Which division is greater? Middleweight or Heavyweight?

Hi Buddy.
Spoken like a true gentleman, I don't know what is the issue here, but the fact you have apologised, is good enough for me, and should be good enough for @GlaukosTheHammer whos tone is very unpleasant, to say the least.
stay safe RGS, chat soon .
Mike.

 

Boxing is still the king of “combat sports” it makes you REAL money but it most certainly isn’t the most popular in the States anymore is it? I’d say none really are overly “popular” like the UFC isn’t quite popular the way people say or “killing boxing”… I think they’re all in decline, if they’d followed the old model we wouldn’t have these problems and the vast majority of people would know who the HW champ is.

 

Ray Robinson was running the show back in his time wasn’t he? Nino the Italian I believe carried boxing in the absence of Ali I read? I’m not sure how true that is… I’d say in Robinsons time he was more popular than Louis.

 

HW.

HW encompasses the most space on the weight chart and at a time anyone could fight at HW it wasn't a weight class. When comparing HW and MW particular when gloved boxing started any MW could fight at HW, and MW was more like a 2nd division for HWs then a division for smaller people like WW or LW. This changed but I think there was ever a point where MW was considered "greater" then HW.

Its probably the 2nd most prestigious division because its been prestigious for the longest period of time other than HW. Back when LHW was starting fighters over the MW limit were claiming the MW title instead of LHW because that was the prestigious honor for non HWs. But with greatness the fighters aren't small enough to be the most skilled fighters in the world P4P and (more recently) aren't big enough to beat HWs like LHWs and CWs are. It was a neutral ground for small LHWs and big WWs to fight for coveted titles but tweener divisions kinda ruined that. Thanks to tweener divisions it takes up a mere 6 pounds on the weight ladder.

So it'd be number 2 historically but it was kinda ruined by tweeners. I think now the 2nd most important "original 8" weight class is WW. During the period everyone was complaining about the "Klitschkos killing HW", MW wasn't the division taking the attention normally reserved for HW it was WW and it seems every time people are bored with HW thats what they follow WW. In my lifetime under the tweener system it seems like thats what always got the most excitement.

In theory the tweener system should hurt WW and MW the same it should actually hurt WW more because 140 and 154 have had more big fighters then 168 but for whatever reason doesn't feel like that. It feels like all the stars who end at MW are there for a New York minute but the ones in WW stay there for extensive campaign.

 

I take full responsibility for this, you and Mike are correct, it's me being the jerk and uncalled for. I have no good reasoning, you should have always benefited from our lack of history; doubt. I assumed and made an ass out of myself. There is no shame for you here sir, only me. I do appreciate the notion of the apology but I say I was the jerk and you are innocent.


Okay, fully apologized up, I hope we can square one this.


Today we call the history of boxing heavyweight. That's not to say Middleweight does not cover some boxing history or have it's own portion just that I can cover all of boxing rules, authorities, equipment, technique, etc. and stay firmly in HW history. Never once relying on MW or any other weight class. Despite, often, advancements coming from smaller men.

For example, the counter is attributed to Mendoza, the uppercut is said to have come from Dutch Sam, and the cross is said to have been added to the game by Jack Randal. All at the tail end of the 18th century. Not to say no man before them ever but rather these are the men who studied and perfected the one technique to perfection and so we all use their version or some evolution of what they left us.

It is the same story when dealing with money. Heck, I can name the same man. The reason you pay for a seat at sporting events is because Daniel The Jew Mendoza, former HW champion of England who was never the current HW champion of England,

Gloves is hella famous, follows John L right? As in no one gives a **** was Nonpariel thinks of BK or gloved fighting.

So, you have one division from which boxing comes from. Everything else, like a MW, was once part of that division and that once just simply was not long enough ago for me to write it off. It may be 2k years before you get to Demokrates but you actually need to get through McCoy to do it and well ... good ****in luck bro, that dude invented the corkscrew.


Probability favors the numbers, but more than anything it's the fact the weight division era begins in the 1890s and doesn't really get formalized until the 1930s.






I'll leave on this, it is my opinion modern HWs have no more claim to historical open weight boxing than modern MWs or any other weight division invented in the 1890s but since the consensus is to label all champions of boxing as HW champions I am aligning HWs with men who were in fact by any metric of today not a HW. Daniel The Jew was about 150-160. Daniel was not called HW until the 1900s. By the later 1700s Danny had achieved "Former Champion of England". What I am saying is this 150s fighter was recognized in his lifetime as a champion of england and since he was a champion of England before weight divisions historians have decided that makes him a HW.


So, really, by HW I do just mean the history leading up to the divisions + real HW history.


... ... ... PPV was invented for a HW title fight. Just sayin

 

Middle/ welterweight is more watchable and relatable to the average man.

my friend once said yeah but the best heavyweight can beat everybody so the best heavyweight is better than anything else
I Find it hard to argue with that

 

MW for me.

 

Obviously Middleweight. Lower weight classes are inflated with talent due to A. The global average height for men being about 5'8 and B, most sports being open weight, meaning smaller athletes have no chance of being recruited for most sports. The opposite is true for heavyweight, with less than 0.1% of the male population being 6'3 or taller and with people that tall and athletic being able to be recruited for any sport they want pretty much.

That's why the incredible vast majority of the longest title reigns in history are at heavyweight. It's usually just one all time great fighter dominating relatively weak competition.

It's also why it makes no sense imo to have literally any heavyweight (yes, including Ali and Louis) in the top 10. Why are they getting rewarded for beating worse competition than their smaller peers? Liston, Norton, Foreman and Frazier + contenders vs Duran, Benitez, Hearns and Hagler + contenders = Ali is ranked higher all time? Wtf? The former group is so much worse pfp and so much worse at actually boxing than the latter group that it really makes no sense to weight it equally.

It'd be like if two footballers have similar stats and a similar w/l ratio, but one plays in the League One and one plays in The Premier League. Similarly I don't see how on earth Joe Louis can be rated higher than someone like Mayweather.

 

Obviously heavyweight. It transcends the concept of a 'weight class'. Weight classes exist to provide championship opportunities to men who can't claim championships at heavyweight, which is simply derived from the original open weight boxing.

If boxing was to be reformed and only ONE weight class was to exist, what would that be? It would be heavyweight. Open to all.

 

Imagine height-classes for basketball. That's about as reasonable as weight-classes for combat sports, the only difference is a small basketball player against a big one will just be bad. A small fighter against a big one is in a life-threatening situation.

 

Why aren't the welterweights beating up the heavyweights then? If they are better, more talented at the sport?
Also, why aren't people calling for basketball to have a 6'1 maximum height limit, football (American) to have 160 pound weight limit, tennis players (male) to be no taller than 5'9 ?
Y'know, to see real "talent" in those sports.

 

Did you even read past my first sentence? Smaller boxers being inferior at most sports than their heavyweight counterpart was actually part of my point... You're misunderstanding me and then making silly assumptions.

Heavyweights are the best at fighting, they're not the best at boxing.

A fight is just a confrontation where you have to hurt another person, whereas a martial art is a tool that's used to multiply the amount of incapacitating force a human being can produce / negate from another person. The better you are at using that tool to multiply, the better of a martial artist you are. The worse you are at using your tools, the worse of a martial artist you are.

Or think about it like this. Prime Roberto Duran is a 5'6 140bs man. Deontay Wilder is a 6'7 230lbs man. The difference between Duram not learning how to box and him learning how to box is the difference between him being bullied by 90% of the population and him bullying 90%. He's so good at his martial art that he has exponentially multiplied the amount of incapacitating force he was able to produce / negate naturally. The difference between Wilder learning how to box and not how to box however is pretty much non-existent. He's so **** at the martial art that he's barely multiplied his incapacitation abilities from what he started with, unlike heavyweights that are actually good at boxing like Ali, Joe Louis, Tyson etc. A gorilla would literally beat Ali to death in a boxing match but it doesn't make it a better boxer lol, just a better fighter.

Field sports are a different dynamic because unlike martial arts they weren't invented to improve anything, they exist in a vacuum.

 

If WWs could beat HWs or not is a moot point under the structure of the sport they aren't going to fight HWs.

Smaller guys can beat HWs but not consistantly. This makes it impractical for ones career. Fighters box in a division where they can ideally win as often as possible and become champion. They are trying to succeed at their career not do a science experiment.

If a Terence Crawford can dominate Dave Allen there is no reason for such an encounter to take place the way the sport is set up. Champs in the lower weight classes want to defend their belt. Contenders want to earn a title shot by fighting guys in their division. Why would they fight lower ranked HWs?

The purpose of weight classes is to make it so no ones prevented from being a champion because they are too small. If everyone fought at HW smaller guys would win fights but they wouldn't be champ. They wouldn't be ranked high they wouldn't make money and there would be no point for them to go into the sport.