernstein hinted at how we can overcome, or perhaps better stated, coexist with this problem of title proliferation: “We’re too far gone in terms of organization, probably, to unify titles and create order. Is that a problem? No question. But it’s not impeding to the degree it once did. In the 90s, it did badly because of a bad product; now there’s an absolutely terrific product.” BoxingScene editor Cliff Rold agreed and went further: “In a sport which has lost the mainstream, clarity could be helpful. (But having many different title holders) is less a part of the problem than it is often cited as. There have been split titles in eras where the sport was more popular and few minded because the fights were frequent and good.” This fall, beginning September 19 with Floyd Mayweather, Jr. versus Juan Manuel Marquez, the fights will in fact be frequent and good throughout the rest of the year. Imagine replicating this quality of fights for several more years, and tell me boxing wouldn’t experience a popularity bounce.
NEXT – PART THREE: WHO SHOULD SAY WHO’S THE CHAMP?
Brain Gorman