Why was it easier to make fights in the 60s, 70s. 80s, 90s, and 2000s compared to today?

More money in the game so more to lose I guess so we see protracted negotiations as promoters protect their investments. Also with less money fighters had to take more risks to earn the big paydays. With Haymon paying millions to fighters who aren't even household names why would a fighter risk losing what little fan base he has when he's making good money fighting less dangerous opponents.

Plus back in the day a loss wasn't such a big deal. In the US it seems losing your 0 has a bigger impact, maybe because the sport has fewer hardcore fans and it's casuals making up much of the numbers. Casuals fans who don't really love the sport will jump on the bandwagon and off the bandwagon of fighters if they lose their 0 unlike hardcore fans who are ride or die types and still pay to watch a fighter after a number of defeats. So fighters are protected more and so big fights get dragged out until one clearly declines enough for the other to risk it.

 

Floyd Mayweather

 

I'd say it has more to do with Haymon. Mayweather was the first example of Haymon's method of dragging out the really big fights. Then we saw it with Joshua/Wilder and now we are seeing it with Crawford/Spence.

When has a meaningful fight ever happened with a Haymon fighter quickly, it seems his business model is the drag it out until it no longer matters as one fighter is ruined to the point if it doesn't happen soon fans won't care anymore. I suspect we may eventually see Joshua/Wilder and Crawford/Spence but only after Haymon decides that one fighter is so faded that his fighter has a shot.

 

Who was the cashcow before Floyd? Oscar. He fought everyone. Didnt drag ot out years to fight tito, Chavez, Vargas, mosley etc.

Ever since Floyd its been about milking out fights, zero marketing, undefeated and marinating big fights for years.
Thats the blueprint legacy he left for boxing and its being implemented to this day.
Other promoters follow it.

Its just about enriching themselves, duck tough fights the fants want to see till it no longer matters and it hurts boxing since we rarely get the fights we want when we want it.
Thats why Floyd mayweather, while a great boxer, has been very bad for boxing.

Hopefully we get a change at some point. The sport needs it.

 

We need answers. It’s so easy for Fury to negotiate with Chisora but yet put hard deadlines on AJ. Crawford just made this fight quick with yet it’s been a year trying to make the Spence fight. Spence easily made the Ugas fight yet bs going on with Crawford. Canelo had no problems negotiating with other fighters but what have David Benavidez done to deserve the fight. Anytime the opponent may present a tough challenge negotiations magically become so difficult.

 

Answer is that they dont want it but want to appear tough like they do want it.
Its basically a scam at this point.

 

"Why was it easier to make fights in the 60s, 70s. 80s, 90s, and 2000s compared to today?" - because the guys were more fearless and wanted to fight. Now they rely more on advertisement and an easier and safer path to glory=money.

 

There's many reasons. The main reason is money. There's a big difference in a top boxer making enough money to live a half decent lifestyle compared to a top boxer of today who can literally retire financially after one big fight. Now this extra money doesn't just end up with the fighter, it goes to the pocktets of fight promoters, managers, TV channels, they all want a piece of the pie and therfore it's hard to make matchups when they all want to make as much money as possible. Boxing fans are also to blame. The mentality of boxing fans has dramatically changed. In the past the best fought the best, and if they lost, then they still fought, but now the boxer is more scared to lose because boxing fans now have more of a tendency to drop that fighter from their fan list, which drops their financial position huge. There's a reason why the money drops, and that's because of the fans. Everything evolves around the fanbase, so all in all we're too blame.

 

Yeah but this works on many levels, i still see posts just like yesterday where it saw the Injured old out of prime Pacquiao missing shots against Floyd in one particular round as the highlight with 99% of comment's of so called boxing fans raving on about how bad Floyd beat him & how he is the best, etc without any of the context in the actual fight just be viewing a 15 second clip,

That is the reality, be cowardly, accuse others of what your actually doing & then reap the rewards, it just pays better to be the Ducker in today's time unfortunately, the blame also should be placed on all the low IQ boxing public out there.

 

Nice, good call back examples .

 

Agreed with a lot of this. I have a feeling there's going to be a correction with some of these larger purses for essentially mismatches. The only real players left are ESPN (who barely acknowledge boxing), Showtime (possibly on the way out with that merger?), DAZN (hard correction coming from them as well as those early contracts were ridiculous), and the middle east (for how long? Who knows).

 

Boxing has a crap financial model.

It benefits the few and hurts the majority.

People claiming to be PPV stars without ever being a real champ.

UFC is miles ahead at this point.