Currently the WBA has two featherweight champions and one interim champion. WBA "Super" World Featherweight Champion - Chris John WBA World Featherweight Champion - Yuriorkis Gamboa WBA interim Featherweight Champion - Celestino Caballero Now the WBA rules state they can reward the Super Championship to a fighter if the unify with another belt holder, and then introduce a regular title, this never happend and the funny thing is now there regular champion Gamboa's next fight is a unification. The WBA rules state they will introduce an interim champion when the usual champion is unable to fight due to injury. When Gamboa won the interim title in April 2009, Chris John had fought in february. When Gamboa was upgraded to full champion in October 2009, John had a fight in September 2009. When Celestino Caballero became intertim champion in April 2010, Gamboa had a fight the month prior, and Chris John has one scheduled for July 2010. To be honest I would have no problem with any of this if the 3 of the actually faced eachother in the ring.
So they put out reasonable sounding rules about having more belts and then just blow through them straight away. 3 belts in 1 division, when all 3 are fighting regularly is disgraceful. The only thing is you'd hope they're becoming so ridiculous that they will collapse in on themselves
I think the WBA can make the world champ a super champ if they have 5 or more title defences....John has quite a few more than that. Same way Felex Sturm was elevated I wonder who the WBA International champ is?
Another shocking indication of why belts mean **** ALL in this day and age. No one belt is more prestigious than another. They are all crap. It's all down to level of opposition. If any of those 3 fight each otehr I'd be willing to say they were the best at 126.
The WBA situation at feather really winds me up, and when Gamboa fans call him a world champ when they know John has had the belt for years I die a little inside
Gamboa can't unify, so hopefully he'll drop the meaningless "regular" title after he beats Salido and keep the IBF one.
3 quality fighters. A disgrace of an organisation. The lower 2 need to be stripped and made in number 1 and 2 contender.
Brilliant thread rob. I didnt realise cabellero was interim aswell, i though gamboa was interim. Disgusting mess this is, alike the hw fiasco not so long back with the champion in recess bollocks in chagev, and regular champ in valuev, and interim in ruiz iirc?. WBA used to be a good association as was wbc, both looked to have cashed in on the sanctioning fee meal tickets. WBC; Diamond belt,gold belt,silver belt.WBA Super champion, world champion, interim champion. The situation is an absloute mess as there doesn't seem to be a standout champion anymore 'a face of a divison' if you like, we should all just follow ibf or ring titles...
Caballero isn't interim champ because he didn't pay so the winner of Eduardo Escobedo-Colmobian padded record bum will be interim WBA Champ they're fighting soon in Mexico. Disgraceful how dumb are these guys in charge nobody will bother fighting for belts if they keep this up why can't they realise that?
good, then the boxing fans can determine who's their real champ, when top fighters get to elite level, they **** them of ,as a top fight doesent need them.
Cant agree more, degale is the wba international champ. What is the difference between international and world? Absolute bollocks these paper titles.