>>>The Mikkel Kessler Warring Longboat<<<

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Mikkel Kessler = top bloke!

Best of luck, Mikkel!:happy :happy :happy

 

:good

 

Interviewer asked MK why he was at the Pavlik Taylor fight; Kessler said he was there hoping to get a fight with one of them. "You never know!"

He said he had taken a long break but has started to train again recently.

Spoke about Andrade's brother - "good fighter and gentleman, like Librado".

 

Let's try and guess Mikkel's summer "name" opponent.

Any chance of Mundine?

Miranda?

Allan Green?

 

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Mikkel Kessler – a hero of boxing – let down and betrayed by the sport that he loves…

By John Alutus: Professional boxing is a business. The risk/reward ratio applies in boxing as readily and as often as it does in investment management. The point of this business is to maximise profits by picking the fights with the smallest potential risk of losing and the greatest reward of winning.. Whilst the fact that boxing is a business should not preclude the maximisation of the level of performance of the fighters involved or the credibility and expansion of the sport, given the way this business is regulated, the incentives induced corrupt its ultimate goals. In the end, this is why boxing is losing ground over other martial arts and why, more worryingly, why its very credibility remains limited and even declines in comparison to that of other martial arts, to the frustration of hard-core boxing fans. ​

The business of professional boxing is failing! There are four main stake-holders in this business: fighters, sanctioning bodies, promoters, commentators and paying customers and all are to blame. Firstly, paying customers (fans) are to blame because they let the hype created by promoters blind them to the real talents, skills and abilities of professional boxers in a way that leads them to reward poor, unworthy contests with their hard-earned cash more than they reward good worthy contests, a lot of the time. Fans often lap up the hype surrounding fights involving big have-been names, past-it legends of the sport, instead of demanding the most meaningful fights out there, involving prime, live, young, hungry contenders. This changes the promoters' incentive structure in a way that leads them to hype up even more poor fights. A vicious circle is created. The defence of the promoters is that if poorer contests weren't getting made, the sport could not support enough combatants to make the talent pool deep enough for the best performers to be truly outstanding and ensure the viability of the business. ​

Secondly, commentators are to blame because they don't call the promoters' bluff when they are selling fans unworthy poor contests as worthy good contests. Instead, they often collude willingly with promoters and hype the match-ups made by them, defending themselves to their consciences by arguing that to pour cold water over a hyped fight would just alienate casual or potential fans, which boxing needs more of if it is to thrive. This alters the promoters' incentive structure in a way that leads them to hype poor match-ups even more. The vicious circle is made even worse! ​

Thirdly, fighters are to blame because they agree to play along with their promoters in making fights unworthy of their talents and skills, whilst celebrating meaningless victories as if they meant or should mean something. This feeds back into the promoters' incentive structures leading them to hype even more poor unworthy wins as great worthy wins, clouding the truly great achievements of great fighters involved in great match-ups, instead of highlighting their achievements. Fighters defend their choice to fight poor, unworthy opponents and to overrate the importance of victories over them by invoking the prisoner's dilemma situation they find themselves in. As a result, the vicious circle is made worse still!​

All these vicious circles lead to boxing becoming a less and less profitable business compared to other sports and thus, to its great potential remaining unrealised. The buck, of course, should stop with the sanctioning body – the regulator. Unfortunately, there is not just one, but four main such bodies and many lesser ones, all vying for supremacy. This in itself is the root of all evil. When their own credibility and legitimacy is questioned, the various governing bodies collude out of an instinct of self-preservation, allowing the degree and extent of moral corrosion at the heart of boxing to increase. Sanctioning bodies defend the decisions that damage the credibility of boxing and its failing popularity by also invoking the prisoner's dilemma. Thus, they argue that if they didn't sanction poor, unworthy voluntary defences, their champion would move to a competitor and they would lose their earnings stream of sanctioning fees. As a result, they argue, all those fighters who fight under their umbrella would earn less for fighting for the belts they put on offer and the sport would suffer as a result. They also defend themselves by arguing that unworthy voluntary defences allow fighters unable to get a legitimate title shot to earn the kind of income required to ensure their participation in the sport and thus, a deep enough talent pool. This creates a feedback mechanism that leads promoters to overprotect their fighters and to pad their records even more. Even worse, it leads to older fighters, long past their best, selling their name, ensuring a trophy win for the hyped young prospect, in fights in which the have-been legends find themselves out-matched and prone to serious long-term injury and destructive brain-damage. The vicious circle, again. Moreover, sanctioning bodies protect their champion from dangerous contenders, by rating the latter too low to get a shot at their famous, big-draw champs. The top stars in the sport also often benefit from partial refereeing and judging, since a single loss on a bad day would lead many of the fans to overreact, damaging the prospects of the former champion. Instead of appreciating skill and performance, these fans, obsessed with the "0" in the loss column – the mark of supposed perfection – are all too ready to proclaim a champion who lost "exposed" or "overrated". It is not surprising therefore when these sanctioned "robberies" on the other hand frustrate sports fans and decrease the credibility of the contest before their eyes to the extent that many of them believe the outcome of the "make-believe fight" to be predetermined according to ready-made story-lines, just like in professional wrestling. And all this while, all the main shareholders, including the regulators, are turning a blind eye to the rot at the heart of boxing, supposedly as a means to an end, "for the sake of the sport", instead of realising that by compromising thus they are in fact condemning their sport and livelihood to a slow, rotting decline. ​

Fortunately, there are still a few outstanding careers which fail to mould themselves according to this sorry pattern. There are still top fighters who obstinately refuse to play the game, good honest commentators, good promoters and good fans. They all represent the hope of boxing. Unfortunately, the very system is against them! Let me attempt to show how by concentrating on these heroic fighters.​