One Governing body

I tend to agree or at least less then four we have now. I think one issue is the Ring magazine lost most of its credibility when Golden boy took it over and the concept of Lineal is simply to nebulous for most. Sometimes you have a guy who is way better and widely seen as the best and doesn't need to have every belt to be recognized as a champ but thats kind of uncommon. I'd either ditch the four belts or further integrate them. The issue always is though how do you regulate a sport like boxing? its international, a lot of the organization is ad hoc and informal, which I don't think is ALL a bad thing, and one body might not necessarily be less corrupt, though it would at least be one champ rather then four.

 

More important one set of rules, the sport unified in preventing drug cheating.

 

The Ring belt was the old way the new way is the TRBB.

 

I know the WBC was almost bankrupt a while ago and nearly went under. I'm not sure how but maybe if someone bought over one of the other organizations or if Athletic commissions could withdrawal from some of the shadier organizations that could go a long way. I don't know how that would be organized but it seems like your best bet.

 

What a great original thought.
Btw, @IntentionalButt did a great thread on this, which for the life of me I can't find.

 

damn i agree best idea in boxing

 

You get what Iam sayin then? how can belts and the need for one definitive title be anywhere near as important as a universal set of rules that allow multiple governing body’s to operate as one, to me that is more important and probably more achievable.

Put simply I’d rather see 4 world champions at each weight, knowing that they are all champions in their own right, that no rules were broken/no advantages were gained/corruption and manipulation weren’t involved in outcomes of fights.

That’s the ideal world but one that will probably never been seen in our lifetimes, as with anything money rules all and aslong as promoters are richer than the governing body’s they have the power.

 

In a perfect world the boxing sanctioning bodies would do what other sports have done over the last century and unify into one organisation. It happened in the NFL, Tennis, Soccer etc and it allowed what was back then sports with much less interest from the public grow into huge sporting businesses which now dwarf boxing in terms of popularity.

Boxers used to be some of the highest paid athletes in the world back in the era of Dempsey, Marciano etc. NFL players, soccer players, tennis players made peanuts in comparison but they now with only a few exceptions like Mayweather most others make more than most boxers. Joshua talks about being the first billion dollar boxer but other athletes in other sports have already reached that benchmark all because boxing can't get it's act together.

 

I really wouldn't have any confidence in one-single governing body ruling the sport. I mean, they're all pretty shonky. At least currently their respective shonkiness is judged in comparison with each other.

One champ is always preferable. But that's why you have unification. To ultimately achieve that goal.

At h/w, things are really easy. Just do as I do & only recognise the lineal champ.

 

It isn't just the alphabet belt organizations who would resist this, the fighters would too IMO. Without the alphabets 90% of the 'champions' of the last 20/30 years would never have won a belt, with all the 'championships' around now fighters can win a belt, retire and look back on fond memories of being a 'champion'.

 

And it's that kind of short sightedness that has led boxing down a path of being a niche sport.

Look at sports like soccer, NFL, NBA, tennis etc, athletes in these sports were paid peanuts compared to boxers back then. But by having unified bodies to build the sport in to the huge businesses they are now and players wages have increased due to that success. Imagine if boxers could again get huge endorsement deal from people like Nike, maybe you would of had Nike Air Jordans but Nike Air Tysons. Maybe Tiger woods wouldn't of gotten that crazy Nike deal with those ads saying "I'm Tiger Woods" and it would of been "I'm Roy Jones Jr."

Boxing could of been structured very differently under one body, maybe have regular tournaments in each division, have word championships or grand slams instead of the idea of passing belts along. You'd have regular programming and seasons like other sports. Boxing as a sport thinks too small and everyone is trying to grab it's little share of the scraps while other sports like Soccer sign huge deals with broadcasters. The premiere league signed a TV deal in the UK for £4.46 billion, imagine if it was the BBBofC selling rights for Boxing in the UK for that?

But it's all too late now, the era when sport and TV first emerged as a big business has passed and other sports have taken the spot where boxing once held. Boxing was once one of the biggest sports in the world, Ali was the biggest sports star ever according to some, but his era was really when other sports started getting their act together and boxing continued to be run in an amateurish way and became less relevant.

 

I wouldn't mind if WBO ceased to exist and IBF merged with WBA (Gilberto being kicked out in the process)

 

I definitely think there needs to be a reduction in the number of world champions per weight category. Each weight should have a WBC, WBO and IBF World champ, nothing else. No Super champ, no regular champ none of that malarkey.