The "Decline" Of Boxing - Your Opinion

The guys highlighted are either retired, did their best work in the previous decade, or are past their primes by years. The ones that aren't highlighted aren't really knocking on any door which says they will go down as all time greats with the possible exceptions of Pac and Marquez.

Having 40 year old guys like Hopkins and Calzaghe in the p4p charts should send alarm bells right away, as should a part time promoter pushing the so called best fighter in the sport to his limits.

 

I don't think boxing will ever be the sport it once was, and it boils down to it being able to be marketed. When you look at other sports they have what you could call designated competitions to find out who a champion is at least once a year, in tennis there are the four majors and the end of year championship, in swimming and athletics there is the annual world championships and the olympics, in other team games there are annual competitions with a final series at the end.

What this means is that we can follow Federer and his ilk through maybe twenty matches a year and he has to battle his way to the finals of these tournaments, or in swimming or athletics we see the best make their way to the finals, And in team sports there is a round robin competition of maybe twenty games and then the best teams make it to the finals to battle it out to see who is the best.

In all these sports we can follow our team or our man or woman all year through the net pay per view or television with team games giving us something every weekend and there is no denying the excitement of the olympics and wilmbledon, the olympics or the world cup or even many other sports competitions, but what do we see in boxing well the big fight in the premier division has been Wlad versus Thompson, there were a couple of great fights in Mayweather/ Hatton and Cotto /Marguritto but when compared to other great sports there are no lead up competitions to get people's interest and nothing with the aura of an Olympics, Wimbledon or a world series.

In other words boxing is simply not as marketible as most other sports it needs great personalities like Louis, Dempsey, Tyson and Ali in which the public can identify with and they only come along every twenty five years or so, where other sports don't rely as much on this aspect. And without this public profile kids who turn into the great athletes are more interested in other sports rather than boxing which is difficult to understand and follow.

 

I think this point is worth repeating. People have a way of forming their opinion first, unconsciously through emotion, and then find reasons for it; not the other way around. Of course the average Classic Boxing poster, who thinks about and loves the battles fought during his youth, is going to say the old days were better. And in the general forum you'll find exactly the opposite opinion where they'll state that we look at history with rose colored glasses. The truth is probably somewhere in between.



Two things, however, are undeniably true:

1.

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In America, boxing is becoming less and less popular as a mainstream sport. The fact that there's no longer one true world champion has had it's bad influence. The fact that there's so few American champions and as good as no new American top heavyweights no doubt has had it's influence. It would have for any sport that was nationally dominated for a century.

But there's more to it than that. I believe the main reason is that society is changing, and in a bad way. We are all wussy-fying. In the old days, disciplining your kids was normal and there was respect for teachers, parents, etc. Today, if you as much as shout, you risk having your ass sued off, receiving anger management, counseling, etc etc. Boxing is violent and as such is losing support.

People used to live in much harder circumstances and today's generation is spoiled like hell. You don't have to go to the post office anymore to send a letter, just send an email. Who needs to go to the library and do some hard worked research when you can find anything on the Internet? Who needs to be able to read maps and find locations when a GPS machine with a voice sexier than your girlfriend will just give you directions?

As a consquence of this, people these days have a very short attention span and constantly need new things. Now, boxing has many layers to it that easily escape the untrained eye. Long term strategy, ring generalship, footwork, etc. It takes time to appreciate this and 12 (let alone 15) rounds can be a long time if you don't get it.


And this is where MMA comes in. It's fast, only has 3 or 4 round fights and is closer to a "real" fight. This is appealing to people. They don't care that outside of Fedor, barely any fighter can keep a few-fight winning streak and professional fighters will lose to TV celebrities taking up MMA. MMA is boxing, kickboxing, Judo, and more. More is better. They don't know or care that boxing by itself is incredibly difficult, which is why no one can really master the mix of those sports and look unbeatable. Plus, MMA fighters are bigger, look buff and the way many people imagine a fighter to look, Hollywood-like if you will. The irony of course is that a beast looking guy like Bob Sapp isn't worth a dime as a fighter, while Fedor looks like your average bus driver.



That is just American, however. In Europe, boxing is very popular. Every other weekend, there's boxing on (free) mainstream channels in Germany, with boxers from all over the world though mostly Eastern Europe.

2.

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We have had absolutely fantastic boxing matches in the last few years. Vasquez - R. Marquez is arguably the best trilogy of all time. Coralles-Castillo ranks up there with just about any great fight. Katsidiz - Casamayor was exciting and had everything you could wish for. Pavlik vs Taylor I was excellent. Pacquiao - J.M. Marquez will go down as classics. The heavyweight division is lacking, but even there, we've had wars like Liakhovic-Brewster, exciting fights like Virchis-Bidenko, W. Klitschko vs Peter, Sanders vs Klitschko (both) and Lewis-V. Klitschko is still a heavy point of discussion four years after.

 

Actually, I think on average the 90s were a better era than the 80s - at the top the 80s were better but on average I don´t think so.

 

Where did that come from?

 

That maybe right for the US but not for Europe and even more so not for Germany. Boxing is at an all-time high in terms of beeing mainstream and media coverage over here. Which has very much to do with 5 free-TV broadcaster showing fights.

I agree.

 

Great post.

 

He's not electable anymore, but that would be the first time i'd see a good reason to vote for George W: give him another 4 years and he'll scuttle the US economy to lower depths than the Bismarck sunk and give rise to new glorious years of boxing.

 

Wladimir Klitschko, Joe Calzaghe, Pavlik, Floyd Mayweather, Manny Pacquiao, Juan Manuel Marquez, Rafael Marquez, Vasquez and Ivan Calderon. This is my list of current fighters who are great representatives of this decade. Mijares and Donaire might be greats. I agree with sweet scientist about Jones, De La Hoya, Hopkins, etc. being more from last decade. But I think Calzaghe has done enough good work this decade. Mayweather and Calderon were/are absolutely brilliant.
Pay Per View is one of the worst things to ever happen to boxing coupled with the disappearance of network tv from the showcasing of fighters.
I will say that I fell out of love with boxing from the mids 90's until about a year ago. Youtube and this site had a large part in recapturing my interest, but I do think the above listed fighters helped too. I also think more good fights are being made. Is that a reaction to MMA?
Still, there are some bad fights made just for money. De La Hoya - Paqcuiao could be a black eye. Do we really need Mosley - Mayorga? Years ago if they fought that would be an espn crossroads fight.

 

How many young kids have the oppurtunity to wander into a Boxing Gym or club and sparr and learn the art of boxing. There are plenty of oppurtunitys to go pass a Bball court or get involved in football at the park, you got batting cages etc...High school football and baseball, wrestling and stuff.

How many trainers are out there who know the skills and can teach, there are tons of gyms to lift weights but there is hardly anything to sparr and just learn just for fun not even considering going pro, wouldnt it be a great cardio work out to go in there with anothr scrub and sparr for fun? The oppurtunity for the average kid to slide into boxing is just not there.

All this has an impact on the quality and skill level of the participants and the lack of skilled trainers to pass on the skills to future fighters.

 

How many young kids have the oppurtunity to wander into a Boxing Gym or club and sparr and learn the art of boxing? yet there are plenty of oppurtunitys to go passed a Bball court or get involved in football at the park. There are batting cages ...you have High school football, baseball, and wrestling teams.

How many trainers are out there who know the skills and can teach? there are a ton of gyms to lift weights but there are hardly any to sparr and learn just for fun. Lets just say for those not even considering going pro, wouldnt it be a great cardio work out to go in there with anothr scrub and sparr for fun? That oppurtunity for the average kid to slide into boxing is just not there.

All this has an impact on the quality and skill level of the participants. There is also a lack of knowledgable trainers to pass on the skills to future fighters. This has the effect of eroding skill at all levels. Enzo Cazaghe is a musician who also basicly threw a towel around his neck and became a trainer. I guess thats why Joe punches the way he does and he is a top 5 P4P guy! Of course skills are eroding.

 

Boxing is the only sport I know of where you cant use the argument that athletes are bigger, faster, and stronger now, so the guys of yesteryear couldnt compete with the modern athlete. First of all a lightweight weighed 135 50 years ago and they still do today,so fighters in the lighter weight classes have always been the same size. You can't even use that argument for the heavyweight division. Marchiano at 185, Foreman at 217, Ali and Holmes at 212, and prime Tyson at 217 would all destroy today's heavyweights. who weight 250 and up.fighters today just don't learn their craft like the guys before. They don;t fight as often, they don't have the great teachers they used to have years ago, therefore even with advances in nutrition and training equipment fighters today are not as good as the ones from the past.

 

Ditto. Thanks for this food for thought.

I would say there is simply more competition as regards sheer excitement, on the one hand. The radio broadcast of a heavyweight championship fight of yore had little equal for capturing the imagination. At the end of the transmission, kids would run out throwing punches in the air, envisioning Jack Dempsey and Joe Louis.

Once upon a time, the heavyweight champion was considered a hero, a man of honor, an idealized sportsman in times when ideals were still held in high regard. This inspired youngsters to hit the gym and be willing to submit to grueling work to perhaps, someday, reach the impossible dream...