A recent proposal for judges to score fights from a remote location is not at all going over well with the boxing community. It also doesn’t figure to be part of ESPN’s plans for its upcoming televised events.
The suggestion has been made by the World Boxing Council (WBC), who introduced the plan to BoxingScene.com and other media outlets during a recent panel discussion regarding essential personnel on hand for boxing events. The current coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has made it impossible for mass gatherings of any kind to take place, with combat sports promoters figuring out ways to move forward in such an environment.
Top Rank founder and Hall of Fame promoter Bob Arum has been working tirelessly with his staff to have a portion of its vast stable return to the ring live on ESPN as early as June. Such shows will take place without fans in attendance, and with all fighters, team members, ring officials and commission members quarantined in a set location. Among those who figure to be on hand for each event will be assigned judges who can expect to take their post at ringside rather than behind a television monitor, at least if the broadcast team has its say.
“I’m not all about that,” Bernardo Osuna, veteran announcer and reporter for ESPN stated during the most recent installment of the State of Boxing series on ESPN+. “In order to judge a fight, you have to see it, you have to hear it and you have to feel it.
“Even as it is now, the judges see it from their different perspectives from where they are seated. Imagine how it is now, no matter how good a director is, there’s stuff that TV simply cannot convey.”
His sentiments were shared in unison by ESPN expert analysts and former two-division champions Andre Ward and Timothy Bradley.
“If there’s a limited number of people that have to be in the building, the judges have to be in that number,” insists Ward. “There’s no way that someone should be sitting in the comfort of their home trying to judge a boxing match where guys are putting their lives on the line. Even if there’s no crowd, these guys are still taking the same amount of risk. These guys gotta be in the building. They gotta hear the punches, they got to be able to look in their face, hear their breathing—everything that comes in a live event.
“What if their Wi-fi messes up and they miss half a round. You think they’re gonna say “I don’t know who to give it to?” No, they’re just gonna pick who they thought won the round. I get the way of thinking, I get we’re trying to get things back in motion. For me, this is non-negotiable.”
Added Bradley: “Personally, I don’t like it either. I think having no fans is already difficult as it is. As far as the judging goes, it actually can help the fights if judges are ringside with no fans. They won’t be influenced. Sometimes they think a punch lands because the fans go oooh and ahh but the punch don’t actually land. I don’t like the fact that they won’t be in the arena, that they will remotely watch it on television.”
The concern from the WBC stems from the ability to assign neutral judges to sanctioned fights, given current travel restrictions. Even if the policy sees the light of day, it wouldn’t universally apply as non-title fights will still come under the auspices of ring officials assigned by local commissions.
Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox