World Colored Championships

What about Latin Americans or Asians like Philippinos?

 

You know what I mean. There aren't teams in Major League Baseball NOW in the National League East from England, Italy, France, Germany, Belgium, etc. The Chicago Cubs don't play the London Fogs or the Munich Boars in a three-game series this weekend.

But there were world boxing champions from all over the globe back then.

MLB was a US sport in the early 20th century. Boxing was a global sport even back then.

Who a boxing champion fought back then was primarily up to him.

If he chose to fight a black challenger, he did.

If he chose not to, he didn't.

But black fighters fought for world titles up and down the divisions back then.

Retroactively saying Colored Champs were equal to World Champs is rewriting history. What is this "need" to rewrite history?

Joe Jeannette wasn't a "world" champ. Basically, 100 years later, deciding to call him one is rewriting history. He wasn't.

 

It would be more than reasonable, to view it as being equal to an alphabet strap today, at lest for most of its history.

For example when Jim Jeffries was the champion, and the closured title was being contested between Denver Ed Martin, Jack Johnson and Sam McVea, then in hindsight it was a very significant title.

 

So, after years of insisting there should be one world champ per division ...

Now you guys want to go back to when there actually was ONE world championship in a division and, a century later, retroactively "split" up those, too, so more guys can get recognized as champs?

What is reasonable about that?

Who started this thread? Jose Sulaiman's grandson?

Are they going to retroactively present them all with "green" belts, too?

Jesus Christ.

Colored champs weren't world champions any more than Pan-Asian champs are world champs now.

Don't rewrite history.

Black fighters fought for World titles back then. Black fighters WON world titles back then. Joe Gans was a world lightweight champ. Battling Siki was a world light heavyweight champ. Jack Johnson was a world heavyweight champ. Joe Walcott was a world welterweight champ.

Sam Langford, Joe Jeannette and Sam McVea didn't get title shots because Jack Johnson (the world champ) already beat them (some many times) and didn't want to defend against them.

That was "his" choice. Nobody back then told him (or really any of the champs back then) who to fight. He chose who he wanted to fight.

Sucks they all didn't get world title shots. But they didn't.

Everyone didn't get a medal back then.

 

George Dixon claimed to be the colored bantamweight champion of America after beating one local nobody (Elias Hamilton). Later he also had a 3-round exhibition with Robert Green, "the colored spider", and a victory over Jimmy Brackett, which some people could consider him defending the title, I guess, but it is just pointless, it was a completely meaningless title. Same as George Godfrey claiming to be the colored heavyweight champion.

 

I respect your well argued points, however the idea that history shouldn't or isn't rewritten is IMO totally untrue. There is no one way of looking at history, only a perception shaped by an individual or states culture and shared beliefs. Things that were held to be historically irrefutable 100/200 years ago have been abandoned, not because they are untrue but because modern society choses to look at the same facts differently.

 

I disagree. You can be any race or nationality and fight for a WBC world titles.

Like a Pan-Asian belt, you couldn't be any race or nationality and fight for a Colored championship.

The "Colored" title was primarly a title that was contested by black fighters who were from the Americas. It wasn't a world title.

For example, Battling Siki primarily fought in France on his way up and fought for the European title before winning the Light Heavyweight title, because people in France didn't care what color he was.

You even acknowledge some "colored" champs don't merit a world title designation and others do. This is just an argument to elevate a boxer (or a couple) you feel should've been a world champion to world champion status 100 years after the fact.

That's rewriting history.

There was one recognized world champion back then. Splitting up world titles and handing out ceremonial "alphabet" belts to certain boxers you like from a century ago to make yourself feel better ... OR to make it more like today, because we have so many split titles NOW (like that's a good thing) ... is rewriting history.

Awarding more belts to more fighters and calling more than one guy a world champion isn't good.

Going back in time and splitting up one championship that everyone back then recognized as one championship is WORSE.

 

We're talking about a sport that recognized one World Champion.

Going back and recognizing a couple guys you "wished" were champions and annointing them "co-champions" a century later - and blowing off the Colored champions you can't make an argument for - isn't accurately representing the time.

The Colored championship wasn't a world title and it wasn't on par with one.

 

I wouldn't say it is equal because two things are not equal but that does not mean at times the better fighter in a certain division held the Colored Belt. If nothing else, it is important to know the history of those titles and treat them seriously.

 

I appreciate your points. Btw because I simply don't know, who was the governing authority at the time who recognised the official champ during the coloured title years? And who created the coloured title alternative?