You see it in most sports Old school nba fans say the current game is too soft Older nfl fans point to previous decades where certain hits were legal and the game was more brutal Traditional hockey fans point out how the game is moving away from fighting and goons/enforcers I think this is a layered discussion. In some ways the old timers are right but in many others they sell short the current crop but its only naural. It als applies to music and movies too My take is that boxing back then had a lot of the same problems we have always had: bad decisions, boring fights, uninteresting champions, greedy promoters, etc However back then there were less weights and less belts meaning the best had to realy work their way to the top and when they got there they were en presented top tier challengers because they had to go up the ranks too Right now I feel we have a lot of work in progress champs or contender belt holders who got maneuvered into title fights withoutfacing any real top ranked guys and dont unify or face the highest rated contenders and essentially we get second rate title fights that back then might have been #7 vs #8 as a stay or go sort of fight. Now the best guys can all go for one of four belts while avoiding each other and reign separately and I think that effects some of the quality That said the past didmt always play out as I described above qnd the present isnt always that case either
Another factor is the definite nature of the past. Generally any fighter who has retired thirty years+ ago is easier to evaluate as almost certainly everyone he has fought has retired too, thus we have the whole picture. Rating today's fighters against this is very hard. Yes, there clearly is some exceptional talent around, but is that then 25-0 fighter they beat, a future great themselves and thus deserving of great kudos? Or are they an average fighter who now will lose as many as they win? Fighters from the past do not have that problem.
Boxing’s history is the only thing that gives championship titles credibility. Unfortunately 30 years of many multiple titles and 40 leading top ten contenders have so polluted the history during that time and watered down talent that the game is hopelessly ruined. Boxing has to return to one champion in each weight division and only ten top ten challengers. The lay public needs to know who the world champion actually is and it needs to be a difficult task to be called a contender and that much more difficult to be called THE CHAMPION.
I consider Andre Ward's retirement the wrong occasion to **** on him with some backhanded historical perspective. I literally don't care.
So which heyday of boxing should we return to? The days of the color line being drawn? Yes, many of the best were denied opportunities that they earned....and many of the best never faced one another. Should we return instead to the mob driven era (if it indeed ever ended)....you know, where many guys were denied shots unless they allowed mob controlled influences to dictate their career...or had to take a fall to even get a title shot... What era of our purity driven sport is the optimal one for us to return too?
You need a course in reading comprehension. Brief summary for the unlearned: We need to return to when we had one champion in each division. Along with this we get only one top ten challengers in every weight division. Add the both together and we once again have a boxing scene the average fan can comprehend. Everyone can point to one man as the world’s champion in every weight class. The title thus becomes a more difficult one to attain so then only the cream generally rises to the top. Fighters have to be better to succeed so the talent of the best fighters gets better. To address your other points. The color line was an American tradition passed down for decades and expected by the majority of the populous. (this majority diminishing over time) The white race did not want a black man to be seen as the physical master of all men along with the other social and economic implications. All this is irrelevant to the topic on hand. The mob had a level of influence certainly for several decades. They still may have. Overall however there is only evidence of a small % of bouts being fixed especially at a high level. Again this point has nothing to do with the topic at hand.
Floyd gets discredited and lowered in the rankings by many. Modern fans and Historians. But the truth is you’ve never seen a guy like him. Maybe Willie Pep with a different style. Either way he’s far above top fifty for me. Falls somewhere in the top ten. Don’t see why people can’t appreciate today and yesteryears fighters. There’s also many guys who couldn’t carry Marcianos 300 pound briefcase
You need to stop saying this to people every time they disagree with you. Even on the rare occasions where it's true, it's not helpful.
Its past and its worst/heaviest division (the latter being a large reason why I refuse to accept the Classic-exclusive membership as being some more sophisticated breed than are their primarily modern-viewing, General counterparts - neither party is any less infatuated with the perennially garbage HW's)
Top 100 p4p is quite a select club to get into. There has been 140 years of gloved boxing, and god knows how many weight classes over that period. Also some of Andre Ward's opponents are still active, which means that they could still increase/decrease their standing.
I do deeply appreciate your concern for my literary acumen. And I know such an era as you described did in fact exist in nostalgia. But I do not believe a level of purity to return to ever existed. Yes the situations you and I referred to were in fact driven by both the politics of the day and the politics within the sport as well as money of course. You speak of returning to 1 belt and I and most agree, at least in regards to classic. However in every era there has been a level of the best not facing the best for a number of nuanced reasons. The color line, irrespective of politics prohibited the best from meeting the best. The mob controlled year impacted who did and did not get title shots. My own beloved 70-80’s many of the best competitors were prohibited from even competing due to politics within their own nations that would not even allow them compete. Today there are a number of belts and every abc organization has their own top 10, most who do not even list the other champs (I also use this term loosely) or best contenders. Hence due to politics within the sport and money of course the best do not always face the best. I agree with your premise of what we wished boxing looked like...I just disagree that it ever existed in reality,
At no point in this thread have I said whether or not Andre belongs in your guys' Superman vs Goku listicals lol. I've never done a 100 fighter list. Don't plan too. Don't think it matters. I'm saying using that hobby to downplay a top fighter this century, on his day of retirement where he should be celebrated, is petty and should be ridiculed. It makes me question the motivation of the entire exercise.
