UFC has a dictator, Dana White, but sometimes a dictator is good. I hate having seeing my favorite fighters fight only once a year and maybe even against easy opposition. Corruption runs wild, all the sanctioning bodies have different rules. "If we can't get the fight done here we'll do it somewhere else." Dudes are on peds which their promoters love to make light of. There is no more HBO and guys like tank don't want their o to go, the baddest man on the planet won't broaden his horizons and keep fighting the same guy, Canelo is the only fighter who fights four times a year as opposed to p4p peers who won't fight each other. Bivol is chasing greatness, that's one of the positive parts about the game= the light heavyweight division, beterbiev and such. What if we had a national commission to clean up boxing. What would it take? Heck we witnessed a 58 year old fighter capture his fourth belt from an era when he was just a yooung man, Jeff Fenech what the heck? And even with modern day safety precautions dudes are still surcumbimg to head injuries. It's a question I beg to ask about the gloves? Should we have bigger ones for pillowy fists or smaller ones to get the knockout over quicker. That answer would bode well with a national commissioner to enforce evenly placed gloves in every state. If football can get two leagues (Canadian and American) can't we just get one? Also who would be the dictator in charge???
No, you get big fights, lots of people watch it, talk about it and get into it. Have fights accesible and have the best fight the best at the right time and it would be as big as it was. Lots of people love boxing and it has history. Definitly not a niche sport when done right.
Its true but accomplishing it is the problem. Promoters and sanctioning bodies are in the way. Who is going to take over and force a league on them? I think you would need a rich person with boxings best interest to take over sanctioning bodies, have them merge and close deals with streaming platforms to gain hand in having promoters follow suit to eventually freeze them out and create a ufc type competition. Troughout the years I had hopes for Golden Boy, Dazn, even Hearn but boxing keeps struggling unfortunately.
We would be on Spence vs Crawford 3 by now, Usyk Fury 2, Beterbiev vs Bivol fight of the year of 2019 or 2020, the lightweights would be setting the world on fire with a round robin series etc. The top fighters would get paid less, the lesser fighters paid a bit more, and people would be complaining that boxing is a monopoly and things need to be like how they actually are today.
Not sure it would transform the sport but I think it would lift it’s standing if the right person(s) come in with enough money to do as you say.
No. MMA is in a funk right now, the UFC doesn't do numbers like it once did back in 2009 era. They don't really have any big draws, and their top fighters all want to box jake paul. Dana white still can't seem to make certain big fights made. DOn't get me wrong boxing does need change, and a swift kick in the ass. Its been a TERRIBLE year for boxing. Big fights falling through, lackluster events. And they keep trying to push womens boxing and youtubers down our throats. Its not looking good.
I think there is no doubt whatsoever that boxing would be bigger, maybe even huge again, if there were one champ per division, impetus for fighters to fight each other, and far fewer screwjobs, so the answer is hell yes.
I think it would absolutely be bigger with the right league structure. As we've seen, tournaments like the Super Six and such never fail to create stars. There have been a lot of great UFC fights, but the best boxing fights are better. It's more fun to watch as a sport. Only the biggest combat sport nerds watch BJJ tournaments, only the fighters' mothers watch Greco Roman wrestling, but boxing is popular (to an extent), and kickboxing is regionally popular. All MMA promoters try to claim their next big star is a stand up striker, why not just promote the sport that's all striking all the time?