It's the only sport where the competitors have a lower life expectancy than the average population. IMO not worth it on average. https://www.deadlinenews.co.uk/2021...eals-the-impact-of-boxing-on-life-expectancy/
For 1st world guys it's not worth taking it beyond self defence level training unless you have some God given gift like the death touch. CTE is no joke.
It really depends, as there are plenty of fighters who are lucid. Sugar Ray Leonard and Duran are fine, Hearns carried on too long and is in an awful state. Boxing doesn't always equate to CTE. I see boxing as a necessary part of society. Our world is extremely grim, brutal, and ultraviolent, and is full of people who do not understand how to talk about their problems. Boxing is a necessary, controlled antidote to scratch this itch and let people blow off steam. From a pro sport standpoint, it's the warrior code, ingrained in our DNA since the dawn of time. You can live your life clean every single day, and still develop neurological conditions. American football has a boatload of CTE cases, too. Millions of people sit around and kill themselves with alcohol, cigarettes, and dreadful diets. If somebody wants to fight and it makes them feel alive, then why not? Especially if they have a gift. Any boxer who throws the dice and aims for true greatness shows a spirit that 99.99% of people will never have. It's why the sport is so special. There is true risk involved. Something has to get you in the end. "What we do in life echoes in eternity."
It takes a terrible toll. So does war. These guys are soldiers. Soldiering is an honourable profession.
Basically combat Events, going back as far as history allows, are a case of plebians assaulting and maiming one another for the amusement of the bourgeois.
Very dangerous sport and that's why the vast majority of us pay to watch others do it, rather than do it ourselves.
it is estimated between 2000 and 2019 that 100 boxers died as a result of injuries sustained in the ring. known a few that have serious problems as a result. not worth it really. how very few reach the higher levels that make real money. out of that small % how many get away without brain injury? out of that % ...how many have their money 10 years later?
Eventually there will be no contact sports left. Ice Hockey and football have removed most of their contact. Soccer removed the tiny amount it once had. They stop fights over next to nothing for years now. I'd bet a pretty large sum the NFL will be flag within a decade and the NHL no check.
Not due to boxing but more former champs who lost their lives young was Berbick, Marciano and Paul Williams who is in a wheel chair from an accident. So many great boxers have almost been cursed. Liston died from a drug overdose I heard too.
To put it in perspective, the working class men have been doing dangerous jobs since the dawn of time, far more dangerous than boxing, and getting paid very little. And of course being cannon fodder in European societies for a long time. It wasn't too long ago that peasants in Europe and American were dying all the time building dams and mines and buildings and ships etc. Boxers are spoiled, all of them. But people can set up some GoFundMe pages if they wish and help them out with their own money.
Boxing is tough and it’s difficult to leave with everything in tact. but many jobs are like this, especially labour ones.
The short answer is nope.................long answer: There's far too many cautionary tales in boxing and not enough rides into the sunset.