By Miguel Rivera
The president of the World Boxing Organization (WBO), Puerto Rico's Francisco "Paco" Valcarcel, described it as "negligence" for the World Boxing Council to insert a 'Diamond' world title in a match where neither fighter has any involvement with the World Boxing Council.
This past Saturday night in Montreal, Sergey Kovalev fought Jean Pascal with the WBC's Diamond title at stake. But Kovalev is not a WBC champion. He holds the world titles of the three rival organizations - the WBA, WBO and IBF. Pascal rejected the idea of paying a sanctioning fee for a Diamond title and he also took a pass on the WBC's offer to pay a fee for a final title eliminator position.
Despite all that, the WBC crowned Kovalev as their Diamond champion at 175-pounds - after his victory over Pascal. Kovalev, while being the world champion of the WBO, WBA and IBF - is now the mandatory challenger to the WBC champion Adonis Stevenson.
The WBO President takes offense to this move, because his organization does not have any other WBO titleholders at the weight - interim, silver or otherwise, but they do have contenders waiting to get a shot at Kovalev. He says world champions are being harmed when there are numerous belts created at the same weight class, because it confuses the public and harms the champion's recognition among the fans.
"It is unwise and product of a tiny mind, to make a public statement that the winner of this fight would be the mandatory opponent of Adonis Stevenson. Now I want to see movement on this, because its actions that speak louder than words. They are world champions and they must be respected as such," Valcorcel told ESPN Deportes. "I do not know what the plan will be. But the titles of tin and copper should not exist. We should have respect for the world champion. I do not know if this is some ploy to force Stevenson to fight Kovalev. Only they know."
