So...Boxing this year...

2025 is a stinker. Tough to stay interested. Canelo did fight Crawford, but what else is going on? Are there any fights y'all are even excited about? Scene feels dead. Wish I had more to stay.

 

Other than Crawford V Canelo the last few months has been very slim pickings

 

I agree that this has been a somewhat down year. Q3 and Q4 dont have much to get excited about. Some of the bigger fights were duds like the time square card

There are some very good potential matchups to be made but im not sure how many actually get done

 

"The Times Square Card"

The more you go back, the worse it gets.

2025 was brutal.

The "biggest" fight this year was actually Jake Paul vs Mike Tyson. Literally everyone I know saw that. Just terrible.

I "quit" telling people I liked boxing this year. People asked If I saw some fight or another, and I just say no. Because they were only bringing it up because something "not good" happened.

 

It wasn't a terrible year. There were good cards and fights this year: February 22nd Saudi Card, multiple Japanese cards (honestly every good fight this year was in Japan), July 13/20 cards, Canelo-Crawford. The autumn schedule is solid, so there is that to look forward to.

For me, 2025 was a breather year. There wasn't any real direction or any major fight that people wanted. For next year, with Inoue-Nakatani and maybe some big heavyweight fights, 2026 will be better.

 

I don't want to nitpick, but that was in 2024.

 

At the championship level it has been a dud of a year with barely any notable big events, at least ones I enjoyed.
But, I have enjoyed the smaller cards. Lots of fun fights and great nights.

Personally, I have enjoyed 2025.

I do think boxing is in a bit of a rut, and it will take at least a couple of years before it turns around. Sports moving to streaming has made a chaotic environment for broadcasting rights, and boxing has yet to find its footing.

 

I thought it was a pretty good year for boxing in terms of number of good fights and major events that took place.

We've had:

Canelo Alvarez vs Terence Crawford
Shakur Stevenson vs William Zepeda
Chris Eubank Jr vs Conor Benn 1
David Benavidez vs David Morrell
Dmitry Bivol vs Artur Beterbiev 2
Naoya Inoue vs Ramon Cardenas
Isaac Cruz vs Angel Fierro
Kenshiro Teraji vs Seigo Yuri Akui
Callum Smith vs Joshua Buatsi
Seiya Tsutsumi vs Daigo Higa
Subriel Matias vs Alberto Puello
David Morrell vs Imam Khataev
Regis Prograis vs Joseph Diaz Jr
Oscar Duarte vs Kenneth Simms Jr
Kenshiro Teraji vs Ricardo Sandoval
Elijah Pierce vs Michael Dasmarinas
Carlos Canizales vs Panya Pradabrsi 2
Kai Watanabe vs Reo Saito
Filip Hrgovic vs David Adelaye
Nick Ball vs Sam Goodman
Serhii Bohachuk vs Brandon Adams 2
Christian Mbilli vs Lester Martinez

 

Bam vs Cafu is worth a mention because Cafu tried something creative. Didn't work, but still a fight worth watching.

 

It's been okay just quiet over the last 6 weeks. Seems to happen every year! Starting up again with Parker vs Wardley which I think will be a great fight alongside a few other big fights to close out a decent year.

 

It's not like there's no other upcoming fights going into the end of the year. We still have these fights to look forward to:

Joseph Parker vs Fabio Wardley
Vergil Ortiz vs Erickson Lubin
David Benavidez vs Anthony Yarde
Brian Norman Jr vs Devin Haney
Bam Rodriguez vs Fernando Martinez
Abdullah Mason vs Sam Noakes
Gary Antuanne Russell vs Andy Hiroaka
Rafael Espinoza vs Arnold Khegai
Lamont Roach Jr vs Isaac Cruz
Janibek Alimkhanuly vs Erislandy Lara
Jai Opetaia vs. Huseyin Cinkara
Kubrat Pulev vs. Murat Gassiev
Naoya Inoue vs. David Picasso
Junto Nakatani vs. Sebastian Hernandez
Kenshiro Teraji vs. Willibaldo Garcia Perez

 

Callum Smith Vs Joshua Buatsi was a cracker.
Bivol Vs Beterbiev
Eubank Vs Benn

 

It was s*** and Crawford vs Cinnamon was overrated too.. boxing fans need to up their standards

 

Canelo vs Crawford was a good fight, with an exciting and historic outcome... but no one really asked for the fight.
In fact, lots of fights named in this thread are ones that the fans did not ask for.

Eubank vs Benn was a really fun fight, but it was between two guys who chose to fight each other instead of the best in their own divisions. In fact, we actually had rather few fights between the top ranked guys.

 

Throughout history we've had some of the biggest fights that fight in the "nobody asked for it" category. Buster Douglas vs Mike Tyson, Canelo vs Mayweather, even Ali vs Foreman...... Those are all examples of fights that hindsight, turned out to be historical not only for the fighters involved, but the sport as a whole, but before those fights were made official or at least rumored to be in the works, other than the diehard fans of the underdog of the match up, no one was begging for the fight.

I actually like what 2025 gave us as fans. We had some damn good match ups and still have quite a few that's worth looking forward to in the up coming month.