When boxing was most popular?

One of the posters here, I think maybe bert cooper?, always talks about and links to old articles from about every era talking about how boxing is a "dying sport". Mayweather is probably making as much or more money, even including inflation, as has ever been made before. Boxing has penetrated markets its never had before, such as eastern Europe, and much of Asia and Africa. A good argument can be made that its more popular now than ever. It seems to be in a resurgence in UK as well, which has more HW contenders now than it probably ever did before.

If your just looking at America, HW boxing isn't remotely as popular as it was before, but again, look at Mayweather.

 

The 80s and 90s boxing was booming.

 

In the US, probably turn of the century (19th into 20th), and then wartime/Louis era, and then Ali era, and then from the 80's into the early 90's (Tyson, Chavez, Pea, and the Four Kings) - with down periods in between, and dragging on from the mid 90's until now. The era of Lewis and ODLH was the last time boxing was semi-mainstream, and it was still much less so than it had been in the previous couple of decades.

There just happens to be an inverse correlation with the general American public's fascination with (or giving a damn about) the sport and the shifting trends in technology, lifestyle & media saturation.

Mayweather and other modern boxers are riding social media to heights previous athletes couldn't, but without the happy accident of that helping-hand they aren't more popular in any kind of homegrown, capturing the people's imagination kind of way. Quite a bit less so.

 

Well said. Some people seem to think advances in technology(mostly social media/internet) Means boxing is more popular. NO quite the opposite actually.... Everyone, and I mean everyone was turning on their radios listening to fights, reading about them in the paper etc. Boxing dominated American sporting interest more than ever in the 20th century, you couldn't turn on your radio, or read the paper without hearing about it.

 

The 70's was its most popular,particularly Ali who was a very colorful figure and the times in that era made it thanks to the Howard Cosell selling it like he did.Tyson made himself more popular and brought it back in the spotlight in the late 80's but everyone knew Tyson ,not who he was demolishing other than Holmes.Frazier/Foreman/ali all combined made the sport more popular than it actually is today with media attention and the sports willingness to promote them in the media..Mayweather is its poster boy now,where Ali was then and you also have to look outside the ropes there is no comparison between the two on who made a bigger impact.I thnk the rise of other sports also took some attention away with more media/t.v.internet access I think pro football/basketball/baseball became more popular,boxing is a sport centered around an individual..the 90's never really had that because Lewis wasn't a polarizing figure outside the ring,and today with foreighn champs no one really knows Klitchko because hes not marketed really here.On a global scale its in more countries now however and is at its largest fanbase but that doesn't make it more popular in a sense.I would lean toward 70's Hw's as the era here when all the boxers were known..and then mid 80's with the Hagler/Hearns and SRL's.This is not my reflection of the best era but at its most popular.

The rule of thumb has always been boxing is only as good as its Hw's.well it continues to grow so it cant be that bad.

 

70's-90's. It's dead compared to then.

 

1922 was a good year for boxing

 

Real good discussion on this. I think people are mostly agreeing that 1. in the technical sense, it is more popular in terms of penetration of countries, more people following it at least casually, and pay days for the very highest fighters and 2. that it is not followed as intensively or exclusively now, as it was in earlier era, particularly in the US.

I'd say by that standard, the Dempsey era, Louis era, Ali era and 80's Hagler Hearns Leonard Tyson era was probably the most popular, in terms of exclusivity and intenseness.

 

I believe it's the Jack Dempsey days and maybe including a decade earlier. There was a lot of newspaper coverage of boxing in those days and newspaper was what people follow. So it makes economic sense for newspapers to write on what they know to be the interest of the readers or population at that time.

 

Plus you have to figure in the first half of last century, some of the major team sports were still in their relative infancy and yet to establish the grip on the public (and in particular the youth market, which mothers never much liked exposing to prizefighting in ANY era, but which they were happy to expose to, say, football, even after decades of research indicating a higher risk of brain damage wearing a helmet in collisions than getting hit with boxing gloves...) that would come especially with the dawn and proliferation of television.

Boxing was briefly the main sport on TV, but was quickly supplanted by the more "prime time" friendly stuff...right around when baseball came into full swing as the national pastime, and basketball spiked in popularity as well, especially in urban areas which formerly had been a bastion of boxing, with lots of poor kids now preferring to watch the NBA or aspire to shooting hoops and making bank than caring about who the champ is or wanting to step in the ring and get their nose busted for peanuts.

 

If more fighters imitate Floyd Rigo and Ward boxing will be dead in just a matter of time. The reason boxing was super popular a long time ago is because of fighters that doesn't RUN. Fans want blood. Not dancing.

 

A true fan will appreciate both.

 

So explain Willie Pep or Pernell Whitaker being the draws they were? Tunney? Walcott?

 

When Jack Dempsey was the HW champion.