Fair enough. I see your point. Just getting on a rant as a pissed off purist boxing fan. Things need a shake up in my opinion.
It gonna be a big thing in the heavyweight division cos you know it’s gonna be market to death to the public as being history making being the first heavyweight ever to hold all 4 belts.
And kind of there in lies another problem. It's the marquee division. The promoters do not want to risk giving a monopoly to the last man standing. PBC, Matchroom, Toprank/Queensbury all vying for control. We've ended up with a ridiculous situation of Matchroom's guy holding 3 belts for years now. Whilst we had PBC and Don King working together providing WBC champions and challengers. Now, we have PBC and Toprank fighting a never ending series, playing pass the parcel with the final belt. They are clearly avoiding the undisputed fight as long as possible, until they can't milk anymore out of that one belt.
This is ultimately the fault of the boxing consumers (and the boxing media that guides their tastes.) If viewers didn't care about who held the WBO, for example, it would die.
this really cant be argued. whether you think his privilege gets him the fights or not, fact is, hes making them. and hes taken pay cuts and made concessions to make those fights.
Tyson Fury has already won all the belts. They're all in his trophy case. He won the WBC, the WBA Super, the IBF, the WBO, the IBO and is a two-time Ring beltholder. Never lost ANY of them in a boxing match. https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2021/01/22/16/38358280-9176923-image-a-14_1611333843956.jpg But 10 DAYS after beating Wlad, the IBF stripped him because Kathy Duva wanted her fighter Czar Glaskov 'the IBF mandatory' to get an immediate title shot and Fury talked about fighting in a rematch with Wlad. And Glazkov couldn't even beat Charles Martin for the vacant IBF belt. And some dumbass fans started calling Martin, Joshua, Ruiz and Joshua (again) champ. None of them beat Fury, but they had a belt. All because of Kathy Duva and Czar Glazkov, neither of whom are factors at all in boxing right now. Glazkov never fought again. Fury even paid the IBF their sanctioning fees, but he wouldn't agree within 10 days of winning the World title to fight the guy they wanted him to face. So, no longer their champ. Boxing fans love "belts" more than boxers do. As long as they guy they cheer for has one.
Just to add to this, another option is the athletic commissions forcing the alphabet groups to come up with a #1 contender they all agree on.
The athletic commissions could get together and decide not to allow sanctioning bodies to stage their title fights in those states, regions or countries. And the collective athletic commissions could call the shots. Just run them out. It's been done before. When Joe Frazier won his first title against Buster Mathis, he was recognized as the Heavyweight Champion in SIX STATES (New York, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Texas, Massachusetts and Maine, I believe) and by the British Boxing Board of Control. That's it. Six of the 50 states isn't a lot. While the WBA (and all the states and countries within that) recognized Jimmy Ellis. That's why Frazier only defended his title in the early days in New York, Pennsylvania and Texas (until he beat Ellis and was reconized by everyone). But it helped that Britain recognized Frazier early on, too. Because when Jimmy Ellis was going to defend his WBA belt against Henry Cooper in England, the British Boxing Board of Control told Cooper they'd take away his boxing license if he accepted the fight because they recognized Joe Frazier. So, Cooper didn't fight him.
Its all who you fought and how you fared. Belts dont matter if you got them all from vacancy against dudes outside the top 20.
It's only impressive if you've fought and beaten the best to get it. Being a champion means nothing if you beat nothing but crap to be one. The real champions are the ones who fight the better fighters. Doesn't matter if that guy has 0 or 4 belts. What matters is who he's fought.
Guys don’t unify because they don’t want to fight for real, this new era more about being a celebrity than being great, Canelo wants the fights so he goes out of his way to make them, that’s what makes him great and separates that actual greats from pretenders pretenders hide behind promoters or this and that when you really want to fight you make it happen managers and promoters work for the fighters not the other way around
