Elite-level pro boxing has become the most predictable sport on the planet

UFC is still just a promotional company, that has a huge monopoly within MMA and has marketed itself well. Boxing has so many more participants and is so much more popular worldwide, so even if a single promoter like Haymon had a dominant share of the boxing market in the US it wouldn't be good enough.

And it's the wrong model to aspire to. UFC still just 'makes' fights. There isn't a defined schedule, where the winner of a fight moves to position x in the rankings and therefore fights the fighter at position y in the rankings next. If boxing was a proper sport you wouldn't be able to get a license and jump in the ring for 4 rounds for $500 just to show you're a tough guy. You would have to start at your domestic amateur level, move up the amateur rankings as you attain success, then move through, say, the domestic, national, continental, and world pro rankings as you beat boxers proven at that level. And of course move down as you lose. Matches have to be based on a fair, set structure if it's a sport. A league. And purses should be based on the level of ranking the fighter's defending. It's easy to say the best should fight the best, but what does that mean if it's not proven below the top level too? The perceived 'best' in boxing can be just the most hyped and best matched.

Check out AIBA Pro Boxing if you haven't. The structure is there, and because they run amateur boxing and the Olympics AIBA has a stake in future pro boxing, so in the long-term could meet their ambition of becoming the single governing body of boxing. 12 weight classes, fighting at least 4 times a year, champions defending only against the number 1 contender, sounds pretty obvious. I wish they had billions to buy out the top promoters, who make today's top pros millions to fight low risk fights.

 

And, if we can imagine a world in which fighters earn purses based on their proven quality rather than their popularity: the most popular fighters would still be marketed by boxing and their star power used to bring in the most money, but that money would essentially be used to subsidise the purses of less popular champions and top fighters. Mayweather shouldn't be making tens of millions when quality champions don't make $10,000. That would allow for the better longer-term success of boxing as a whole, rather than for just a select few stars in the short term.

 

I have to admit that if it's not ideal sure UFC as a model is way better than how fractured boxing is. Because UFC has an interest in every fighter, so it's usually in their interest to match the assumed best, and the winners of fights between top fighters. They're not protecting their assets, like competing boxing promoters do.

 

There are routinely upsets in boxing. Nobody expected Cotto to beat Martinez. The favorite in Donaire vs Rigondeaux was Donaire. Brewster KOing Klitschko was a surprise like when Rahman KO'd Lewis. Everyone was expecting Pacquiao to knock out Marquez not vice versa. Tyson Fury wasn't supposed to be a live dog against Klitschko. Maidana upset Broner and got the shot at Floyd. Ishida knocked out Kirkland in 1. Glen Johnson knocked out Roy Jones Jr. Douglas beat Tyson. Phillips upset Tzsyu.

That **** happens all the time. JAMIE MCDONNELL UD 12 TOMOKI KAMEDA, ADRIAN GRANADOS TKO 8 AMIR IMAM, Thompson KO'd Price, Hopkins beat Trinidad, Foreman Ko'd Michael Moorer, Cesar Cuenca got knocked out by Troyanovsky last year, etc.

 

Bull****. Then why didn't Fedor ever fight Brock Lesnar? MMA fans are idiots who have no idea how badly rigged their sport is. They just started ranking people like a year or two ago instead of hyping a new bum every week. But go ahead and tell yourself that the best always fight the best.

 

Newsflash dude. UFC has probably never had an event in your country. It's a regional promotion company that operates out of the US with almost exclusively American athletes. 90 percent of UFC events took place in the US and half of those were in Las Vegas. A handful of events and fighters have taken place in Brazil, Canada, and the UK but this isn't a worldwide company let alone a worldwide sport. It's the equivalent of Top Rank or Golden Boy matching just it's fighters against each other, like they did the last couple of years, keeping all the matches in house.

When and if the sport continues to grow, it won't be containable within a single promotion company monopoly. We have 8 times as many fighters in boxing and they live all over the globe. A single company operating out of the US can't possibly meet the needs of thousands of fighters in Mexico, Germany, Thailand, Japan, etc.

 

Have you ever looked closely at how the UFC does business? They employ about 200 fighters in like 8 divisions. That means a division is only 20 guys deep. Since all of their fights are in house and not cross promoted that means they don't have the luxury of matching their top guy in a division with the number twenty or thirty guy.

That's why Pacquiao fought Bradley three times, because Top Rank was trying to keep all of their fights in house instead of matching them against rival promotions. Except that Top Rank doesn't have enough elite welterweights to match those guys against different opponents all the time. But we don't praise Bob Arum for "demanding that the best only fight the best" because we want to see those guys to fight Thurman or Khan too. Instead they both fight Rios, because that's who else is signed to Top Rank at welter.

Basically, the reason all of their top guys fight each other is the same reason that they have half as many weight divisions, a lack of depth in the talent pool.

I also think that the whole best fight the best myth is overblown. I've tuned into fights numerous times and gone "Who the hell are these bums? They are terrible." But you take what you can get when almost 1/10th of all the sport's active fighters are under one promotion. There aren't enough stars to make every fight impressive so you get these rejects from a tough man competition squaring off on the undercards.

You see more skill when it's just two top 10 contenders going at it in boxing because a division will be like 1,000-2,000 people thick and you are still watching a pair of guys who are better than 99.9% of their competitors. When they match contenders in the UFC you are looking at two guys who are the best of 100-200 person deep divisions. It's the difference between domestic level and world class.

But of course the UFC is a business that protects it's assets. They just control the hype machine better than promoters do in boxing. Audience members are routinely treated to Canelo vs Khan type match ups. The UFC just tells people that it's super competitive and most of their crowd are too dumb to realize the truth. But they protect their rainmakers in all sorts of ways. Since they control all matchmaking, they'll usually pit their favorite against fighters that they have physical or stylistic advantages over for instance.

Sometimes they just throw the most hyped guy against the champion. Even though Chael Sonnen was a no hoper he trash talked his way into a fight against Anderson Silva. Having been knocked out there he trash talks his way into a championship match against Jon Jones twenty pounds up and gets knocked out there too. Is that the best fighting the best or the most hyped fighting the best?

I remember an interview Sonnen gave once bemoaning the lack of competitive structure in mma where he says there's no way to know if the best were fighting the best because they weren't even ranked. He mentioned how guys would be hyped as these unstoppable killers. The UFC would feed them a couple of no hopers to hype a championship fight, which they would ultimately lose. Then after a string of back to back losses they'd get cut from the UFC and no one would ever talk about them again.

Who are these no hopers they feed to prospects in the UFC? You probably don't even remember their names, but just try googling something like "worst UFC fighters" and it becomes immediately clear that their whole roster doesn't just consist of elite badasses like they advertize.

 

Then feel free not to watch.

Some fights on the horizon that are not easy picks.

 

Did you read my initial reply? In response to the OP, I said ufc isn't a good enough model. I hate ufc, don't watch it, can't name more than three ufc fighters, and only know about it because it has an inferiority complex and constantly compares itself to boxing. It's only been able to brand itself as successfully as it has because there's such a shallow pool of fighters for it to claim are the best and baddest. It makes plenty of sense that ufc would manipulate its fighters and matchups to suit its image. They're in a position to adopt a set matchmaking format but they don't, because it wouldn't allow them to peddle itself as the mere consumer trend rather than proper sport that it is.

I do believe if Haymon controlled 20 of the top 30 boxers in each division it would be an improvement from the status quo and would help boxing's popularity. And that's broadly comparable to ufc. But again, what I'm insisting we need is a global governing body running pro boxing with a set matchmaking schedule at every level of participation. Like tennis, soccer, and every sport except boxing, figure skating, and mma. We have the beginnings of that with AIBA Pro Boxing.

 

This much is grotesquely wrong. Mismatches are absolutely the rule in boxing. If boxing were based on even matchmaking we'd get more than a handful of upsets per year. In the vast majority of fights the favourite is more than a 1/10 betting favourite, while in tennis the favourite in most matches isn't more than a 1/2 favourite. There are almost never true pick em matchups in boxing. And when there are upsets they weren't really upsets, but the favourite was just proven as hyped because he had been protected. Promoters rarely match their fighters up tough. And this won't change unless matches are actually scheduled by ranking.

 

Looking at my OneNote of Heavyweight contests of significance (using my definition culled of non name bums and early stage prospects.) for 2016 so far this year. I have 71 fights and maybe 3 or 4 of them could be considered to be upsets. Mike Mollo KO of undefeated Polish prospect Krzysztof Zimnoch, Duhaupas KO of Helenius, Molina KO of Adamek, and maybe Lucas Browne KO of Chageav (may have been 50/50). 4 or 5% are upsets in my list

 

The business die of things has made if you predictable. That's always been the issue.

 

Mayweather is not a star because of his record but because of his skills and charisma.

 

All Blacks won a world record 19 tests in a row which is a pretty good streak... just saying.

 

Matchmaking & cherry picking is killing the sport , if only there was one governing body - one belt per division then things would be so much better. Then there is no title holders , just champs and if you want To be a champ you got to fight one .