Boxing News taking a big stance

There definitely more champs now than ever before because there are too many sanctioning bodies and, as the editor posted, many orgs name multiple champs in each division.

That said, there have always been multiple champs in the sport.

For the first 30 years of the 20th century, Jack Johnson, Sam McVea, Sam Langford, Joe Jeannette, Harry Wills, George Godfrey and Larry Gains were all recognized as the Colored Heavyweight Champion when the World Champions at that time wouldn't face them.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Jimmy Slattery was the National Boxing Association Light Heavyweight champ while Tommy Loughran was recognized as champ by the New York State Athletic Commission. George Nichols and Bob Godwin became the NBA Light Heavyweight champs while Maxie Rosenbloom was recognized by NY.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Gorilla Jones, Marcel Thil, Al Hostack, Solly Krieger, Tony Zale and Rocky Graziano were National Boxing Association Middleweight Champs while Ben Jeby, Lou Brouillard, Fred Apostoli, Ken Overlin and Billy Soose were recognized simultaneously as Middleweight champs by the New York State Athletic Commission. Teddy Yarosz was recognized as champ only by Pennsylvania for a time in 1932. And by everyone a year after that.

It's been going on forever.

It's even going on with the Transnational Ratings and the RING ratings.

They are both supposedly independent ratings groups, but even they can't agree on ratings or the champions, themselves!!!!

* The Transnational ratings recognizes Artur Beterbiev as the World Light Heavyweight Champion, the Ring does not. They say it's vacant.

* Ring recognizes Canelo Alvarez as the World Super Middleweight Champion, the Transnational ratings do not. They have that title vacant.

* Ring will recognize the Errol Spence vs. Manny Pacquiao winner as the World Welterweight Champ. Transnational see it as an unrated guy vs. the #1 welterweight contender. They don't rank Pacquiao at all. They have that title vacant.

* Ring has Jermell Charlo as the Super Welterweight World Champ. Transnational ratings do not have a champ. It's vacant. But they say the next Charlo fight between Castano will be for the World Title.

* Transnational has Guillermo Rigondeaux as Junior Featherweight/Super Bantamweight World Champ. Ring doesn't have a champ in that division and doesn't rate Rigondeaux at all in their top 10 in that weight. As far as I can tell, Rigondeaux hasn't fought in the division in four years. Instead, he currently holds a bantamweight title and is unifying with a fellow bantamweight titlist next. Ring rates him #8 at bantamweight.

* Ring recognizes Naoya Inoue as World Bantamweight champ. Transnational says they haven't recognized a bantamweight World Champion since 1987 (34 years ago) since Bernardo Pinango vacated.

* Ring recognizes Hiroto Kyoguchi as World Light Flyweight (Junior Flyweight) Champion. Transnational ratings have him at #2.

Is this clarity? LOL They can't agree on who is the World Champ in SEVEN divisions.

Wouldn't we be making fun of an org that had Rigondeaux rated as the World Champ in a division where he hasn't fought at in many years and while he was currently holding a title and unifying in another division? Because the Transnational guys are doing that with Rigondeaux.

Hell, how can you be the World Champ at a higher weight where you have no titles and only the fifth best fighter at a lower weight were you actually have on belt and are unifying in your next outing?

Didn't the editor say he was going with the Transnational ratings because the WBC doesn't rank Joshua at heavyweight ... yet the Transnational ratings don't rank Manny Pacuiao - who beat Thurman for his welterweight title last time out and is fighting Spence next for two of his belts AND the Ring championship at welterweight. They don't rate him in the top 10.

WTF?

How do they disagree on who is champ in SEVEN divisions?

Like I said, it's nice they don't rate five champs, like the WBA does, but their ratings are just as jacked in spots as anyone else's are.

 

Good for them. Signed up for the newsletter though not a subscription. Yet.

 

I am amazed that so many are defending the crooked ABC´s here.

 

Pacquiao has not fought in two years. Nor has he had any fights lined up.

 

Guillermo Rigondeaux hasn't fought at Super Bantamweight since 2017. They have him as a World Champion in that division.

Manny Pacquaio ended Keith Thurman's 12-year undefeated run and took his welterweight belt, and he's fighting Errol Spence for the IBF, WBC and RING title next ... and you don't rate him at all because he hasn't been able to fight because of freaking COVID?

How ass-backwards is that? I should say "How alphabet org" is that?

 

I think there should be no champs, no winners or losers. Everyone gets a participatory belt instead. In otherwords, 1000's of belts.

 

Not defending them, just pointing out that the two Independent Ratings bodies can't seem to agree on most **** either and have the some dumb "self imposed rules" that the other ratings bodies put up.

They are looking at all the same fighters and can't agree on who is the World Champ in SEVEN different divisions ... because of the "rules" they put in place for themselves.

 

Hell, the IBF and the WBC agree on just as many World Champions as RING and the Transnational Ratings board can come to an agreement on. (LOL)

The IBF and WBC agree on Beterbiev at light heavy, Charlo at Super Welter, Spence at Welter, Josh Taylor at Super Lightweight and Teofimo Lopez at Lightweight (5).

The Ring and the Transnational Board can only agree on Fury, Briedis, Taylor, Lopez and Estrada (5).

Hooray. There's now clarity!!! (LOL)

 

This exercise is tilting at windmills, but I applaud them for the attempt.

 

Clarity of champions is available to any fan who can think critically however that maybe beyond your capability. You seem to think that every boxer is a superstar with managers and accountants, which could not be further from the truth. What you would consider solid B level contenders are out working a day job to make ends meet. These fragmented belts provide more money fights for these fighters and make them more attractive to broadcasters. Unless you can come up with a better alternative to provide for these fighters then the sport will die. Dana White tried, and realised he was out of his depth. I suggest as an armchair punter you leave the business side of things to those who understand the sport better.

 

Absolutely laughable attempt at relevance

 

I guess this is good. But it's just a magazine's stance on the topic. The ABC's need to be culled...

 

Who cares? Publications have been obsolete for over 10 years now. When you have forums like this and the internet in general, with extensive historical information and film easily available and results being announced in real time, no one is going to care. It's not like they're an actual org or federation removing excess belts. They're now just an overrated magazine paying lip service to stay relevant. Any writers that are any good at these places nowadays quickly move on to writing books anyway (i.e. Alex Daly), or starting their own blogs or youtube channels. Forums like this now have much higher quality content from fans who actually care, and it's free. Boxing publications have massively declined since the '90s in terms of quality.

This is stupid, just like when the Ring wouldn't rank Jr/Super Fly in the 80s. If you can't figure out who 'the man' of a division is after a bit of research then you're an idiot, quite frankly.