World Colored Championships

I view the World Colored Championship titles has official titles.
It's not even an issue for me.
Langford, McVea. Jeanette, Wills, etc... all World Champions in my book.

 

I view then the same as I view titles.

For example I wouldn't call Davis a LW champion, I'd call him a titleholder. He gets no esteem or respect for that, just acknowledgement that he owns a title.

Similarly McVea doesn't get esteem or respect for holding the coloured title, just an acknowledgement that he owned it.

 

This is a fantastic thread!

Personally I think this is a great idea. I do think most hard core fans hold brilliant fighters in high regard whether they were a champ or not and rate them in their personal P4P ratings irrelevant of whatever belts they did or did not hold.

But I think for a more general fans and for righting boxing history it could be a cool idea if The Ring or someone similar issued posthumous belts to these fighters, although the name "World Coloured Championship" would have to be changed I imagine? Or possibly just call it "Honorary World Heavyweight Champion" with the context explained during the issuing ceremony?

It could also be extended to other fighters at any weight who were clearly the best but were denied title shots due to race?

A more general "Legend of (insert weight class) Division" belt could be given to fighters of any race who never got a shot for other reasons but should be recognized for their contribution to the sport such as Packey McFarland or Charley Burley.

Wouldn't it be great to have a spot light thrown on some awesome fighters from the past in this way!

 

Yes, yes I do.

The world champion isn't always the commonly regarded best,but he is always the man who beat the world champion.

 

I feel like if you're willing to call a single title holder in the modern era - say, idk, Emmanuel Rodriguez or something - a world champion, you'd have to extend the same lenience to the old coloured championships.

But for me personally, in an era where there's more than one title - which people don't like to here, but that's virtually every era - I see the person who beat the number one as the champ. Everyone else is a top contender, regardless of whatever money hungry corp tries to tell me otherwise.

Specifically in the case of the coloured championships though, it's a lot sadder than just being greedy. Giving a fighter a coloured championship, making money off them while simultaneously stopping them from fighting the 'actual' world champion and preventing them from ever seeing genuinely life changing money is a and cruel trick. Made worse by it supposedly being to their benefit.

I also think the context of the time is important. There was a lot more prestige with the title back then, simply due to the fact that there was a helluva lot less of them. I don't know how the coloured championship was viewed then, but just as a guess, I'd say not very seriously given how people viewed black fighters then. Everyone knew they were good, but if you wanted to ignore them, most seemed follow suit.

 

Major League Baseball has finally accepted the statistics of the Negro League as being valid, so maybe boxing should do the same thing.

 

I think this is a great point!

 

Personally, I dislike it when people try to rewrite history.

'Colored' titles weren't viewed anywhere in the world back then as the equivalent of an actual World title, any more than the Pan-Asian champs today are considered the same as World Champs now.

Fighters from all races and all countries fought for all the titles in all the divisions.

If one champ here or there refused to fight a black fighter, that was their prerogative. No need to rewrite history over it. Just acknowledge that's what happened.

There were greater restrictions on who could fight for a "colored" title than there were on who could fight for a world title, after all.

 

Major League baseball took place in one country back then and Negro League championship teams aren't viewed today as the same as World Series championship teams.

Boxing is a global sport. Fighters from all over the globe fought for world titles in boxing. And 'colored' fighters fought for world titles up and down the divisions back then, too.

If one champ in a division here or there wouldn't fight a "black" opponent, that was his personal choice. Other champs would and did.

 

Baseball may not be global (actually it is) but it certainly is ETERNAL!

BTW the Saudi's have started up a baseball league....crazy.

 

It wasn't "global" when the Negro Leagues existed was my point. The rules and biases in the US dominated the game.

Boxing was a global sport then and now. And black fighters fought for world titles up and down the sport in various divisions, including heavyweight.

Pretending a colored title back then was equal to a world title simply is just rewriting history.

They weren't considered the same AT ALL.