Has Wlad done enough to establish lineage?

Championship policy is a neccesity; championship policy has to have rules; championship policy rules have to be obeyed. The point where TBR is concerned is that if it was active since Lennox Lewis's retirement, Wlad would have at no time been crowned champion. It is not "supplanting reality", it is applying a rule to reality.

You've made it pretty clear that you don't like the TBR model, which is fine. You have WBA, WBC, Ring, or your own model to follow.

 

Extend it naturally. When a title is vacated a fighter can become champion without beating the best in the division. "Piling up the wins" can come to eclipse a champion crowned by 1 v 2. I think crowned by public perception is a real thing, and i'm fine with it. But the complications that arise naturally make it deeply, deeply unsatisfactory and basically impossible to "obey" in any meaningful way.

The simplest way to think about it is this: Wlad isn't WBC champion because he has never fought the fight the winner of Rahman-Barrett fight after Rahman won it to claim a "version" of the WBA held by Vitali Klitschko, who later retired. Upon his retirement, the WBA "unified" it and handed it to Raman, who then "defended" it in a majority draw against ****ing James Toney, named their top contender.

Wlad isn't the TBR champ because he has never beaten the best HW in the world excepting himself.

See the difference?

 

"Here" is the problem in this sentence. Applying a championship model on a case by case basis is what the WBA does. For money. It's affect on the sport is horrific.

Granted. So is Brian Viloria. Linear champion: Toshiyuki Igarashi. Inarguable. Reason? Vliroia has never beaten the linear champion or the #1 fighter in the world excepting himself during an era where the title is vacant. Igarashi has.

So?

Don't say "You with your models" like i'm somehow unique or odd. Every single championship body in the history of every single sport has a model, without exception. Even corrupt, broken ones like the WBC.

That is utterly spastic, Jack.

TBR hasn't crowned Wlad champion because he's never beaten the #1, or #2 heavy in the world whilst he himself was #1 or #2 in the world. I think you know that the 2008 economic crisis was a little more complex than that.

The model - and that's the last time i'm using that word, becuase it seems to inexplicably really upset you - is designed to crown champions in the sport of boxing. Of course it serves itself. How the **** else would it work?


If the #1 doesn't fight the #2, TBR doesn't recognise a champion. You find this abhorant to the point of lunacy. That's your prerogative.

 

In and of itself it is not that meaningful in my personal opinion. But what it represents can be signficant, depending.

Your Roy example is interesting. Of course, he wasn't, nor should have been, berated every time he appeared on tv for not facing DM, but it is exactly the stick used to beat Roy by people who want to undermine him nearly 15 years later.

Where Wlad is concerned, i'm also interested. He's straddled an era occupied by two great Heavies in Lewis and Vitali, and for various reasons has been unable to fight either. Unquestionably #1 for the post-Lewis era, and unquestionably (to me), great, he's never been tested at the highest level. I'm interested to see how that will play.

 

What I think it shows is that people really do care about and are aware of this stuff.

Sure. I don't object to that, it would be crazy. There are dozens of fighters not ranked linear that can do so. But what Wlad hasn't done is beaten the #1 heavyweight in the world excepting himself or beaten the champ (one was not available).

What i'm saying to you is, only crowning a champion in the insance where the #1 has fought the #2 MUST be seen to be reasonable. How could it not be seen to be reasonable?

Returning to the TBR (and I don't want to make this all about that), it doesn't have the luxury of saying, "oh, let's make an exception in this case and make him into a champion." Interestingly, Raskin (Ring editor who presided over it) is on record as now regretting making Wlad-Chag for "The" title. Such an option doesn't even exist in the TBR rules.

And that's the way that should be. Make it simple to understand, make it fair, use it across the board - best v best crowns a champion and starts a new lineage.

Now, even if you like Wlad as champ, you surely can't look at that and go "yuk!"