boxing fans root for 2 pound forbes

Here is what you are missing.

You are talking about hardcore fans.

I am talking about fans in the general public.

Boxers make much more money, and get more recognition based on what is "meaningful" in the eyes of the general public, than what is meaningful to us hardcore fans. You look at ESB, which is a pretty big damn message board with some hardcore boxing fans. When you think about it, the amount of people on here doesn't even make a difference in the grand scale of things when it comes to a boxing match. None of us could order Oscar vs Mayweather II, and it would still sell millions of PPVs. In other words... the general public's opinion matters more than us few hardcore fans who sit online and talk about this stuff everyday. How can you say that the boxers are showing that they don't give a **** about what the fans want, when more fans want to see Oscar vs Floyd than Floyd vs Cotto? Doesn't make sense. I am not only talking about what is meaningful to the boxers... I am talking about what is meaningful in the eyes of MOST fans, which MOST fans aren't hardcore fans who are dying to see Mayweather vs Cotto. MOST boxing fans in the general public would want to see De La Hoya vs Mayweather II. Especially after Oscar does this fight on regular HBO, and I believe that it also happens to be when HBO is doing a free promotion and EVERYONE with cable will have access to HBO, let alone Floyd running around in the WWE picking up more viewers as well. In other words... this rematch with be HUGE.... and more meaningful in the general publics eye, than a match against Cotto.

Get the point? I really don't know why we are arguing this either, it's really simple. Us hardcore fans would love to see a lot of fights that the general public has no idea, or little interest in. That's just the way it is. It doesn't make the fight more meaningful, just because we know more about the sport. It just means that to our well trained eye, we know that Oscar is older, inactive, and more involved in promoting than fighting... and that Cotto is a young, hungry beast who would make a great fight with Mayweather. Same thing was said about Hatton... and as soon as Floyd beat him, it was like Hatton never belonged in there anyways. It's almost a lose-lose situation because you can't get credit for beating these young undefeated fighters anymore. You didn't just beat a young, talented, undefeated fighter. In today's boxing world you just "exposed a hype job". It is us hardcore boxing fan's harsh treatment of our current fighters that has fighters not willing to take a risk for a dangerous fight that isn't huge in the public eye. No credit if you win, and you're finished if you lose.

 

I'm not missing a thing. You are once again, confusing popularity with meaningful. More people will watch the Mayweather vs DLH fight than Mayweather vs Cotto. And when they are done with that fight, they won't care a thing about it or the sport and will apply no context or meaning to the fight. It's why the sport gets bare minimum coverage. To have meaning, they'd have to actually give a damn. They don't.....

The most meaningful and legacy building fights are not always the fights that are the most popular. You think that Mayweather's legacy or career will be defined at all by his win over DLH? Hell no, he has much bigger wins....The people who decide legacies are the people who REMEMBER the sport, the hardcore fans and historians. Not general sports fans who forget about it a week later.

This is by far the most important statement you made. They don't have an interest in the sport in general. So they decide nothing about the long term impact of this fight on the sport OR each fighters legacy.

Bottom line, it isn't meaningful at all. The general public won't give a **** at the end of the day. The fight fans, historians, publications, and the like will be the ones who determine it's true impact. Hell, Mayweather doesn't get a ton of credit now for the first win. Not just here, but in magazines and anything else that discusses boxing. The people who care and decide the impact of his legacy on the sport all want to see him fight Cotto. They are the ones asking "why is he fighting DLH again?"

 

BTW, you're right, I don't know why we are arguing this.

You keep trying to latch onto the "perspective" of "meaningful" instead of going by the the essence of it's meaning with the context of the sport and how it was originally being discussed.

I, nor anyone else here, cares what the general fan who won't remember a thing about the fight a month from now thinks. Nor should we. Meaningful, in the context it is being used, means the impact it will have on the legacies of the fighters involved. And for Mayweather, a win over DLH now means nothing. PPV numbers mean nothing as well for his legacy.

And if PPV numbers make fights meaningful, are you going to argue that the most meaningful fights of the past 20 years are Lewis vs Tyson and DLH vs Mayweather? Those are the two most meaningful fights ever? I doubt that. There have been far more meaningful fights in boxing AND in those fighters careers.

 

All this crying over DLH/May II.
You guys are going to be on suicide watch after Oscar wins the rematch and DLH/May III is in the works.