What are your thoughts on 'weight bullying'?

If the fighter can make the weight it isn't bullying. When the so called "A" side imposes a rehydration clause, that's weight bullying. It's the timing of the weigh in that needs to be addressed, not what the fighters are doing.

 

Every rehydration clause is one step close to what we want.

 

1) Do away with most of the weight classes Something like 125-150-175-200+
2) Weigh 2 hours before the fight. If someone doesn't make weight, penalize their purse. If it's a title fight, it becomes a non-title fight. If they refuse to fight, mandatory 3-year suspension.

Problem solved.

 

You make a decision to compete in a weight class according to the rules, there is no such thing as weight bullying, in that way. There are too many weight classes to be quibbling about the margins of who is big for the weight having an unfair advantage if they're making the weight. But some corny people will come in and claim it even if weights are separated by tenths of pounds, instead of pounds, to spite some fighter they don't like because of their skin or their style or their sins or their smiles. As long as it's by the rules your opponent gets. You have a risk/reward assessment for if you want to move up or down till heavyweight. Are you better off bigger but dehydrating more or smaller but dehydrating less. That's more than fair. It's too fair. We should not even have weight class boxing. Can you imagine weight class football? No. Because it would be stupid. People like Pacquiao should not exist. Zhang would murder Pacquiao in a real boxing match where you have to hang in or not, regardless of your size. No one would know who Pacquiao is. But everyone would know who Zhang was because he'd have beaten global superstars like Pacquiao. Wait-...I think I have a temporal logic problem here. Hold on. I'll come back to this thread in the future.

 

Excellent post I agree 100%.

 

Made up term

 

When someone gets into fighting (boxing, whatever) do they think:

I want to test myself against smaller guys!
Or
I want to test myself against bigger guys!
Or
I want to make as much money as easily as possible!

It's basically selling your honour. But, hey, they make way more money that way. So doubt they care

 

I'm not against "weight bullying" in principle but the sport needs to intervene in unsafe weight cuts for safety reasons. The fighters suffering brain injuries directly linked to being dehydrated. The option I most like is periodic weigh ins leading into the fight. Some orgs use this already to some extent

 

This is all up to the commissions to fix somehow. No bullying in my eyes, just younger prime fighters that are able to cut weight easier. Most move up in weight as they get older and richer anyhow.

 

It's the rehydration I have issues with. If you can make the weight for the weight in fine but you shouldn't then be jacking on lbs overnight.
Crawford V Beltran, Bud allegedly weighed 155lbs on fight night. Now that's a weight bully.
If your weight is more on fight night than the limit for weight classes above and in some cases several weights above then something is majorly wrong.
I still think the rehydration limit should be capped. We know the same day weigh-ins were scrapped for safety and fighters draining down too far and not having enough time to get water into their body - but it should be capped to a certain level for fight night.

 

Day of weigh in fights cures a lot of boxing problems..

 

I agree weight bullying is pretty bs considering you can have severe issues if you don’t make the cut right. Extra weight won’t make a difference.

Bringing guys up 2 classes with no chance of winning is pretty feminine imo. People deserve stick if they do that. If it’s a p4p fighter daring to be great then that’s different. I wouldn’t call them a ***** but if they won they still only get partial credit.